.

[eyebiter]

.

[endfire79]

Nice find Eyebiter!  Will be sharing this with the guys at work.

[Jarhead0331]

Why don't you just ask Toonces?

[Staggerwing]

Why don't you just ask Toonces?

I was just going to say...

[GDS_Starfury]

he'll just talk about his watch.   

[bayonetbrant]

or start showing surfing videos...





... featuring his watch
;)

[GDS_Starfury]

I wonder if he has a surf board thats also a watch?

[Toonces]

That was an interesting article.  That part where he talks about the fleet going from 24 squadrons to 12?  I remember when our community detailer came out to brief us on that out in Keflavik.  That was the exact moment when I decided to make a career change and get out of flying, which was a real bummer.

The scariest flight I can remember was this one time about 1000 miles from land in the middle of the Pacific.  We got what is called a fire of unknown origin.  Basically, the plane started filling up with smoke.  When that happens, the crew starts looking through all the closets where the electrical components are located, seeking the source of the smoke.  Part of our qual process is to know every single component in the plane just by what rack it is in, so that if you find something burning you know what it is so you can pull the circuit breaker.

Anyway, after one go-through they couldn't find it and had to go on portable oxygen.  Those things only have about 10 minutes of oxygen; after that you have to depressurize the plane and open up the vents to clear the smoke if you can.  Another go-through and they still can't find it.  At this point in the cockpit we start shutting down electrical buses one at a time.  The idea is that hopefully you secure a bus, the fire goes out, and you can start turning things on one by one until you figure out what it was, then pull the breaker for that.  So we shut off Bus A....still smoke.  Main Bus B....still smoke...and so on until we were down to the last bus before we completely shut off all electricity to the plane.  The plane will fly with no electricity, but you have no radios, no hydraulics, no a/c, no nothing. 

We got to the last bus and the fire finally went out.  Let me tell you, we were shutting down those buses and I got the sickest feeling in my stomach you can imagine.  Because after that last bus, if the fire doesn't go out, you have to ditch the plane.  And I thought for sure we were going to have to ditch in the middle of the ocean.  I was like, "I can't believe this...we're going to have to put it in the water....I can't believe this..."

So it turns out the fire was in one of the a/c fans external to the plane, and since it was in the a/c system it was putting smoke into the plane until we secured the bus with that fan on it.  After that it was a simple matter to pull the breaker, turn everything back on, and RTB.  Still, man that sucked really bad.

I also had to shut an engine down (ironically on my first flight as plane commander) but the P-3 flies fine on 3 engines and so it wasn't a big deal until we tried to get down through the weather into Whidbey Island and the engine started icing up because all the anti-ice stuff is tied to the engine's bleed valves.  That kind of sucked too.

[Toonces]

Man, the more I think about it, I could spend all day telling stories about pieces falling off these planes or things breaking on them.  Like the time we took off out of U-Tapao Thailand right into a thunderstorm, got struck by lightning, and one of our HF antennas blew off the tail and draped itself over the wing next to the prop.  We actually got one of the guys in back into a parachute and opened up the overwing exit to see if he could reach out and pull the antenna into the plane, but he couldn't reach it.  That was a fun one, too.

[GDS_Starfury]

but even when you looked down to see how much time was left before you might die you smiled at the sight of your watch.   :P

[Toonces]

^ well, that is true.    8)

[GDS_Starfury]

pilots  ::)

hard to believe but, I had a client once that used to be a F-15E pilot and he was a pretty humble guy.

[Toonces]

Heh.  I've heard jet guys called many things, but never humble.

[GDS_Starfury]

I was pretty shocked.  In his home office he only had 1 photo on the wall and his helmet on a shelf.
and he was in the shit during GW1 and I have outside confirmation.

[LongBlade]

but even when you looked down to see how much time was left before you might die you smiled at the sight of your watch.   :P

Ha!

Nice pucker stories, Toonces. Glad they all had happy endings.