Archive for October, 2005
The aviator photoblogging the last cruise of the Tomcats has some more pics up at his Flickr site. Check ‘em out.
Here’s a good one and his entry:
This was Puck and Mr. Hanky on their first combat mission — mine, as well. That is the boom and basket from an Air Force KC-135, most pilots’ least favorite tanker. Notice that the hose is not only short (less than ten feet, compared to 30-40 for an S-3), but it will not allow flow unless it has a >90 angle at the basket joint. Hence pilots have to get in the basket, which is hard and unforgiving, and then maintain that ridiculous kink in the hose.
Be sure to keep an eye on the site. Much higher res versions are available there.
Weapons elevator contractor selected
Federal Equipment Co., of Cleveland, beat out Oldenburg Lakeshore Inc. of Iron Mountain, Mich. for this $50 million contract. It’s a permanent magnet linear synchronous motor-powered design, and is a key component of the goal to increase daily sorties by one-third over current carriers.
US CBO Gives OK to HULA Airships for Airlift
The Congressional Budget Office likes the Walrus. Check out the nifty pic of the Walrus and TSV at the link, and also see this post by Buckethead at the Ministry of Minor Perfidy on the Walrus.
Rambling Rebuilder
He’s helping with reconstruction work in the wake of Katrina. With some photos. Worth keeping an eye on.
Joseph Wilson says he hoped the Iraq Constitution would fail
Frank Warner has the report.
Former USS Greeneville commander blamed for collision with fishing boat
Sub’s commander deemed “largely responsible” for wrecking a Japanese boat and killing nine during an “emergency surfacing” drill.
Iraqi forces have conducted 1,000 post-election patrols without U.S. help
That one battalion must be exhausted…
Icebound body may be airman from 1942
Possibly a victim from an AT-7 trainer crash in California.
U.S. helping Iraqi air force get off the ground
And you thought building a new Iraqi army was tough…
The ‘Memphis Belle’ arrives at Dayton
The last surviving crewman from the plane passed away a few weeks ago.
Customer requests may lead to 787 tweaks
And while they scramble to remain competitive in the commercial sector, they continue to work on a 777 tanker design. Any word on the Italian 767 tankers?
Does Al Qaeda exist?
Al Jazeera reports on a Pravda article which writes “Al Qaeda, a fake enemy created by the United States and its ally Britain, was produced for the sole purpose of using it as an excuse to invade and terrorize Arab and Middle East nations to swallow the world’s oil resources“. A-J and Pravda. What a team.
Freedom Journal Iraq on the referendum
Video from the Pentagon Channel
Suspected Somali militia leader arrested
Abdi Hassan Awale, also known as Abdi Qeybdiid, was a commander in warlord Farah Aidid’s militia
IFF always inoperative in OFF mode
Got this oldie but goodie from a reader. It was headlined “Quantas QANTAS Flight Reports”. I’ve seen it before as an “Air Force Squawk Sheet”. Not sure what Quantas QANTAS airliners would be doing with IFF systems. So that convinces me that this is a 100% accurate Air Force list.
That’s all for now. Toss up any any interesting links in the comments section or trackback this post if you’ve got a blog entry worth looking at.
V-22 bows out of U.S. CSAR-X competition
Defense News via USAF AIM Points:
The V-22 Osprey tiltrotor developed by Bell Helicopter Textron and Boeing will not be a competitor in the U.S. Air Force’s CSAR-X combat search-and-rescue aircraft program, company officials said Oct. 20.“After thorough review of the revised Air Force request for proposal, it was clear that the CSAR-X program’s requirements and funding profile did not call for the advanced speed and range offered by the V-22 Osprey, and instead leaned toward capabilities found in more traditional helicopter-type aircraft,” Bob Kenney, vice president of Boeing’s V-22 joint program, said in a statement released Oct. 20.
I received an email last night wondering what I thought about the V-22 Osprey. Basically, I think it’s a fine idea that hasn’t been worth the effort and cost. When all is said and done, helicopters are going to be able to do almost everything the V-22 can at a fraction of the cost and without new prodcedures and thinking that are required for any new program.
While helicopters are inherently dangerous, no one can really argue that the V-22 is any safer. As I often do, I’d argue that we should definitely incorporate a small number of V-22s into the arsenal, if only to give them a workout in the real world and learn lessons for later generations of vehicles. If some special Osprey units are put together to take advantage of the vehicle, that would make sense. But to jump in headfirst and become too dependant upon them would be a major mistake.
A Marine from Regimental Combat Team 8 shakes hands with an Iraqi boy dressed in traditional Islamic clothes in Fallujah on Sunday.
The final Titan IV was launched from Vandenberg on Wednesday. It carried a “critical national security payload for the National Reconnaissance Office”. Smile!
From the USAF Museum page on the Titans:
Titans have boosted numerous types of payloads into space. These included the Gemini spacecraft, various Air Force reconnaissance, communication, navigation, and weather satellites, and many NASA spacecraft such as the Viking I and II missions to Mars and the interplanetary vehicles Voyager I and II. The Titan program has played an important role in the expansion of the US military and civilian presence in space. It also provided a proven and economical booster for America’s first major commercial space launch program.
