The Down Range Forum
Member Section => Down Range Cafe => Topic started by: alfsauve on December 07, 2023, 05:08:52 PM
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Quite literally a US Military helicopter is circling my house. Out of Dobbins AFB. Oops I'm so bad,<sigh>, Joint Base Dobbins.
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Don't worry, I'll bake you a cake. What is your favorited flavor frosting - 24 tpi or 20 tpi?
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Any bastard will do.
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Any bastard will do.
Oh gosh. You guys are bad. Alf, what kind of subversive anti-communist, anti-socialist, anti-Brandon speech have you been engaged in?
US Airforce Eurocopter UH-72A Lakota. Another source says US Army for Homeland units. I see where the chopper has been down around and across the border out of Laredo, TX
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I SURVIVED THE NIGHT.
Shortly after I posted the copter went back to Dobbins. If I had to guess some brass, or maybe just a pilot type, was doing flybys of their house, or perspective house.
HOWEVER, shortly after that a SIKORSKY UH-60 Black Hawk took off from Dobbins and practice touch and goes for an hour. ???? Really? Is that a thing? Touch and Goes for a helicopter?
What's really fascinating to watch are when the USNavy Drones are on-station at 55,000' over the eastern Med. I wonder a) Why they turn on the ADS transponder at all, except as a warning to the bad guys who undoubtly are monitoring ADS-B, b) How many are out there without their transponder on?
FYI, most all the fighters & bombers are tagged by USAF as T-38s so you don't know what they really are. (Cargo and refueling planes have their real model numbers, usually.) However by watching their flight patterns you can sometimes discern what they are. A guy noticed a "T-38" light up on his nearby Air Base and he monitor the tower saying, "xxxx, hold for runway sweep" (That's involves 1 or 2 vehicles going down the runway and pick up any debris less it be sucked into the engines.) About the only plane still flying these days requiring a runway sweep is a B1-B. He quickly grabbed a camera and went to his favorite plane watching site. Sure enough about 20 minutes later he got a picture of a B1-B on takeoff.
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I SURVIVED THE NIGHT.
FYI, most all the fighters & bombers are tagged by USAF as T-38s so you don't know what they really are. (Cargo and refueling planes have their real model numbers, usually.) However by watching their flight patterns you can sometimes discern what they are. A guy noticed a "T-38" light up on his nearby Air Base and he monitor the tower saying, "xxxx, hold for runway sweep" (That's involves 1 or 2 vehicles going down the runway and pick up any debris less it be sucked into the engines.) About the only plane still flying these days requiring a runway sweep is a B1-B. He quickly grabbed a camera and went to his favorite plane watching site. Sure enough about 20 minutes later he got a picture of a B1-B on takeoff.
Thanks. I have always wondered why I was seeing so many T-38's. Now I know.
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HOWEVER, shortly after that a SIKORSKY UH-60 Black Hawk took off from Dobbins and practice touch and goes for an hour. ???? Really? Is that a thing? Touch and Goes for a helicopter?
It is.
I have a good friend who....'did some things'....and one of those things was bailing out of a helicopter that was touched down for a count less than ten....when conditions did not permit low/high altitude parachuting or rappelling from a hovering chopper.
I like to watch the activity around Dothan and south Alabama at Ft Rucker. Rotor wing school offers a lot of helicopter business on the map.
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HOWEVER, shortly after that a SIKORSKY UH-60 Black Hawk took off from Dobbins and practice touch and goes for an hour. ???? Really? Is that a thing? Touch and Goes for a helicopter? Yes, it's a thing, we see it here at Hunter AAF with Chinooks
What's really fascinating to watch are when the USNavy Drones are on-station at 55,000' over the eastern Med. I wonder a) Why they turn on the ADS transponder at all, except as a warning to the bad guys who undoubtly are monitoring ADS-B, b) How many are out there without their transponder on? At 55k feet, the only other thing that high, besides Willie Nelson, are other .mil drones.
