Coolest flight you've been on?

[jblomenberg16]

Hmm...no miliatary experience for me, so don't have any of those flights to talk about.

My coolest three are;

1) Flying with my grandpa when I was a kid in his J-3 Cub. Used to leave the "doors" open on the right side (cub guys know what I mean) and would put the plane in a fairly steep right hand bank. He would put the wing on a point, like the barn on the farm, and then turn so the barn always was on that wing. It was a near perfect, unobstructed view of the ground. I always enjoyd flying with Grandpa as a kid. As I got older he'd let me fly when we were up in the air.


2) Over Christmas I flew with my uncle off of the family farm in his plane (think it was a 172, not for sure...definitely a 4 seat, high wing tricycle gear prop plane). I hadn't been up in a small plane at the family farm for several years. We taxied to the end of the runway - a grass strip between fields - , took off, and he said, you wanna fly? He gave me some brief lessons (all while he was also on the controls) and allowed me to fly for about 20 minutes or so, including basic navigation by sight (north south / east west roads, landmarks, etc.) and by compass heading. Man, I had forgotten how much I loved flying until he took me up.


3) Honeymoon in Kauai about 7 years ago. We took a helo tour through the Waimai (sp) Canyon in a very small, nimble helo. Pilot was a Vietnam vet that could really handle that thing. No doors, just the awesome sensation of flight. Almost lost the video camera out the door though...good thing my hand was through the hand strap!

 

[60Driver]

My opponent is about to have a Bad Day...

Repped for having that guy dead to rights...but gotta ask even if you are the HMFIC...did you manage to convert that energy postion into a guns solution or did you overshoot

 

[Woodsman]

Unfortunately no pictures of this, but I managed to swing a ride in a dual seat P-47 for about 30 minutes flying around E-ville many moons ago. I bet that was the last low pass made at Dress Regional. Man was that a hoot.

I'll never forget that.

Another one was in a helicopter in Kauai. Flying along at about 500 ft over land and then out over a sheer cliff that dropped about 1500 feet to the ocean. Right after we took a tour through a dormant volcano that had half its side gone. I was sitting right seat so I got to see everything from the bubble. Another memorable ride. The lady in the rear seat lost her lunch!

 

[WhitleyStu]

Years ago when the Stinson Tri-Motor was at the Auburn Cord Duisenberg festival in Auburn, Indiana, my wife and I took a ride in it. The cool part was its sides were canvas. Several years later we took a ride in Fort Wayne Air Service’s P-51 Mustang. Sadly it crashed a few years ago and was destroyed.

 

[Scutter01]

Repped for having that guy dead to rights...but gotta ask even if you are the HMFIC...did you manage to convert that energy postion into a guns solution or did you overshoot

It was 10 years ago, but IIRC it was supposed to be a high yo-yo, but I over-controlled and it just about became an inside loop. By the time I hit apogee, I had already lost considerable airspeed. I just pulled the throttle back hard and drifted in behind. He was already going probably close to 200 knots after coming off of his own yo-yo, so it wasn't too hard.

Here's the guncam proof right after that turn. Note the smoke...

Found another pic, BTW. There was a "500-foot bubble" rule, but there was also a "If You Ain't Cheating, You Ain't Trying" rule. I broke the first but not the second.

 

[Stschil]

I had a 1LT friend who was a Cobra Pilot stationed in Nelligen, Germany.
We were avid rock climbers, so we would do map recons to find new faces to scale. Every once in a while, he would call me and say that he'd arranged some 'training' time and we would recon them from his Cobra. I'd get to sit in the front lower seat during these flights.....Never anything cooler for me!

I wish I still had the gun sight video of this but it "disappeared" with an entire crate of hold baggage during a PCS move to Germany in the late 80's.

 

[50bmgshooter]

Did you have to pay for that?

No, it's good to have great friends!

 

[kedie]

Ever do that in the right rear seat? The only doors open blackhawk flight I went on, that's where I was at. The rotor wash so so bad I could barely keep my eyes open. I don't think my k pot webbing touched my head the whole flight.

Yup, we called it the hell seat.

 

[Tactical Dave]

KC-135 while they were refuling some of my fathers then F-16's........ a few years later he got to fly in and fly an F-16 (he is a crew chief)... I want to go on a B-17 flight soon.

 

[Grizhicks]

January '88, flight out of Seattle to Indy, plane banked right over Mt Rainier. Just like looking at a topo map; wish I could have taken a picture. -- Greg

 

[KingWeb50]

Definitely a ride on a CH-46 Sea Knight from a supply ship to a destroyer while at sea. Loved the brief where they stated that we shouldn't worry about the dripping hydraulic fluid. We should worry if they stop dripping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was scared every time we were on a 46. All the shaking and rattling I thought it was going to come apart and crash. Now the 53's we were on a few times were nice and smooth.

