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On my 3rd cruise, in VF-114 on the USS Enterprise CVN-65.
You can see the ship turning into the wind to launch.




Not me, just a cool (and WAY better quality) video of operations. The "Jolly Rogers".
2x2x2 (AIM-54, AIM-7 and AIM-9) loadout.
What a great fighter!




Not my footage, but after a cruise in the RF-8 and 2 cruises in the F-14A, the Navy forced me to fly adversary in the F-16N. Poor me!

Cool vids!
As a kid I used to dream of being a fighter pilot, and F-14 was my "favorite" plane, although they did not fly in the country I grew up in.

CwmRaider wrote: ↑

Tue Feb 06, 2024 2:31 am

Cool vids!
As a kid I used to dream of being a fighter pilot, and F-14 was my "favorite" plane, although they did not fly in the country I grew up in.

It was a great airplane, for sure.
When I went to VF-126 they were transitioning from the F-5 to the F-16. We went up to get photos of the airplanes we were flying, and I had a guy in my back seat with one of those old VHS cameras. Not great quality, unfortunately.

We could usually run the fighters out of gas, and then we'd go 1v1 against each other, guns only, to get our fill of close in dogfighting. After a few months of that and we got pretty good!

And someone put together some great footage of the Swiss Air Force flying:



The Rafale is very cool!



Edit, March 1: Growler Jams has great videos as well.

Just taking a run down memory lane.


I posted to this video as kayakutah :I flew the N in VF-126. What a great airplane! We would fight as adversaries and then go 1v1 guns only "in house". I wonder how we managed to crack those wing spars? It was great having a radar. In the A-4, we'd tune in the fighter tactical frequency and switch to ADF and follow the #1 needle to the merge. Surprisingly effective! Everyone rightfully mentions the reclined seat for increased G tolerance, but that only reduced the height of the blood column by a few inches. To me, the design of having the feet almost at hip height was a bigger factor as it effectively reduced the column by a foot or two. With HOTAS, and the reclined seat and elevated feet, it had the perfect seating geometry. It was like sitting in a lawn chair with two cans of beer and a gatling gun (even though this model didn't have one) - stay off of my lawn!



Also, in burner, it took about 800 feet to hit rotation speed and from there, you could gently rotate into an Immelmann without pausing the rotation to gain speed. In fact I did that with a wingman on a hot day in El Centro quite comfortably ( I was "asked" not to do that again, for some reason). On my last flight, I want to check out it's service ceiling of 50,000 feet. At 45,000 feet, not in burner and holding M.9, the VSI was pegged at 6000 FPM. Then I went into burner and chickened out at 62,000 feet! In my defense, I did have a wife and children at home! One of my buddies claimed he made it to 75,000 feet. It seemed both crazy and plausible.

This thing was a one-eyed rocket ship to the seventh planet!

wonderful life experience you've had in the NAVY, I hope your thankful. your one lucky sum-bitch!
my flight career has only gone as far as a 152 and 172 cessna and an old cold war Blanik glider... good times , and I loved it. But for some reason I find sailing in boats much more enjoyable. slower is better

Montana St Alum wrote: ↑

Tue Nov 26, 2024 12:39 pm

On my last flight, I want to check out it's service ceiling of 50,000 feet. At 45,000 feet, not in burner and holding M.9, the VSI was pegged at 6000 FPM. Then I went into burner and chickened out at 62,000 feet! In my defense, I did have a wife and children at home! One of my buddies claimed he made it to 75,000 feet. It seemed both crazy and plausible.

This thing was a one-eyed rocket ship to the seventh planet!

since you've been in military circles and seen things you cannot speak of, and travelled higher than any civilian mortal, would you call yourself a Flat Earther or a Globe'r?