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the only other thing that high, besides Willie Nelson
That right there is an example of humor in real life :o
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Quite literally a US Military helicopter is circling my house. Out of Dobbins AFB. Oops I'm so bad,<sigh>, Joint Base Dobbins.
The army version of those is called the UH-72 Lakota and some are armed.
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I SURVIVED THE NIGHT.
Shortly after I posted the copter went back to Dobbins. If I had to guess some brass, or maybe just a pilot type, was doing flybys of their house, or perspective house.
HOWEVER, shortly after that a SIKORSKY UH-60 Black Hawk took off from Dobbins and practice touch and goes for an hour. ???? Really? Is that a thing? Touch and Goes for a helicopter?
What's really fascinating to watch are when the USNavy Drones are on-station at 55,000' over the eastern Med. I wonder a) Why they turn on the ADS transponder at all, except as a warning to the bad guys who undoubtly are monitoring ADS-B, b) How many are out there without their transponder on?
FYI, most all the fighters & bombers are tagged by USAF as T-38s so you don't know what they really are. (Cargo and refueling planes have their real model numbers, usually.) However by watching their flight patterns you can sometimes discern what they are. A guy noticed a "T-38" light up on his nearby Air Base and he monitor the tower saying, "xxxx, hold for runway sweep" (That's involves 1 or 2 vehicles going down the runway and pick up any debris less it be sucked into the engines.) About the only plane still flying these days requiring a runway sweep is a B1-B. He quickly grabbed a camera and went to his favorite plane watching site. Sure enough about 20 minutes later he got a picture of a B1-B on takeoff.
Yep. As others have stated. That's a thing. When I was stationed in Germany there were Hueys and Cobras doing touch and go landings down the block from me at the current Illesheim Army Heliport. I walked past the airstrip every day to get to the mess hall. I still remember the tanker trucks painted with the warning, no smoking within 16 meters, 50 feet. The copters would fly in just like fixed-wing craft, let the skids hit the runway rocking them forward, and take off again. It reminds me of videos of planes missing the arrestor cable on aircraft carriers. I think they did that several times before they practiced landing by autorotation to simulate an engine failure. The army had to be prepared for anything. They got a bunch of AH-64 Apaches there in 2019. No Cobras in the army since 2001, but the marines still use the AH-1Z Viper, based on the AH-1W SuperCobra, a twin-engined version of the single-engined AH-1 Cobra the army had since the '60s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illesheim_Army_Heliport
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33-Dz4eV-RU
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I checked with the Elf’s Area Director and Santa’s sleigh does has an ADS-B beacon. So come Christmas Eve we can track the jolly man directly.
As ADS becomes more tried and tested NORAD’s mission may focus on looking for a/c without ADS and to watch for a/c whose ADS GPS doesn’t match their observational data.
A/C and commercial ships are now tracked. Golf Carts on some courses. Some truck lines are as well. How long before ADS or AIS systems will be mandatory on all vehicles? Cars? yachts? Bass boats? ATVs?
I was a classmate of Bob Bruninga who invented APRS, Auto Position Reporting, oh what have you wrought Bob?
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Speaking of tracking, I saw this from Strike Industries last week, Strike AirTag Holder (Picatinny) -- $11.95.
The Strike AirTag Holder keeps your Apple AirTag safely inside and securely. Using the AirTag, track the location of your weapon if lost, even if it’s just buried in the back of your safe. While traveling with your weapon or on your next hunt, use this AirTag holder to know where you stuff is at. Fully enclosed in the Strike Holder and securely locked in with the SI unique anti-theft set screw. Included is the security tool required for installation and removal of the set screw. This holder mounts directly to just about every 1913 Picatinny rail as long as there is enough space. Made from high-strength and lightweight polymer, The Strike AirTag Holder helps you keep track of your precious stuff.