The Atlas V and Delta IV will cover most launches that the Titans previously handled.
Pic from the USS VALLEY FORGE Korean War collection. Check out the one of the snow and ice. I think that one, or one very similar, was in the National Geographic.
One Reason Recruitment Is Down
It says “You can’t be all you can be if you’re dead. There are other ways to serve your country. There are other ways to get money for college. There are other ways to be all you can be. Think about it. Before you sign your life away.“
The ad was created and paid for by a Warwick student who is a member of the Bruderhof community, a Christian-based communal order in Sugar Loaf that preaches pacifism.
It seems that some parents with family members in the armed forces were unhappy with taxpayer money funding this advertisement in a student newspaper. What the exact details are, I can’t say. I scanned the newspaper article source, but now I can’t get back in without registering. I did, but the confirmation hasn’t arrived. Maybe they didn’t like the pseudo-info that I entered. If I get in I’ll post a bit more on this.
UPDATE: Okay. Here’s a clip from the original article:
Calling it a political ad with religious ties, some parents, faculty members and students say the ad undercuts those serving in the military and shouldn’t have appeared in a tax-funded public school newspaper.Many opposed to the ad noted the school’s “Wall of Honor,” which displays photos and names of about 20 recent Warwick graduates currently serving in the military, many of whom are in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Maggie Adams, the Warwick High nurse, who has two sons who graduated from Warwick and are serving in the Marines, said she was outraged when she first saw the ad and has written a letter to the editor of The Survey.
“I understand the right to free speech and I support that. But I don’t think it’s appropriate for a school newspaper,” Adams said. “I refuse to believe what the ad says. I refuse to believe those people who choose to join the military, like my two sons, are wasting their lives.”
And a point constantly overlooked by anti-war types is noted:
Army Capt. William Bliss, in charge of recruiting at Warwick High, said the ad was misleading and the Army is exploring placing some of its own ads in The Survey.“It’s disappointing when you see something that blatantly attacks what you do and what you believe in a school newspaper,” Bliss said. “But it’s free speech, ideas and thoughts like that, whether you agree or not, the military is fighting to protect.”
The student who created the ad and placed the order with the paper remains anonymous. He’s apparently been told that the ad will not run in future issues.
UPDATE 2: I noticed that the school’s drama club is putting on “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” next month. While the religious overtones are sure to score points with this student and the communal order (s)he belongs to, I’m wondering if the killing of the wolf attacking Lucy or the battle against the Witch’s army of monsters will be dismissed as pointless warmongering on the part of Aslan’s forces.
I hadn’t seen MAROONED since I was a youngster, but I caught it the other evening thanks to the wonder that is TiVo. It was directed by John Sturges and stars Gregory Peck as the Flight Director trying to get three stranded astronauts down after their Apollo spacecraft malfunctions, leaving the crew (played by Richard Crenna, James Franciscus, and Gene Hackman) stranded in orbit. David Janssen plays the astronaut who will pilot an experimental winged spacecraft up in a daring rescue attempt.
To be honest, it’s a pretty good film. Although a lot of the same ground is covered in APOLLO 13, I was surprised at how good the film was and how solid the grounding on real engineering was. Plus, the archival footage of various space launches was a treat. Some of the popular clips are recognizable from within longer sequences.
The Apollo hardware was fairly good, and the special effects were more than acceptable. It would have been nice if they had used the X-20 DynaSoar or the X-24 as the rescue vehicle. I would have liked to see the Air Force boys dusting off the cancelled X-20 in order to save the day. As far as I know, the ‘XR-V’ vehicle used in the film wasn’t a real program, though it seemed to be pretty close to the X-24. And it was launched atop a Titan IIIC, which was to be the X-20′s launch vehicle. It’s the attention to that sort of detail that really stood out to me.
With those sorts of things in the news all the time when the movie came out (1969) I guess they were sort of obligated to stick closer to reality, because the audience back then would catch obvious crocks much more easily than today’s audiences. Today, in fact, I don’t think many people would care even if they could tell the difference.
MAROONED is available on DVD, and a review is available at DVDFile. All in all, a good flick.
At the bottom of the post in the individual archive pages (reached from the main page by clicking the timestamp down in the ‘posted by’ section) is a link called ‘Printer-Friendly’. This will give you a hardcopy-optimized version of the post for prints and grins.
It doesn’t seem to work in Firefox. I have no idea why not.
UPDATE: I tweaked it slightly. It still seems to have issues in Firefox when previewing and printing posts longer than one page, though it looks okay in the browser view. I’ll continue to tinker, though I doubt printer layouts will get a lot of use. What I’m saying is that it’s not real high on the priority list. If you’ve got suggestions, send ‘em in, though. I’m sorta making this up as I go along…
Oil guru says crude could hit $190 this winter
I have no idea what the odds of this happening are. I think they’ve got to be astoundingly long. Incredibly amazingly stupendously long.
Simply posting it here in case I need to refer to it again in the future at some point.
