Aviation BS and Photo Thread

R.I.P. Lt. Col. Richard "Dick" Cole spread those wings in Heaven a hero to be remembered Godspeed.. it was an Honor to have met you......

 

The quickie is gone now. Must be in Dallas.
This airport is really growing up. Today there wasn’t a tie down open. Mostly Cessnas, but a G5, Pilates, and King Air were taking up space.

The hanger now. Gives a sense of how big that Corsair is.

 

Such a beautiful plane...that mustang in the back not to snappy either. 66? 67?

 

It belonged to Louise Thaden. I think it's a 66. I may have seen it doing a quick 1/4 mile down the runway this week.

 

Yeah, the quickie is in Dallas now. By G5, do you mean a Gulfstream? That’s a big ol jet for that airport

Pretty sure the FBO will let you take it as a courtesy car...at least they were talking about that a while back. I think it’s an awful idea, but it’s not my car

 

I was wrong. Just looked up the registration. It's a G-IV. I guess it just looked bigger parked next to the 152.

 

I parked a 152 beside a F18 once. Felt a little tiny lol

 

The IV is still a big plane, but not nearly as big as the V. I’d be shocked if the ramp could handle a G-V there.

 

Yeah. The G-IV was parked as far back as possible and would have been in the way for anything much bigger than a cessna to get by. The King Air and Pilatus were both parked on the other side of the circle, and they take up a bit of ramp space there as well. That's the second Pilatus (PC-12) I've seen there in the last week. Business is really picking up with the new terminal. Plus the east ramp was full. I think it was air out the hanger day on that side.

 

That's the big gotcha with the larger corporate planes. They have the runway performance to get into some smaller airports but if you go below 5000' in runway length it can be very tough to find one that can support something like a G-IV or GV due to taxiway width and turns, ramp size, and ramp strength. There are pictures online of Gulfstreams sinking into asphalt on ramps.

 

Sorry no pics ....


Yesterday about 1030hrs heard the familiar sound of Military helicopters flying overhead . So I quickly head outside and right away see nine Blackhawks flying in tight formation maybe less than 1k ft

They looked to be heading NNE towards the Lucerne Valley area . Since I live in the High Desert of Socal and close to Ft Irwin and 29 Palms I see alot of Military aircraft flying around . But yesterday's sighting was the lowest I've seen any Military aircraft flying around


Anyone have an idea or insight what these Blackhawks were doing yesterday ??

 

That many birds might be an insertion mission - so probably practice dropping a force into hostile territory. Isn't that where the training grounds are?

 

Oh yeah, back when I was working line service I saw a 737 BBJ sink into the asphalt on a 100+° day. Seen a G-IV sink in many times in Arkansas as well. Just gotta use some thrust to get out, tug won’t do it if it’s sunk deep enough

 

Put on your tinfoil hats!




God, that stuff was insufferable.

 

By car I'm 85 miles from NTC Ft Irwin and 89 miles from MCAGCC 29 Palms . They flew directly over Hesperia and Apple Valley both very populated towns up here

 

Most aviation units fly their aircraft to and from NTC rotations.

 

Yes I see almost daily CH53's , Ospreys flying the usual pattern and at 10k ft heading to /from these two Military bases . But yesterday's sighting they were definitely at 1k ft or even lower elevation and the lowest elevation for Military aircraft especially over a very populated city


Back when I was active duty 1981-84 I never saw Military aircraft flying that low over populated cities here . I was even at MCAS EL TORO and never saw aircraft that low except on final approach


The normal Military flight path here is following the I -15 day until out past Barstow

 

From the (not funny) thread..

 

Tuesday I saw 4 then 6 Apaches flying down the 91 towards Orange Co......yesterday saw 4 of um heading North and maybe heading to the high desert. But these were all Apaches, not Blackhawks.

 

There are IR and VR routes that military aviators can use that allow them to fly as low as 500 AGL and in excess of 200 KTS. It may just be that they were on one of these routes during your sighting.

With all that said, leave it up to the army to pull some dumb move like high speed maneuvering at low altitudes over populated areas.