I thought about getting one and sticking a AirTag somewhere within the body and frame of my ATV. It's been awhile since I've had one stolen, but had a total or 4 Polaris ATVs stolen from my driveway. Only one was recovered, on the east side of town and I live on the west, and it was stolen again. Now I have a Sportsman 570 with power steering and it's better than any ATV I had before. They were all stolen after a bunch of black people from the north end of Flint started going to the church by my house. Since nothing has been stolen lately, one of my friends asked me just the other day if the church across the street was still open. Well, I don't know where they all went, but I assume they found somewhere to go in the north end. I was tempted to say where they belong, but that would sound racist. I have black neighbors, but they come over here and steal everything like the evil churchgoers.
https://www.strikeindustries.com/si-iholder.html
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<snip>... It's been awhile since I've had one stolen, but had a total or 4 Polaris ATVs stolen from my driveway. <snip>
Somebody did you a favor...
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I didn't get do too much plane spotting over Christmas but I did catch this humorous call sign today.
It's a C5 with the call sign UHAUL.
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A sense of humor....I bet it won't go unpunished very long.
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A sense of humor....I bet it won't go unpunished very long.
I was part of the Category II test team for the C5A at Edwards AFB back in the day. We all called the C5, when it was new, Fat Albert. Cosby had just introduced the character on his Kids TV show at the time (1969). Some one even had a cassette tape of the TV shows music, which would occasionally out over the office or hanger PA system <looking up and whistling>. While we couldn't get FA stickers we did get some Arkansas Razorback ones and we put a big one on our two test planes as nose art. They lasted all of about 5 days when the top brass brought some VIPs out to the ramp for a tour of the plane. The Crew Chiefs got their behinds busted. A while after that airmen started using the term FRED for the C5. I mean who could object to Fred?
F'king Ridiculous Economic Diaster.
The name has stuck and is still in use.
Side Note: It wasn't too long after the we got chewed out for the razorback and for using the moniker Fat Albert that the Navy Blue Angles started using a C-130 for their support aircraft. Wanna guess what they call it? I still hold a grudge against the Blue Angles for stealing the name.
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I remember there were many issues with the Galaxy. Some quite critical. Is it still in the inventory?
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There are about 50 C5M models flying see screen shot from ADS-B tracking.
The main problem is USAF/DOD/Congress wanted EVERYTHING NEW. Well that takes a while to design and assemble so by the time the first a/c rolled out it was already out dated. The other problem is with so many untried, untested NEW systems the problem multiply exponentially.
One good example on was the Inertial Nav system on the early models. All brand new design. Somewhere north of $100k. Only one gyro. Very fragile. Placed in the nose cone (why nobody knows). Very heavy, ~100 pounds, with all the black boxes. AND voluminous. I think somewhere around 18cuft all told. At the same time Boing was shipping there 747 with 3 (THREE) Honeywell, off the shelf INS systems. Three system that I think ran a total of 20#ea, cost $10kea and only occupied about 4 rack units in a STANDARD 19" rack.
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Sounds like they gave that one to a new college grad engineer.
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There are about 50 C5M models flying see screen shot from ADS-B tracking.
The main problem is USAF/DOD/Congress wanted EVERYTHING NEW. Well that takes a while to design and assemble so by the time the first a/c rolled out it was already out dated. The other problem is with so many untried, untested NEW systems the problem multiply exponentially.
One good example on was the Inertial Nav system on the early models. All brand new design. Somewhere north of $100k. Only one gyro. Very fragile. Placed in the nose cone (why nobody knows). Very heavy, ~100 pounds, with all the black boxes. AND voluminous. I think somewhere around 18cuft all told. At the same time Boing was shipping there 747 with 3 (THREE) Honeywell, off the shelf INS systems. Three system that I think ran a total of 20#ea, cost $10kea and only occupied about 4 rack units in a STANDARD 19" rack.
Somewhat reminds me of the old joke about NASA's high dollar space pens vs Russian pencils.
