Coast Guard C-130

[From_the_NEK]

In the Early '90's, when I was a kid, my house in N VT got buzzed by the predecessor of the C-17 one Saturday morning. Heard a strange whistling noise and all of the sudden this comes up over the low rise hill a 1/4 mile in front of the house. No more than 150 of the deck.



Shook the whole house. It headed straight at the mountainside 5 miles away and simply popped up and over it and was gone.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_C-141_Starlifter

Where's the back-up beeper alarm for that C-17?
~3000' of runway to get that mass airborne is very impressive.

[splat]

~3000' of runway to get that mass airborne is very impressive.

Considering some buds and I used all 6000 ft of the runway in Santa Fe to get a Piper Cherokee up to three feet off the deck at the end of it one hot summer day, I'd say so. Took one of us on the flaps and another flying to keep from hitting the desert.
I think we lacked the thrust....

[MontuckyFried]

But the ability to back the jet up was pretty useful, did it all the time, even parallel parked the aircraft (!) at Kuwait City International since the cargo ramp had some...interesting..parking. Especially when they'd park C-5s on either side of you and they'd break, which C-5s did, a lot...

Haha. Yup. As a former C-5 load, I can attest to that. Loved my plane, but it was kind of the Land Rover of the aviation world (Re: unbelievably capable, but total piece of crap). I remember watching you goons backing up no problem, and I gotta admit...I was a bit jealous of that feature.

Back to the topic at hand, I ended up finishing my enlistment, but before I did, I was seriously considering transferring to a C-130 unit. Freaking amazing plane. You would not believe the maneuverability of those things in the sky. I'm sure somebody here can think of a good skiing analogy for them that can explain it to the fine folks here better than I can.

[2nd mate]

I enjoyed some pretty cool rides on C-17's back and forth from DGAR. I real cool reserve unit out of Hawaii would be by the island every so often and they always had a cooler full of good beer we could never get in the ships store. I was pretty amazed at how quickly the aircraft got off the treadmill and how fast the thing climbed. Watched many cool aircraft over the years between Guam and other places I was anchored. Pretty cool watching B1's and B2's with NVG's.
Never got to see a spooky/spectre. By far the most badass.

[hop]

I always like watching the B-52s land at Anderson from my office. We get lots of flybys from other aircraft there too.

[Jumper Bones]

Diego Garcia and Guam. Ahh, the memories of Pacific Channel missions...

[KIRinPNW]

I got a few rides in the C-130 down on the ice. I remember the pilots always being pretty cool guys/gals.

[warthog]

i love this thread, something so cool about being in the right spot at the right time to witness a random fly-by.

got to see some F18's at close range while i was fishing the gulf stream off the outer banks, nc two summers ago.

It is pretty much a daily thing here. Their approach is right over a main rd here. The flybys I don`t like seeing are the Coastie helicopters. We see them screaming out towards the gulf, while we are out in the boat. Just gives you a bad feeling. Glad they are here though.

[skinny_kid]

Walking out on the hot tarmac, getting pummled by hot exhaust and prop blast from a C-130 was an amazing experience during my first airborne jump. The noise, smells, winds, heat.

My father used to fly them all over the pacific when he was in the Navy so it was cool to finally ride in one, though I didn't land with it.

[LightRanger]

Yah I could never figure it out until I met a pilot and he said it's so they can get to Tahoe and assist with SAR, drop a liferaft etc and still get over to the ocean quickly.

I used to get buzzed by fighters in Eastern Sierra canyons all the time, never really figured out where those planes came from, Fallon or Nellis? Maybe something to do with the Naval depot or in coordination with the Marine base. Crazy how easily they can sneak up on you!

Edwards or China Lake...

[splat]

Wishin I had a pic of the drones that were following us around the edges of area 51 when we were skiing there. I've never felt comfortable mentioning it before. Pics did a magic disappearing act. That was ten years ago. Didn't even dream then that drones would become commonplace like they are now.

[Mazderati]

I'm sure it was just a weather balloon.

[Jumper Bones]

Nope, swamp gas.

All kinds of wondrous stuff flies around the Nellis ranges, and we've been flying Predator UAVs for, what...15 years? Since the Bosnia stuff at least.

[Arty50]

Back to the topic at hand, I ended up finishing my enlistment, but before I did, I was seriously considering transferring to a C-130 unit. Freaking amazing plane. You would not believe the maneuverability of those things in the sky. I'm sure somebody here can think of a good skiing analogy for them that can explain it to the fine folks here better than I can.

Yeah, they're unreal. I remember hearing about this years ago and just found a vid. Here's a C-130 performing unarrested carrier landings and unassisted carrier takeoffs:

[CazMan26]

Not too many places you can see Lockheed Electras fly anymore

The weather channel had a series not to long ago about this outfit that was based up in Hay River, Northwest Territories. They use the Lockheed L-188 Electra. . It was called "Ice Pilots NWT"

[TNKen]

When I lived in Southwest Virginia on a wildlife management area, my house/shop was in the flight path of the SAC. We had probably 6-8 B-52's over the house every day, as well as a bunch of fighters and other light bombers. Had the wreckage of an FB-111 on the top of one of the mountains in front of the house. Biggest piece was about the size of a desk.

Had a lake on the top of one of the mountains the pilots used for practice bombing runs. Was on top of one of the ridges one day and had one come within a few hundred feet. Could smell the fuel after it passed.

[splat]

Yeah, they're unreal. I remember hearing about this years ago and just found a vid. Here's a C-130 performing unarrested carrier landings and unassisted carrier takeoffs:

The aircraft carrier in that vid was the USS Forrestal.
My neighbor was on the deck with John McCain when the shit hit the fan in '67 and spent six months in a burn unit.

Start at 9:00

[Fenris]

The ones that shuttle between McMurdo and the Pole are pretty impressive too:

I want to ride you.

[rossibandit]

wicked_sick is that near Salmo? Looks like road to Shambhala :-)

Where I live forest fires are a pretty common occurrence. You never get a sense of how huge the planes are till the fly right overhead. Rattles your bones.



(bonus points if anyone can name the location)

[itsnowjoke]

We've seen similar stuff on this board, but this was yesterday. And it's my nephew.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sjn8oq6UfwY&sns=fb

[MakersTeleMark]

We've seen similar stuff on this board, but this was yesterday. And it's my nephew.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sjn8oq6UfwY&sns=fb

It's a C-130 thread, Jong.

[P_McPoser]

No shit, there is already a separate thread for shit like that

[itsnowjoke]

Trolls. You guys need anger management class. You have 6 and 8,000 posts, and what you post is inane bullshit such aircraft type? Get a life, jongs! In case you hadn't noticed, this thread morphed a long time ago. 3 out of five posts above mine have nothing to do with C-130's. C-130's are awesome, but really, props are for boats!

[Timberridge]

Deep dive into a C-130 variant. Really neat stuff.

[schindlerpiste]

I think that the most awesome plane that I have ever seen up close is the Lockheed C5 Galaxy. When I was living outside of Frankfurt at the end of the Cold War (1987-1990ish) seeing and hearing those jets close by was an experience. People from all over Hessen who were alive at that time will always remember the roar of the Galaxy.