dinahmoehumm

Hate to quibble with you NATOPS, but it was spinning slowly because the airplane was slowing down as it landed. A windmilling prop (assuming the safety coupling has decoupled) is going to spin at an RPM commensurate with the airspeed of the airplane. Faster airspeed = faster windmilling prop RPM. Slower airspeed = slower windmilling prop RPM. As to your statement that "it was feathered so no drag," well, that's not exactly right either. A feathered prop that hasn't decoupled creates quite a bit of drag actually, and the 1-1 makes note of that (higher VMCAs). That's why the safety coupling exists, for that very reason. The safety coupling's location (between the torquemeter and the pinion input gear in the RGB) is set to decouple at a negative torque value of 6,000 lbs. (if I remember correctly). It gets to that negative torque rating precisely because the prop IS "driving" the engine, not the other way around (normal operation). You would have to have two component failures in the same RGB (prop brake and safety coupling) for the prop to be both windmilling AND remain coupled. Even at a reasonably slow airpeed, a windmilling prop is creating enough negative torque to cause the safety coupling to do it's thing. Not trying to be a d*ck, just providing some clarity.

An equally important question to ask is if #1 was decoupled or not. If so, good. If not, bad. Coupled drag = bad, decoupled drag, while not good, is better than bad (See: coupled drag = bad). I'm sure the crew reset the fire handle (as long as no indication of a fire existed). It's a good bet that #1 in this case was decoupled, and had been windmilling on NTS prior to decoupling. The fact that it was spinning backwards tells me that prop brake failed, but that's when our old buddy the safety coupling comes out to play, and suddenly your bad day isn't quite as bad as it was a second ago. That's at least how I remember it was supposed to work, I think...

The medal was dumb, glad they flushed it before it hit the street. Almost as dumb as those stupid "space wings" you see some folks wearing. They looks sorta like something Buzz Lightyear might wear. Have you seen those things? Ridiculous. Here's a pic in case anyone's interested (but I don't know why you would):[ATTACH=CONFIG]3393[/ATTACH]

Boxes and boxes of Cuban cigars out of Howard, along with enough rum to stock a bar for years. Allegedly. Coolers full of halibut out of Elmo. Stuffed to the gills with bootleg DVDs out of Kuala Lumpur. Allegedly. Had an AC once that was married to a Korean, and we were RON at Osan. He bought a ton of kimchi and had it boxed up to bring back to Yokota. Well, we broke, and he left the kimchi on the airplane. In Osan. In July. When the MRT arrived a day or two later, and opened up the airplane, you can imagine the smell that greeted them. The best thing I ever carried were the remains of MIAs out of Danang, Hanoi, and Phnom Penh on their way home to their families. Flying missions in support of JTF-FA were the most rewarding missions I ever flew.

Don't be afraid to call out an examinee that outranks you. One of the hardest check rides I ever administered was to a CMSgt FE (a basic FE in the -130) who had come from 141s. He might have known everything there was to know about a -141, but his knowledge of the -130 was commensurate with someone with a couple of hundred hours in that particular airplane. I think he figured he'd "get by" on his stripes and toilet bowl on his wings. He was wrong. He ended up getting a Q-2, and a "gentle" ass-chewing by me in the debrief, reminding him that I expected more and that other people did too. His face turned every shade of red in the spectrum, but he knew he'd sucked that night and better step it up. As an evaluator, people pay attention to you, both on and off-duty. Remember that when you're TDY and someone wants to "break the rules."

I just don't get it. For every story I read or hear about like C-130Hcc and jmitch's, there are numerous stories about guys getting approved for things like indigestion and heartburn and stuff like that, with little to no effort required on their part. I work with a guy who got 10% for that very thing, and he didn't have to jump through many hoops to get it either. It makes no sense.

We called her "Eighteen Dirty Whore" at Yokota. She could be stubborn at times, but generally behaved. I flew her to lots of places around the pacific, including Papua New Guinea, Australia, the Philippines, and SE Asia for the REPAT efforts in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. Hope she continues to serve well in her new role...

I was on the Air Force's web site and I noticed a couple of articles about the CMSAF visiting various bases in PACAF. They were interesting, and it's good to see senior leadership getting out there and meeting the troops. Now to my observation: I noticed a link to Chief Roy's bio, so I clicked on it. He's been in for nearly 30 years, and looking at his ribbon rack on his blues, he has not ONE ribbon/medal/device from any sort of contingency/conflict/deployment/etc. I read his bio to confirm, and he spent his early years as a CE-type, then went into MPF, and ended up as the command chief at various (predominently) AETC bases. Curious, I looked further to see if there were any MAJCOM four stars with combat experience. I found ONE. The PACAF/CC has a silver star, a DFC, and a bunch of air medals. The ACC/CC? NOT ONE!!!! How is it possible that in our AF of today, almost all the senior leadership has ZERO COMBAT EXPERIENCE? What happened? How does a guy who's never done anything (by his own bio) end up as the CMSAF? How is it that the commander of ACC has ZERO combat experience? ACC has "combat" right in the title for cryin' out loud!!! Any thoughts? By the way, I'm a retired herk eng (retired in 2006) with a ton of time, both regular and combat. And I'm not special in any way when it comes to that.

UH-1F/P OV-10A T-33A C/JC/HC/MC/AC-130 All as a knuckle draggin' engine guy. C-130E/H/H-1/H-2 All as a flight engineer.

60 clean 45 dirty Have crews exceeded that? You bet. Exceeded it myself during an FCF. Not fun, or comfortable.

I was up at C-74 (Eglin Aux. Field 1) and looked around to see it there was any evidence of 74-1683 anywhere, but was unable to. I know all the salvageable "unique" parts were removed from the wreckage and then the remains were disposed of, but where? The only thing I've ever heard is that the wreckage was "buried" at C-5 or C-74. Anybody know more? By the way, for those interested, Aux Field 1 was also where the Doolittle Raiders trained. Lots of history there.

Correction, right wing.

Is it just me or is the left wing gonna hang over the road just a bit? Especially with that new intersection they just built there...

Yep, the E-model is 63-7872. I too watched the Chuck slowly get torn down. I think the Chuck was involved in the ill-fated "Stinger" gunship proposal, and I think the Herk is involved in gun tests as well, as it's parked next to A-22, which is the main gun test site, and the fact that the LH external is removed, making it easier to do "stuff" on the left side of the airplane.

Low thirties, Yokota to Elmo in an E-Model. An empty airplane, but with the standard gas stop fragged at Shemya. Once we got going, and I looked at the winds, I knew we could bypass that damn rock (got stuck there one day for a week) so I kept crunching the 1-1. By the time we were talking to Shemya on VHF, I told the pilot "Press on, let's get to Elmo, we got this thing" and so we put Shemya under the nose and pressed. By the time we checked in with Anchorage on VHF, we were in the high twenties and eventually stepped the old girl up to the low thirties. Of course, at that point we were sipping gas, with max cabin diff and a cabin at or near 10 grand. We took the obligatory picture of the altimeter with our name tags around it, and then dropped her into Elmo with plenty of gas to spare. Full stop, go to Humpy's, grab some halibut chunks and then on to Koots!