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<snip>... It's been awhile since I've had one stolen, but had a total or 4 Polaris ATVs stolen from my driveway. <snip>
Somebody did you a favor...
By stealing the world's best selling ATVs from me? I don't think so! And before you say it, they
weren't the world's best selling just because they kept getting stolen and had to be replaced.
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Somewhat reminds me of the old joke about NASA's high dollar space pens vs Russian pencils.
There are a ridiculous number of people who think that old joke is true. Social media users are re-sharing old posts saying NASA spent a decade and millions (if not billions) of dollars of tax-payers' money developing pens for its astronauts, while Russia made do with pencils. But the Russians weren't dumb enough to have pencil shavings floating around from sharpening them, wreaking havoc wherever they went. So they developed a trillion dollar pencil sharpener with a vacuum attachment and multi-stage HEPA filtration system. ;D No, not really. The Fisher Pen Company funded the Space Pen's development, not by NASA, and it was used by both American astronauts and Russian cosmonauts.
It reminds me of a meeting we had at work where someone from upper management was addressing us mere peons. According to someone working for GM who was well enough educated to be be an assistant plant manager (<-- well, there's your problem, right there ;)), the Chevy Nova had terrible sales in Mexico because no va means it doesn't run (literally not going) in Spanish. Most people in their right mind, no matter what language they spoke would probably look at the single word nova and think it means new, like a new star, if they attached any meaning to it.
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A couple more F***ing aircraft nicknames you may or may not know. ;)
B-52 bomber, BUFF, Big Ugly Fat F***er. I've known that one for a very long time, but not the next one.
A-7 attack plane, SLUF, Short Little Ugly F***er. It was based on the F-8 fighter, shortened by nearly 10 feet, restricted to subsonic speeds, and simpler and cheaper to make.
As far as I know, the only U.S. military helicopter* that wasn't named after a Native American tribe was the Cobra, and I still have no idea why. AFAIK, it didn't have a nickname like those planes did, but in Vietnam the pilots were called Snake Drivers. How cool is that? Not all pilots get their own group nickname like that. I always liked the sound of that, but I don't think I would have made a good Cobra pilot. The cockpit looks like it's barely wider than my shoulders. Even if I fit in it I'd get claustrophobic in no time. I'd be the guy you see with the window rolled down and his arm stretched out on the windowsill. ;D
* Not counting variants, like Pave Hawks based on Black Hawks, etc., where the original model DID have a First Nations' name.
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The SR-71 has been known as Habu. The Habu is an extremely venomous snake native to Okinawa, Kadena AFB there being a major SR-71 base during the '70s. Those associated with the SR-71 (and it's variants) are called Haburats. I was not one. I was however a MAC Trained Killer.
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The SR-71 has been known as Habu. The Habu is an extremely venomous snake native to Okinawa, Kadena AFB there being a major SR-71 base during the '70s. Those associated with the SR-71 (and it's variants) are called Haburats. I was not one. I was however a MAC Trained Killer.
My neighbor's dad was one. I knew the man very well (his family and mine were "generational neighbors" and still are.....he passed away last year) and I was in my late 40's before he ever let on that he worked on the development phases of the SR-71.
He had had knee replacement surgery and we were visiting him one day and he got to talking about all the things that went on an how secretive they had to be back then. He talked for a long time saying they had declassified a lot of it years ago and he could talk now, but since he had never told anyone about it before nobody knew to ask.
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It reminds me of a meeting we had at work where someone from upper management was addressing us mere peons. According to someone working for GM who was well enough educated to be be an assistant plant manager (<-- well, there's your problem, right there ;)), the Chevy Nova had terrible sales in Mexico because no va means it doesn't run (literally not going) in Spanish. Most people in their right mind, no matter what language they spoke would probably look at the single word nova and think it means new, like a new star, if they attached any meaning to it.
