Posted on 02/09/2007 10:56:28 AM PST by Excuse_My_Bellicosity
February 9, 2007 (by Franklin Fisher) - Two airmen - including one who pleaded guilty to trying to throw a frog into a running jet engine - were punished in separate courts-martial at Kunsan Air Base, officials there confirmed Tuesday. The other airman was punished after pleading guilty to breaking into a dorm room and stealing property.
In the incident involving the frog, Senior Airman Welland Wilkerson, an aircraft maintainer, was sentenced to reduction from pay grade E-4 to E-1, 30 days in jail and a reprimand. He's assigned to the 8th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, part of Kunsan's 8th Fighter Wing, also known as the "Wolf Pack."
The incident occurred sometime last year and was reported to authorities in September.
Officials said Wilkerson tried to throw a frog into the engine but missed, said Master Sgt. Anthony Davis, a wing spokesman.
Another airman subsequently threw a frog into the engine.
"After this incident, our wing checked the engines," Davis said. "They did a scan … for damage and no damage was found from the incident."
The incident was videotaped in an area where filming is banned without authorization, Davis said.
In September, Kunsan-based agents of the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations were told by their OSI counterparts at Sheppard Air Force Base, Texas, that a video clip had been posted on a personalized MySpace page showing "an individual throwing a frog into a running F-16 engine intake," Davis said.
"Subsequent investigations revealed Airman Wilkerson was involved in the incident," Davis said. "Because of the nature of the incident, Airman Wilkerson was removed from any duties that required him to perform aircraft maintenance."
"There's still an ongoing investigation," he said. "So more details about the event are not something we can talk about right now."
He could only add that an investigation into "the actions of others involved in the incident is continuing." He was unable to provide further details.
Wilkerson pleaded guilty to two counts of dereliction of duty.
He was tried by summary court-martial Friday before Maj. Timothy Kodama, summary court officer.
In the larceny case, Airman 1st Class Brent Schneider, of the 8th Maintenance Squadron, was sentenced to reduction from E-3 to E-1; forfeiture of $1,000 per month for six months, and six months in jail.
Col. Steven A. Hatfield, chief military judge for the Pacific Circuit, imposed the sentence Monday after Schneider pleaded guilty to larceny and housebreaking. Schneider was tried under the rules for special court-martial.
He unlawfully entered the dorm room of another airman and stole a computer and other belongings, Davis said.
OSI agents searched Schneider's dorm room and "discovered the computer and the other belongings that didn't belong to him," Davis said.
Not a good idea to be standing anywhere near a running turbine when blades start to go.....sorry Kermit.
How is the Frenchman doing? :)
did the frog survive?
I bet they're more upset by the unauthorised videotaping (security violation), than by the frog thing.
WHY would anyone want to do such a thing?
SICK!
Where's the "Hold muh beer" alert?
That's sickening. Hope they rot in the brig.
Just a dumb guy. I want to say dumb kid, but...he is in the military, and they aren't kids anymore, even though psychologically many of them are. I am sure he didn't mean to do damage and was just screwing around. But hey, Airman...you know you do those FOD Walkdowns for a reason.
A frog is FOD, guy. Think. Lucky he didn't kill a pilot.
We used to throw empty oil cans into the exhaust when doing high power turn-ups just to watch then get flattenicated against the JBDs.
I suspect the video was headed for youtube...
LOL,
Fun and frolick and on the flight line.
You never know what a bunch of butt heads will do when there is little else to do.
(We used to throw those God awful giant green grasshoppers into the jets. Sometimes the bugs would get their act together just in time to make a good go of it. Then it got interesting as the bug tried to overcome the intake.)
Jackass - The Military Sequel
If you were Navy or Marines, you might have been doing that with F-18s. Which would be kinda funny. A bug eating a bug. So to speak.
...and yet when a muslim Captain in the US armed forces intentionally takes the list of interrogators and prisoners from Guantanamo, and other classified information, abjectly against the law...a mistrial is declared.
Once upon a time on a flight line in PI was a Fudd driver who knew more than his ground handlers.
So tired of his sh!t were the ground crew, that they pulled up a chunk of hamburger and threw it in the port side prop while the handler was frantically motioning cut.
Yes, there was a Captains mast, and some article 15s flew around, but said Fudd driver never jockied again.
At Camp Schwab on Okinawa, we found a low-life sneaking through our squad bay lifting wallets. We were on the upper half of Schwab.
We held him on the concrete deck, took our M-14 smoke poles, and broke his wrists, forearms and ankles then threw him off the cliff (not that steep, my buddies threw me off when I came in drunk and kept them up).
We NEVER had a thief come through our barracks again.
LOL,
Thanks for the youth vote.
No, I predated that fine airplane.
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