Wow, that’s chilling… but also quite impressive
Nothing to share with respect to the topic of this thread, but I just wanted to say that was the most delightful and vivid description I’ve ever read of a plane’s observable process for take-off. Had me laughing and simultaneously shaking my head in awe. Thanks so much for writing it out!
That almost happened to me when we were doing the endless paperwork that started Army life. A Marine paused and looked at my papers. It wasn’t until later that I found out they could take you. I barely made an acceptable Army guy; I would have made a terrible Marine.
During my stint in the USAF, I was the OIC of a bomb dump which had two sections. The larger section was for conventional munitions of all sorts, while the smaller section was devoted to special weapons. While both sections were under tight security, the special weapons area was especially secure, with the usual double gate system for entry inside of our normal perimeter. Access to this area was severely restricted and was guarded at all times by AF security personnel.
One day, I was in my office when I received a call from the security personnel at the entry gate to the special weapons area. Apparently there was a Lt Colonel who was temporarily acting for the wing commander (ill), and he wanted to inspect the area - which wouldn’t be allowed under normal circumstances, but he felt that it was his chance to see the area as he was the acting wing commander. He was insisting that he be allowed access, even though he was not on the access list.
I told the security staff to not let him in, and if he insisted that he be let in, to follow procedures, and I would be right there. I hung up, and drove over to the security gate, where the LC was spread on the ground with live weapons pointed at him. I told the troops to let him up, and explained the situation, telling him that the security troops had fooled the correct procedure…the troops were trying not to grin by this time…the LC proceeded to curse me out, and make a number of threats, and left in a huff.
The next day the wing commander called me into his office, congratulated me on the security incident and shook my hand. The LC apologized, and I went back to work after dropping past the security gate to pass on the good words of the wing commander.
Unfortunately I was not able to hear the wing commander’s remarks to his LC fill-in.
Yeah, that story’s been going around forever. When I first heard it, though, it was Turks, not Gurkhas.
This thread has inspired me to complete the second entry in the series:
I served in the US Army during the 00s but as someone doing computer security so I was stateside the entire time. Too many same-old stories about drunk arrests/fights, but the most entertaining story came I heard of (not direct witness) somebody on base got drunk, found a spent AT4 rocket launcher tube, got off-base on the side of a nearby freeway and was pointing the rocket at cars that passed by. Eventually the normal police and MPs showed up to arrest him, he dropped the tube and ran for it and got tackled by a bunch of cops. Got sent for a psych-eval and got mustered out of service on a General discharge I believe.
Moroccans in Italy too
“In his book “Up Front”, war cartoonist Bill Mauldin referred to the silent killing of one of a pair of sleeping soldiers (thus leaving one alive to awaken and find the other) as ‘an old Ghoum trick.’”
I was on a detachment in St. Thomas, VI (tough duty, I know). Some of us went to one of the beaches one day with a couple of coolers of beer and such. We’re slogging along the beach and passed some older people sitting on beach chairs. One of them must have noticed the short hair and called out “Hey, who are you guys?” I replied “Seabees!” He said “Seabees?! I thought they were disbanded after WWII!”. I stopped in my tracks, dropped my cooler, turned to the other guys and said “Hey guys! The war’s over!”
Basic was 6 weeks at camp, kinda fun. Then two years of school, learning and teaching, followed by two years analog computer experience based in Las Vegas Nevada. Went in a kid and got out with a career.
A friend of mine had a unique experience. He enlisted in the Navy in Clovis New Mexico. They put him on a bus to Lordsburg NM where the new recruits boarded a train. In the middle of Arizona their cars were decoupled onto a siding. Two Pullman cars and a diner car in the middle of nowhere waiting for another car load of recruits. They read, ate and played ball for a week and he decided the Navy was an even better deal than he’d imagined. It all changed when he got to San Diego.
I have heard the “opposite” story from a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend-…: something along the lines of, a couple of sentries at an army base at night were smoking and goofing off and otherwise not properly guarding, when a colonel showed up and did not like what he saw. He asks the fuck-ups for the name of their commanding officer, and while they were hemming and hawing, he smoothly picks up one of their weapons from where they left them leaning against the wall and points it at them, maybe that will help refresh their memory. They were scared shitless about what would go down in the morning, but, in this story anyway, they lucked out as there were bigger fish to fry that day.
USS Philadelphia?
Correct.