I used to work in an ad agency, the biggest independent HQ'd in Chicago. One of the stories I heard was of AMC coming up with a mighty and awe-inspiring name for their sports car, the Matador! Then they went and test marketed it and everyone loved the name - except in the Puerto Rico test market the car dropped like a lead turd. Turns out, in idiomatic Spanish, matador is an assassin.
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But it turns out the exec's at AMC didn't care. They named it Matador anyway. Should have saved their money and not done the focus groups.
Which reminds me. I took a class (believe it or not a whole college class) on corporate relocation. Our team was given a supposedly real life example as a project. We spent hours researching the proposed cities. Labor, economy, transportation, natural resources, taxed, etc. Gave our presentation, made our recommendation, got an "A". I then asked that if this was from a real life scenario what did this company actually decide to do. Prof said the relocated to Vale, CO. VALE? That wasn't even close to the cities they had recommended. WHY? It met none of the requirements, had none of the resources. Answer? Because the CEO liked to ski.
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Answer? Because the CEO liked to ski.
Don't you love it when, in life, people ask you for your advice, you spend time to help them, and they turn around and ignore your information? This has happened TOO many times in my life.
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Interesting on the SR-71 was that the fuel guys had to put fuel in , take fuel out and then put some back in again...with the people watching never knowing how much fuel it took on as to gauge just how far it was going to go. A friend of mine was in defense fuels and relayed the story...he said every time a Blackbird took off there seemed to be a food truck parked on public property under the takeoff path.
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Didn’t matter. One of the first things they did once getting airborne was an in-air refueling.
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Miss Kitty asked me why I watch ADS-B aircraft tracking so much. Here's an example of today. I noticed two news chopper circiling right off the end of Dobbins AFB runway. Turn on the scanner and start checking the online news sites. Shooting at US41 and Windy Hill (3miles away) and suspect is on the loose.
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Didn’t matter. One of the first things they did once getting airborne was an in-air refueling.
Because they leaked like a sieve until they got cruising and everything heated up and expanded. That's why they used JP-7, a less flammable fuel than any other jet in the world used. It was called Turbine Fuel Low Volatility JP-7, and was developed in 1955. It poured all over the ground under the jet, and they didn't want anything too flammable lying there when the engines fired up. JP-7 is a compound mixture composed primarily of hydrocarbons; including alkanes, cycloalkanes, alkylbenzenes, indanes/tetralins, and naphthalenes; with addition of fluorocarbons to increase its lubricant properties, an oxidizing agent to make it burn more efficiently, and a caesium-containing compound known as A-50, which is to aid in disguising the radar and infrared signatures of the exhaust plume. The SR-71 Blackbirds used approximately 36,000–44,000 pounds (16,000–20,000 kg) of fuel per hour of flight. Compare that to JP-8 which is still used in most military aircraft AFAIK, and is a kerosene-based fuel similar to commercial aviation's Jet A-1, but with corrosion inhibitor and anti-icing additives.
The Lockheed A-12 was also called Habu, before the SR-71 was developed, but I didn't Habu was a type of snake. It sounds a bit like SNAFU and could have been an acronym for all I knew. The Habu nickname was left over, so the SR-71 was called both Blackbird and Habu. The A-12 was the fastest aircraft in the world, even faster than the SR-71 because it was almost 6 feet shorter, with half the crew, and lighter, but had the same engines and wingspan. But most sources say the max. speed of both of them was Mach 3.3. Wikipedia lists these weights but not the A-12s empty weight. A-12 Max takeoff weight: 117,000 lbs, Max landing weight: 52,000 lbs. SR-71 Empty weight: 67,500 lbs, Gross weight: 152,000 lbs, Max takeoff weight: 172,000 lbs. They also say the Lockheed YF-12s top speed was Mach 3.35, but the SR-71 was supposed to be faster. It had an Empty weight of 60,730 lbs and Gross weight of 124,000 lbs. The A-12 should be faster than the SR-71, at least when they're both at their maximum take-off weight, since it's 55,000 pounds lighter.