Back in Mar-April 06, I took my on wave-off at the boat. From both the left and reat seat of the COD, I've come aboard the boat about 550 times and this was the first and only time I had had seen one's own wave-off and it was mine.
I had DV's on board, got the call for the straight-in and went to dump fuel. As it were, the aircraft would not dump fuel. That was 5 miles out....I made exactly 5 calls, 3 calls to tower and 2 to paddles that I was too heavy to come aboard (3000+ lbs too heavy). I had no response from any of them. The Boss was my former Skipper at VRC-30 as well but his performance as CO and Boss left a lot to be desired anyway. So IC-AR I took my own wave-off which needless to say, got everyone's attention.
Yep, had to go see CAG Paddles (though a friend of mine), DCAG and then CAG. CAG Paddles understood but being a friend, it helped. DCAG just chewed my ass but this was his standard for anything. I think even if he was giving you an 'atta boy' you would first get your ass chewed. Then CAG was upset because I took the wave-off too late in his opinion. I had important people onboard (mayor and congressman as I recall) and I could have grabbed a wire for an inflight engagement......though IMO, I was plenty high enough. CAG was an E-2 driver with 5000 hours, TPS graduate and of course CAG, so I have no doubt to the validity of his opinion
.
I had DV's on board, got the call for the straight-in and went to dump fuel. As it were, the aircraft would not dump fuel. That was 5 miles out....I made exactly 5 calls, 3 calls to tower and 2 to paddles that I was too heavy to come aboard (3000+ lbs too heavy). I had no response from any of them. The Boss was my former Skipper at VRC-30 as well but his performance as CO and Boss left a lot to be desired anyway. So IC-AR I took my own wave-off which needless to say, got everyone's attention.
Yep, had to go see CAG Paddles (though a friend of mine), DCAG and then CAG. CAG Paddles understood but being a friend, it helped. DCAG just chewed my ass but this was his standard for anything. I think even if he was giving you an 'atta boy' you would first get your ass chewed. Then CAG was upset because I took the wave-off too late in his opinion. I had important people onboard (mayor and congressman as I recall) and I could have grabbed a wire for an inflight engagement......though IMO, I was plenty high enough. CAG was an E-2 driver with 5000 hours, TPS graduate and of course CAG, so I have no doubt to the validity of his opinion
.
