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Operation Deep Freeze

taxi1

taxi1

Well-Known Member
pilot
Doesn't seem to be a thread on it, so now there is. As mentioned in other threads, my dad served on the ice 1966-1968. I spent formative years at the Quonset Point Chief's Club playing pinball and listening to a bunch of chiefs talk about Antarctica over beer, and here's some more quarters don't tell your mom I took you to the club.

My one real regret in Naval Aviation is that I wasn't able to serve in VXE-6. Choose the carrier or the multi-engine path, and I wanted to do both. Should have tried harder? I rushed the ANG unit that took over the mission, but no joy.

Found this really interesting history of Deep Freeze from the Air Force side. Covers the Navy effort, but also a lot of info about the USAF bringing C-141s, C5s, and C17s down there. Flying in Antarctica was sporty.

 
ea6bflyr

ea6bflyr

Working Class Bum
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
taxi1 said:
Doesn't seem to be a thread on it, so now there is. As mentioned in other threads, my dad served on the ice 1966-1968. I spent formative years at the Quonset Point Chief's Club playing pinball and listening to a bunch of chiefs talk about Antarctica over beer, and here's some more quarters don't tell your mom I took you to the club.

My one real regret in Naval Aviation is that I wasn't able to serve in VXE-6. Choose the carrier or the multi-engine path, and I wanted to do both. Should have tried harder? I rushed the ANG unit that took over the mission, but no joy.

Found this really interesting history of Deep Freeze from the Air Force side. Covers the Navy effort, but also a lot of info about the USAF bringing C-141s, C5s, and C17s down there. Flying in Antarctica was sporty.

Click to expand...
In my enlisted days flying the C-2 COD, several of the loadmasters I flew with had previously served in VXE-6 and really enjoyed the mission. I had one of my fellow AEs go to aircrew school and chose to be a FE on the VXE-6 C-130s. By the time I left CODs, VXE-6 was already on the sundown list, so I chose P-3 FE school but never made it there as I picked up ECP and headed off to college.
 
ABMD

ABMD

Bullets don't fly without Supply
The active duty command over our reserve regiments/battalions participates in ODF each year, albeit not from the aviation perspective. I tried to hop on the list for this FY, but more pressing things took precedence (MOB).
 
Flash

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
We had a few VXE-6 folks in VQ-1, the NFO's did a tour there then had to go to P-3's or EP-3's right after to get a mission qual as they were only Nav's in the LC-130's. Up until they were decommed they did celestial nav as GPS coverage that far south wasn't the greatest at that time, and grid nav too. I worked with one guy and his stories were great, all sorts of great adventures and deploying to New Zealand apparently didn't suck either. One story was about doing runs to the South Pole and a few times only the lead nav had to do the work, with everyone else following the preceding bird's contrails if the winds were calm enough. He had a few close encounter with penguins, who walked up to him and the folks he was with to see just what the hell they were (he had pics of it), and he even had time in this bird.

The very last Nav that got selected for VXE-6 was in the class behind me at flight school, it was only going to be for 6 months since they were decomming then but it seemed like a really cool opportunity.
 
sevenhelmet

sevenhelmet

Low calorie attack from the Heartland
pilot
I have a good friend who went down to Antarctica in the Merchant Marine, as a midshipman during his sea time at USMMA. He was on a cargo ship called the Arctic Tern. The stories he has told me from the ship are horrendous, and he made McMurdo sound like a twisted version of that part of deployment where it seems like everyone is hooking up with everyone else, and drama abounds. We were in college, so I imagine he was embellishing a little, but that ship sounded downright dangerous. They evidently had an engine room fire that nearly killed him and someone else at one point. He actually recommended that nobody sail on that ship again when he got back- I don't think the school heeded his advice.
 
Griz882

Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
Flash said:
We had a few VXE-6 folks in VQ-1, the NFO's did a tour there then had to go to P-3's or EP-3's right after to get a mission qual as they were only Nav's in the LC-130's. Up until they were decommed they did celestial nav as GPS coverage that far south wasn't the greatest at that time, and grid nav too. I worked with one guy and his stories were great, all sorts of great adventures and deploying to New Zealand apparently didn't suck either. One story was about doing runs to the South Pole and a few times only the lead nav had to do the work, with everyone else following the preceding bird's contrails if the winds were calm enough. He had a few close encounter with penguins, who walked up to him and the folks he was with to see just what the hell they were (he had pics of it), and he even had time in this bird.

The very last Nav that got selected for VXE-6 was in the class behind me at flight school, it was only going to be for 6 months since they were decomming then but it seemed like a really cool opportunity.
Click to expand...
As nav’s only, did they wear the old navigator wings or where they limited to the Marines only?

IMG_1716.jpeg
 
Flash

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Griz882 said:
As nav’s only, did they wear the old navigator wings or where they limited to the Marines only?

View attachment 39862
Click to expand...

Nope, they still winged just like everyone else out of flight school. The Navy only used those Navigator wings, technically Naval Aviation Observer (Navigation) wings, from March 1945 to March 1947. Interestingly a few women earned those wings as Navy officers circa 1945, IIRC they may have been the first women actually winged as military aviators (not retroactively like WASPs).
 
Uncle Fester

Uncle Fester

Robot Pimp
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
I worked for two guys who’d flown with the Penguins as JOs - one pilot who wound up flying E-2s and an NFO who went VQ. The latter was my commodore out in Bahrain; he had done loadmaster duties in addition to Nav’ing, and even as an O-6 he could still rattle off the specs and requirements for loading different types of gear and pallets in the Herk. They both had some pretty bananas stories from their time on the ice, including joyriding in the Hueys with some of the female science types when things got boring. 1707324433949.jpeg
 
VMO4

VMO4

Well-Known Member
One of my father's contemporaries was a pilot with them back in the 50's. It was common for those early pilots to get mountains named after them by the early surveyors, This wiki article mentions him, I knew him as the guy who taught me how to change the brakes on my car when I was in high school. Harvey Speed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erb_Range
 
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