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Clara Ball
- Thread starter jmcquate
- Start date
I watched another helo dude turn on his IR searchlight 2 mi from the CVN. He didn't notice until passing over the rounddown when it bloomed out his NVDs. He called "723, waving off," and the very confused P-3 shooter HCO said, "uh, roger, waveoff?" The shooter asked if everything was alright, and the pilot came back with a Han-Solo-esque, "just had a lighting malfunction, we're all fine here, (how are you?)"
Had to tell a funny, because the big deck isn't too scary when you're wearing goggles and don't have a stall speed.
Had to tell a funny, because the big deck isn't too scary when you're wearing goggles and don't have a stall speed.
I don't know what this "ball" is, so I'll spare you all my harrowing stories in plane guard behind the boat using my ouija board and crystal ball to try and guess what crazy shit their OOD was going to do next!
Seriously though, Recovering LSO, those are some legit vids. How does the LSO give course corrections to the pilot when he can't see the plane? Radar? Beacon?
Seriously though, Recovering LSO, those are some legit vids. How does the LSO give course corrections to the pilot when he can't see the plane? Radar? Beacon?
Trick question! They're all blind so they can't EVER see the plane!
I keed, I keed. Thanks for keeping me safe Paddles!
Since helos don't normally have any issues around the Carrier I'll offer this one up.
Operating in the general area of Japan, weather starts to go to shit. Man overboard call goes out and it's actually legit, witnesses saw him go over. 2 Helos already in the air and boss launches a 3rd to help search. Unfortunately right around this time weather really gets bad. Huge fog bank, can't see spot 3 from the island, etc.
Eventually the first 2 helos start getting low on fuel and need approaches back to the boat. They are receiving precision vectors but not breaking out. Start taking them well below mins and not seeing anything. (Found out later that the precision radar went down. Only the ASR was working, but CATCC decided not to tell the pilots this and pretend to offer precision guidance anyway...)
Next thing you hear is a call over the 1MC for a helo rep to meet CAG paddles on the LSO platform. They tried a smoke light approach, but the birds never saw the smokes. Eventually CAG paddles was making calls like "I can hear you, can you try hovering to the left?" and "Can you try and hover at 100' over where you think the carrier is at 0.0 DME and just descend vertically?" This resulted in a bird being told to come left because paddles was certain they are right there. The crew chief in the helo looked out the left window and called a "Break Right" just as the antenna from the island appeared out of the fog about to hit the rotors.
One of the birds knocked it off with just enough gas to make the beach. The other 2 got lucky as the carrier found a tiny pocket where the fog was lighter and they were able to land. A few minutes after recovery and we are back in the fog for hours.
Operating in the general area of Japan, weather starts to go to shit. Man overboard call goes out and it's actually legit, witnesses saw him go over. 2 Helos already in the air and boss launches a 3rd to help search. Unfortunately right around this time weather really gets bad. Huge fog bank, can't see spot 3 from the island, etc.
Eventually the first 2 helos start getting low on fuel and need approaches back to the boat. They are receiving precision vectors but not breaking out. Start taking them well below mins and not seeing anything. (Found out later that the precision radar went down. Only the ASR was working, but CATCC decided not to tell the pilots this and pretend to offer precision guidance anyway...)
Next thing you hear is a call over the 1MC for a helo rep to meet CAG paddles on the LSO platform. They tried a smoke light approach, but the birds never saw the smokes. Eventually CAG paddles was making calls like "I can hear you, can you try hovering to the left?" and "Can you try and hover at 100' over where you think the carrier is at 0.0 DME and just descend vertically?" This resulted in a bird being told to come left because paddles was certain they are right there. The crew chief in the helo looked out the left window and called a "Break Right" just as the antenna from the island appeared out of the fog about to hit the rotors.
One of the birds knocked it off with just enough gas to make the beach. The other 2 got lucky as the carrier found a tiny pocket where the fog was lighter and they were able to land. A few minutes after recovery and we are back in the fog for hours.
My scariest thus far was one night in the Arabian Gulf, fog or something rolled in during our cycle, and when I checked in with approach after commencing, paddles comes up and says "99 taxi lights on"......not a good sign. Flew the best precision approach of my life to get to a good start, still IMC. Paddles contact. They lip locked me all the way down, finally broke out the ship at about 1/2 mile or a little less, had a quick power and lineup correction and was in the wires. Paddles earned their pay that night for sure. I doubt that ranks anywhere near the top 10 of naval aviation, but it was my personal scariest.
CG-51
16 Jun 1989 (before NVGs)
SH-60B 162981
Took off on a moonless night for a mission to identify surface radar contacts. About ten minutes out we got a pitch trim servo leak, which resulted in a loss of all pilot assist/boost servos. For the non H-60 fliers, that is like losing your power steering in a truck with a lot of play in the steering wheel. The aircraft gets squirrely and the controls are harder to move. We flew back to the ship and landed boost off to the cruiser deck. It doesn't sound like much, but it was my scariest approach to a ship...unless you count flying with Army aviators for initial deck landing quals! LOL
16 Jun 1989 (before NVGs)
SH-60B 162981
Took off on a moonless night for a mission to identify surface radar contacts. About ten minutes out we got a pitch trim servo leak, which resulted in a loss of all pilot assist/boost servos. For the non H-60 fliers, that is like losing your power steering in a truck with a lot of play in the steering wheel. The aircraft gets squirrely and the controls are harder to move. We flew back to the ship and landed boost off to the cruiser deck. It doesn't sound like much, but it was my scariest approach to a ship...unless you count flying with Army aviators for initial deck landing quals! LOL
Got a fuel pres light while sliding into spot 4 once. Flammed out 2 seconds after touching down on deck. Wasn't scary while it was happening because as far as I knew it was just a light and when it got bad I was already on deck, but it still scares me to think how interesting things would have gotten if I were a few seconds slower to Charlie. I guess technically this was beside the boat, not behind it, but that was as scary as it got for a boat I intended to land on.
