ldschmidt29

I'm looking into the 136th Texas air national guard, and was wondering if anyone was from there?

wish we had those, going around packs with the long cord is a pain.

I'll believe it when I see it.

VMGR-452 is sending 2 planes tomorrow to hual goods from cherrypoint NC to Haiti. Hoping to get on the next rotation!

centerline! thanks for catching that...

Oh ya, there is always something they know that you don't!!! And they always make you feel really dumb for not knowing, lol.

I've seen the ladder in Tool Room, never seen anyone use it though. On one of my check rides the Instructor asked me what the connection points on the Vertical Stab were, luckily I had seen the ladders once before and was one step ahead of him.

Aux tanks are basically cargo weight, the are so close to CG that it won't throw off you weight and balance.

Went to look at the Libyan C-130s on Google maps, and I found a F-22 on the runway 29 over the displaced threshold, thought it was pretty neat.

Thanks!

I know this is a really old thread but I was reading Herk "hero of the skies" and it tells the story of the 'four horseman' and I would love to see more footage of it. I found a short clip on youtube, but it seemed to be just a tease. Thanks for any help!

Awesome video.

Marine FE's used to come from the ranks of the Herk maintenance department exclusively. One had to be a CDI (collateral duty inspector) prior to entering flight training as a FM. Once qualified you could follow on to be an engineer after a couple of years of experience. As the need for FE's grew the MOS became open to other platforms as the F-4's, A-4's and OV-10's were retired. The MOS manual was changed to reflect that the qualified candidate had to have an aviation MOS as a prerequisite. Eventually it was opened up even further to basically anyone that could breathe. We were inundated with grunts and truck drivers for a while. Very few (less than 10%) made it through training.

All FE training was conducted in house until around 1986 when the schoolhouse was opened at MCAS Cherry Point. Pilots, Navigators, and Radio Operators (LM) were trained there as well.

In 1993 a new MOS was created in order to become a feeder for the FE MOS. We would take brand new Marines fresh from aviation maintenance training at Memphis/Pensacola and put them through FM training. What was supposed to happen was that we'd have this pool of qualified fliers to pick from for FE training. As with almost all first term enlistee's, most of them got out, so the pool wasn't so big afterall.

The introduction of the KC-130J changed all that. Some of the FE's left for the reserve units in TX and NY. The ones that didn't (or couldn't) were converted to crew chiefs. Quite a few got out or retired. The schoolhouse has since been decommissioned and all initial training is conducted at Little Rock for the "J". The two reserve units train there own FM's and FE's now. And most of thier students come from the Herk maintenance department.

Someone said it earlier, what goes around comes around...

I am currently a FM for VMGR-452 And this pretty much describes my training. I went through boot camp, Marine Combat Training, then on to Pensacola for water survival training (aircrew candidate school), after candidate school you go over to the navy school house and attend there AD school which is a power plants school where you learn the basics, Then they ship you off to Brunswick Maine where you go to a 2 1/2 week SERE school. After SERE school I was sent to Cherry Point MCAS and went to J model Crew Chief Ground school. From there their was a slot open to VMGR-452 on the "Old Plane" that no one else wanted, I thought it would be neat to learn the old one too, figured the chance wouldn't be there for long. So I got qualified for flight training on the J and left for NY to start FM ground school in house at NY, which was by far the hardest training I had been through. After I passed the ground phase I started flight phase, after completing all my codes and a check ride I finally got pined and received my wings. FE's are picked from the FM but very few do it, most of us get out. I only know three that have tried to become FE's and two of them have dropped out of FE training. I have been pondering the idea of FE training but with a family to take care of it is very hard FE students fly MANY hours to try and learn and get qualified ASAP, and it is not easy. FE training is supposed to be coming to an end but with budget cuts I don't foresee us getting J models soon as promised many times before.

VMGR-452 was supposed to get There J's 2010, now they are saying 2012 until we get our first one then maybe longer for the next. But we are jsut a reserve squadron so active duty had the priority.