Great summary of a very hard working group of aviation specialists. The plane captains who served my C1A COD with the VRC50 1975-8 were all extremely professional, and hard-working. They constantly worked in preparation and execution of our missions to service the fleet. A very proud group, who I am honored to have served with.
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!