More issues plague Russian Aircraft Carrier

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

There is a reason why some of those lines are painted on the deck. One of them is the maximum reach that an arresting cable can reach if it snaps. During recovery you are not in that area unless it is absolutely necessary. I was way up on the angle deck and the catwalk that I was on was below deck level. I was waiting for that last plane to land, so that I could go up and recover one of our helicopters. Safety is stressed heavily. My first days working on the flight deck, I was assigned to a Petty Officer in my shop. When we were on the flight deck, I was right behind him, literally holding on to his belt, while I learned my way around. First rule was to keep your head on a swivel. Keep looking around, be aware of what is going on around you. I zigged when I should have zagged one time and got blown head over heels down the deck for about 100 ft. when a Tomcat turned and I got caught in his jet blast. I wasn't hurt, thanks to the safety gear that I was wearing. After a while I was the guy who had someone holding on to his belt.

There are things that are not in the books. Lessons learned the hard way. When you are taking a break between launches and the Chief starts talking about the weird things that he has seen, you pay attention. He is passing on knowledge. Some where down the line you might find yourself about to get into one of the situations that he talked about and recognize it in time to prevent something bad from happening.

The Russians and Chinese don't have that institutional knowledge. From the most junior enlisted up to the Commander of the carrier group, they all have the same amount of experience. There is nobody who has been there, done that for them to learn from.

a reply to: Zaphod58 Would refueling them be a waste of money, with them being older ships are they not in need of more maintenance? I know you said "theoretically" but what is the likelihood of this actually happening. I guess maybe all out war, all hands on deck kind of situation?

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

All carriers undergo Refueling and Complex Overhaul (RCOH) around the 25 year mark or so. They spend a couple of years in the dock, while they're refueled and upgraded. It's expensive as hell, but worth it. But by the time they reach the end of their life, so much technology has changed that can be retrofitted into their hulls, and parts of them have been so irradiated that replacing them would be difficult.

a reply to: JIMC5499 Getting caught in a jet blast? That must have been some experience, I have been to Saint Martin, and their airport that is so close to the beach you would not believe it. You can literally almost touch airplanes as they land, and when they take off you get blasted by the jets down the beach, into the water.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

I used to love being behind them with engines running. I've been in vehicles that had to go between the wing and horizontal stabilizer of a -135 doing a full power engine run looking for leaks around the wing. Good times.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

We had a Tomcat on each of the bow catapults and two more right behind the jet blast deflectors waiting their turn on the catapults. We were launching a helicopter from the font of the angle deck, when our Flight Deck Chief starts yanking my life jacket off of me. Over time while maintaining the helos, grease had built up on my life jacket and it caught fire. We were in the North Atlantic and I had cold weather gear on under my vest, so I didn't feel the heat.

a reply to: Zaphod58 Sounds fun, like I said I was on the beach at Saint Martin and that thing blasted me across the median down the beach into the shallows, I was wiping sand out of my ears for days, haha.

a reply to: JIMC5499 That is something, I was in Serbia in 2008 and my Yugo caught fire, the oil canister was on top of a spare on top of the engine apparently. I was going through the mountains, when my car started smoking. Luckily I had good rental insurance lol.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

Our normal run spot was asphalt for some reason. We would run C-130s at full power, and just sit there watching as huge chunks of asphalt broke loose and went flying back into the field behind the spot. That would really ruin your day if you were standing behind that fence. Luckily the hammerheads are concrete.

a reply to: Zaphod58 That would get my adrenaline going for sure. I am from Hamilton, Ontario, we have a nice aircraft museum here. We have a Lancaster bomber, I had a chance to fly in one. It was really scary, I didn't want to back out though as I won it for free eon the radio.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

I'd give someone's right arm for that opportunity. I got to fly on a B-25 and that was fun. But there are only two Lancasters flying in the entire world, and one only just started flying after being restored like last year.

a reply to: Zaphod58 it was a rush man, really loud as well. The one in Coningsby, UK was the one that got restored I think. Didn't it catch fire or something? I remember because the one from Hamilton flew over there while the other one got restored, for veterans day or something like that.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

Yeah, they had some kind of serious issue with it, but I forget what off the top of my head. There's a third one being restored now in the UK.

a reply to: Zaphod58 Serbian Aviation Museum Here is a link to an aviation museum I have been to in Serbia. Nice Yugoslavian era planes on display.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

I would love to get to some of the Eastern European museums to see the old Soviet aircraft, and some of the Western parts and pieces that are there.

a reply to: Zaphod58 The third one is not airworthy for now I believe, it can only taxi down the runway. The issue with the Coningsby based one was a fire in the outer starboard engine. I think there are 14 more that are intact but not airworthy.

a reply to: Zaphod58 That website actually ahs a virtual tour and a really nice gallery, its not the same I know but still pretty fun to check out. I believe I linked you the page in English, if not top right hand corner has languages to select.

When I was living in Yugoslavia I had the chance to see a lot of cool stuff. Including airplanes and military vehicles of all sorts. Even now, going into Serbia and Croatia I see a lot of cool stuff.

a reply to: Zaphod58 Funny you say that about the parts and pieces, that museum has pieces of a Nighthawk and some UAV's. As well as an F16-C.

a reply to: LordOfDestruction

The one that they're working on now will see a lot of work done next year. It will eventually become airworthy, but isn't close now.

a reply to: Zaphod58 Do you think they purchase those parts or machine them? Or is there a common courtesy between the restoration teams and museums where they just exchange parts?