A Day in the Life of a US Navy Plane Captain

3/3/2023 | Me

[Blood of Tyrants]

EA-6Bs? I was in VAQ-140 back when they stood up in ‘85. What squadron were you in?

[Chode]

LOL...

[WhoisAlanGreenspan?]

Thanks for a great read. I'm not a vet but a huge aviation and military history fan. My brother in law flew A-7's in Vietnam off a carrier I don't remember the name of.

Those like me, most of my uncles served in WWII and almost all of them came home. There's so many jobs all our veterans did over so many battles, wars and during peacetime military service that very few of us could ever understand or appreciate without some personal experience stories from those who were there.

Thankfully my Dad did relate some amount of his experience flying 50 missions in a B-24 as a flight mechanic, another was a sailor on a destroyer in the Pacific, yet another worked in Army heavy equipment transport after D-Day, yet another lost his life during the Battle of the Bulge.

I'm going to try to contact my B.I.L. To see if he has any comments on your story from the pilots perspective. Again thanks.

[babygene]

Thanks for your post. I found it fascinating.

[freepersup]

My hometown airport has an aviation museum on the grounds - Heritage In Flight. There are several static display aircraft and vehicles. One of them is an A-7E II Corsair and said aircraft has the Clansmen squadron identifier on the vertical stabilizer. Small world.

http://heritage-in-flight.org/

On the website, there is a small image of the Corsair under the heading - General Information.

[babygene]

BTW. If you could provide more information about the John McCain incident I would appreciate it. My late brother Steve was on the Forestall when it happened. He wasn’t involved in aviation, but I know he had a very low opinion of him.

[freepersup]

Try as I might, I have not been able to find a detailed image of the Corsair that I speak of, on static display at the Logan County Illinois Airport, that's large and clear enough to get an a/c number. The Corsair is on the right in the image that I am posting.

[joe fonebone]

Howdy...
EA-6B Plane Captain here...
VAQ-133...
I went to the line division and refused to leave...
Did my entire hitch there

[Psalm 73]

Hey, thanks for the walk through - you remembered a LOT after 45 years. It was a fun read.

(Note to self: start working on a similar write-up for test-running large gas turbines and mid-range turbo-fan engines, while I still have a few marbles left.)

[rlmorel]

Wow. You can imagine my surprise when I went to the Yuma Air Museum with my wife and saw this:

One of the actual planes I worked on, no doubt!

[rlmorel]

Thanks, I was going to ping you to it right after I pinged poconopundit on it...:)

But I got interrupted!

[rlmorel]

Hey! Thank you for your service, Friend! And I can tell you, I LOVED those C1A CODS!

And not just when they landed with mail, which you know how we all felt about that...:)

I loved the sound of the engines, and when they took off starting back at the fantail, as they revved up the engines, the planes seemed to squat and coil, then when they got the launch signal, they would lumber down the deck and take off well short of the end of the deck.

When I got out of the Navy, I often thought if I could buy a plane to fly around, I would have bought one of them...:)

There was something so...so...analog and old school about them that appealed to me!

Thank you again for what you did. Guys like you, flying in and seeing those canvas bags full of mail tossed off, well...if we had been ashore, you would have never had to buy yourself a drink!

[rlmorel]

I am glad that you enjoyed reading it!

[rlmorel]

You are most welcome, FRiend!

[rlmorel]

Hot DAMN! I loved those planes. I thought A-6’s in the hands of a good pilot must have been a fine flying plane, but the EA-6B Prowlers seemed so much faster and more maneuverable to me.

Fine looking planes, too, with that thinned out and extended fuselage ahead of the wings, the gold canopy, and the big radiation symbol on the front of the radome made it one bad-ass plane!

I loved it when they did the air shows for the crew at sea, and the Prowlers would fly in at a steep angle and level out right at the flight deck level and scream by.

I envy you that view from the plane...:)

[rlmorel]

Absolutely! As you can tell, I just got lost in the recollection there!

[rlmorel]

As a Damage Controlman, I’ll bet you were busy as hell on those two ships! With all the solvents, machine shops, and repair processes there.

[rlmorel]

You are most welcome. I recall we used to cross paths with the Saratoga, I believe she was one of those vessels we used to hook up with off of Rota, Spain, when we were going home and they were coming on station.

I don't know if that is her, but that darn well might have been me waving to go home!

[rlmorel]

LOL! What did you do a Zoomie? When were you in, and where did you serve, if you don’t mind my asking?

[airdalechief]

Very Good

Very damn good