 

[jeremy]

Coolest Rotary Wing...

I got to sit in the doors of a Huey a couple of times.
Got to ride the skids on a Little Bird too. That was just freaking insane!
Got to sit in the Gunners Seat of an Apache. Would have been so much cooler if I could have got to be the gunner...

Coolest Fixed Wing...

Got to ride in a B-52.
The trips in an MC-130 and an AC-130 were pretty neat too though.

 

[Tactical Dave]

Definitely a ride on a CH-46 Sea Knight from a supply ship to a destroyer while at sea. Loved the brief where they stated that we shouldn't worry about the dripping hydraulic fluid. We should worry if they stop dripping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dripping hydro means you have hydro and are good....... when it stops dripping it means you no longer have hydro and the pump has probably allready gernaded itself haha.

It is like the old Radial engines, if they are not leaking oil then it does not have oil in it........

 

[grimor]

I've been in/on KC-135, C-5, old tail dragger Cessnas and who knows what else commercially.. I don't have pics of most of em.

here's some I do have...

that was a much better flight than some others....

 

[HandK]

Got to fly in a Bellanca Loops, Barrel rolls, Inverted flight and a hammerhead stall, I also flew a Piper Warrior, 140, Tomahawk, Bell Jet Ranger. Here is a picture of me in the Jet Ranger. I have a bunch of old Pictures of me doing Crash & dashes but need to scan them in!

 

[Jay]

My father and Gen Curtis Lemay, developed the concept for the "Looking Glass Aircraft". Here's a pic of Gen LeMay, with dad in the right seat, and I took the pic just before we took off.

Here's a cut-away pic of the "Night Watch" aircraft....

...and a pic of the first "Night Watch" aircraft signed by the members of the 1001st Command Control Sqdn, at Andrews AFB

 

[Blackhawk2001]

Yup, we called it the hell seat.

I've flown in that seat. Fortunately, I could just put my helmet visor down and cut most of the wind.

Probably my most memorable flight in almost 40 years of aviation, was when I was able to take my wife and my son for a ride in a Bell 47J just after I had finished my helicopter CFI course. The Bell 47J is a M*A*S*H-style helicopter, for this model, the pilot's station is right in the middle of the cockpit, so my son sat on one side of me and my wife sat on the other side as we flew low over the Oregon countryside.

Probably my most interesting ride as a passenger was the C-130 ride from Kuwait to Al Asad after dark. That combat approach was...interesting; it surpassed our C-141 ride to Puerto Rico flying in behind a hurricane...

 

[femurphy77]

I had the opportunity to ride on a test hop on an Airbus A320 after a heavy maintenance overhaul. It's amazing what a plane that size is capable of doing! I have to say that roller coasters don't bother me but much to the enjoyment of the flight crew I was more than READY to deplane after landing!

That plane is fly by wire and they had to ensure that the computer safeties would not allow the human factor to do stupid things that would cause the plane to crash. The pilot would try to force the plane to do things it shouldn't like roll inverted or take off straight up and then they would wait for the computer to take over and correct/compensate for the pilot inputs.

 

[Colt556]

I was in Civil Air Patrol when I was a kid and spent several weeks each summer on different Air Force bases. I worked on weapons systems/avionics on A7E when I was in the Navy later on. I've been around many military and civilian a/c. I've flown in KC135s, P2s, P3s, A37s, Cessnas, Beechcrafts, Wacos several other military/civilian aircraft. But the coolest plane I have flown in would probably be the B24 "Witchcraft" a few summers ago! The B17 got all the glory but the B24 could carry a larger load farther and faster. I have quite a few pictures and will post some later. The B17 "Nine O Nine and a P51C were there that day too. The Mustang was gorgeous! Most ppl like the P51Ds but I really like the earlier B and C models. I really wish I'd stayed in the Navy and made a career of it. One of the guys I joined with just retired as a Master Chief!

 

[Tactical Dave]

Probably my most interesting ride as a passenger was the C-130 ride from Kuwait to Al Asad after dark. That combat approach was...interesting;

I got to watch "dash cam video" of a 130 doing a combat take off on a less the great run way. Sides of the runway had markers, if you were not at a certian speed by each one you were pretty much going to die by runing into some huge craters....... you also had to line up with marks on the pavement to help avoid the other craters that are in the "useable" section of the run way.

Never seen anything like it....

Another was a 130 combat landing that was pretty nuts..... when you landed and pulled onto the taxi way you had to do a max effort turn once you were ont the taxi way... if not you would end up an a HUGE ditch that at night you can't see well even with NVG's due to how far up you are sitting....... apparently everyone was amazed that at the time nobody had crashed into it...... that was in Afgan.