I am amazed the damn freighter didn’t snap you guys in half, I know nuclear boats are sturdy, but a freighter weighs 5 times as much.
The story I have is my partners brother in law. He was the XO of a frigate and they had returned from a long deployment. He had always promised his wife (my partners’s sister) that they would take a vacation Italy, something she really wanted as she is an artist by training.
His ships been moved to dry dock or whatever they do for maintenance for a ship at the end of a long at sea deployment, so he thought, well nows the time and they went. A day or so after they arrived, the 2019 Indo-Pak crises began and his ship was ordered to sea post haste, and he was directed to return home as soon as possible, which led to a whole day at the embassy in Rome trying to arrange his passage home. (I guess ships in dry dock take a bit longer to get ready to go to sea, so they could wait for him?)
They are out for months again,
The following year, he has been posted to a nice desk job and they decide nows the time to properly take that holiday, which had been cut short.
A couple of days after they arrived, the Covid lockdowns began and once again they had to get the embassy to help them return.
The main story is, that fucker shouldn’t go to Italy.
Joined the Navy under a delayed entry program, left for boot camp a week after graduating from high school Enlisted under the Nuclear Power program, meant a lot of schooling and a 6 year enlistment. While in “A” school at Great Lakes, I was told they were dropping me and a few thousand others from the NP programs, they had too many people already. This also meant I only had to serve 4 years and I was give preferential selection for my first duty station. I ended up at Whidbey Island Naval Air Station in Washington, only 100 mile from my home town. After 2 years at Whidbey I was transferred to San Diego and assigned to a submarine tender. This was the only time I ever went to sea, February of 1979 we spent 22 days at sea and went to Mazatlán and Acapulco. June of '79 I was offered $6000 in cash and orders to an aircraft carrier to reenlist for another 4 years. I said no, I had been offered a job by San Diego Telecom after I got out. Before starting my new job, I went home and stayed. Ended up working for Boeing for 40 years.
If anyone could have skated through 4 years of service in the Navy, I did it. I found the work to be easy, extra duties were meaningful. One of these extra duties was being part of the Whidbey Honor Guard, we provided a 21 gun salute to veterans that had passed. The only time I got in trouble it was a hoot. One rainy morning I walked by a junior officer and failed to salute him. He gave me a quick butt chewing and reminded me I was saluting the uniform, not him. I saw him a few weeks later and I snapped a smart salute and pronounced “Good morning Uniform”. Avoided Captain’s Mast but ended up restricted to base for a week. Ended up being a good friend with this guy due to the fact we both liked watching auto racing.
Wow - quite a saga.
As a former US Navy destroyer officer, what strikes me is that the CO was apparently not on the bridge. This was absolutely standard practice when we were operating in any restricted waters, even when it meant major loss of sleep for the Captain.
We junior officers took this as normal and indeed mandatory Navy-wide - and it made all sorts of sense: it was clear that the Captain would always be held fully responsible for the consequences of any screw-up by anyone.
I had a similar experience on a destroyer, of the Captain always being there even if it meant no sleep, but the counter to that is sometimes… maybe it’s a bad idea to have the Captain be the final backstop to prevent a catastrophe while being sleep deprived?
See, for example, USS Porter, USS Port Royal, USS John S. McCain, etc., etc. The Captain on the bridge and calling shots for all of them, and all of them disasters, with the latter being fatal for ten sailors who were drowned in their bunks (or “racks” as we might call them).
After the captain and others were fired, the temporary replacement CO (a fiery and experienced O-6 who had already finished a sub command tour) took all the officers into the wardroom, chewed us out, and told us the only reason we were still alive is that the Navy builds subs out of very high quality steel.
I’ll echo the sentiment that sleep deprivation really needs to be considered just as dangerous to ships and crew as lack of training and equipment malfunction, and it wasn’t (not even close) when I served. When I served, lack of sleep was a point of pride, and sailors and officers who complained of tiredness after 24+ hours of being awake were often mocked. My record for time without a wink of sleep was about 44 hours. I’m sure many have gone for much longer.
8 hours for sleep (*plus stolen catnaps) out of every 72, for an entire six-month deployment. The only exception was during port calls a few days at a time. Even then, instead of catching up on their sleep, the young sailors and Marines would be awake all night in town with the b-girls wringing every last possible drop from their seminal vesicles
*one youngster snuck into a watertight compartment to sneak a nap. Somebody threw a switch and sucked all the air out. Our first fatality