Interesting Planes You Have Worked On or Been On

[hiss srq]

I have a pretty big list.
Air Force 2 is hands down the coolest though. I missed getting to handle AF1 in SRQ a few years ago by a couple of months.
A NAA 757 flying an immigration charter from SRQ. The asphault on the part of the ramp where it had to be parked was pretty fresh and unstressed at Dolphin Aviation After we put 8,000 gallons of Jet-A on board she sank a bit into the ramp. They had to actually use a bit of extra thrust to get her out leaving the imprints of a 757 landing gear on the Northwest side of the ramp boardering Alpha at SRQ. Numerous Navy fighters and a NASA T38 are included. A pair of TED A320's in one day. Both took lightning strikes and diverted to SRQ while enroute to MCO from points west. That was my first experince using the drip sticks on an Airbus. N727EC, Pharmair's former DC9, N8860, John Travolta's G3, A KC135 that diverted to SRQ after overstressing while passing through a nasty thunderstorm on the way back to MacDill. (There was a crease in the fusealage just forward of the wing root) A UPS 767-300 which transported a sick whale to the Mote Marine Aquarium, we topped off a Evergreen 747-200 as well once using 3 fuel trucks and totaling around 12,000 gallons and routinely took care of Terry Bradshaw's Lear 31 during the off season. On that note Gov. Jeb Bush used to frequent SRQ in the states Citation and KingAir 200 as well. He was always a treat. How about you guys? I know Phil has some amazing experinces.

[coachrowsey]

Mine is nothing compared to most of you all, but I love the DC3's.

[Derf]

I have been on AF1 and AF 2, mutible Concordes and the Hurricane hunter, Flying Eye hospital, Last flying F-14 and too many other aircraft that are noteworthy. I only put the best flights I have pictures of below. But have Lots of Great memories of other aircrafts that I have been on, in or around.


Me in a Connie


B-17 with Kings Park in the backround


Me in my Favorite T-6


An oldie...got oil all over my lens!!!


then there was my ride in this

[cancidas]

through my fueling job in CA:

USN Blue Angels
USAF West A-10s
USAF T-43s
USAF C-17s
USAF/USMC C-130s
CANFORCE Snowbirds
CANFORCE CT-142
CANFORCE CF-18s
USMC AV-8B -----> hot fuel on the ramp in SNS!

N771TA --> Tutima Academy Extra
N772TA --> Tutima Academy Extra
N260SP --> The Oracle Challenger

thats all i remember, more later maybe.

[SengaB]

1980-83 flew back and forth to Korea and Japan. At 6 years old never thought of even picking up a camera.
C-5 Galaxy. On one C-5 flight we had a tank behind us in the Cargo Bay.
C-141 Star Lifter
C-130 Hercules
In both the C-141s and C-5s were in the Vietnam Camouflage and the Air Force White and Grey Black nose livery.
Not many people can say they flew on a USAF C-130 from Kimpo International to Tokyo Japan to spend a few days at Disneyland :)

Senga

[cancidas]

senga, that's awesome! only been on a C-5 once, never even set foot on a C-141.


i did forget one... USMC's Faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat Albert! have amazing shots of the Snowbirds during a practice flight when my fuel truck broke down and i got stuck out at the a/c.

[SengaB]

Matt,
One one of the USAF trips to Korea I remember they crew gave us kids a cockpit tour at 30,000ft+. That was pretty cool too. That was really the only time was able to look outside. We also had ear plugs too. Sitting in a dark smelly cavernous screaming machine for 14 hours is is hard for a kid :) The C-130 rides ...even though I always had a window seat we all faced inward since it was a Cargo/ Jump plane. It was really cool because you walked out onto the flight line to be greeted by dozens and dozens of C-141s, C-5 and C-130s and they usually. I wish parents had put a camera in my hand back then.

If you have pix please post them.

Senga

[m.marra]

*Flew out of MaGuire AFB on C-141 refueling mission with the Civil Air Patrol back in the early 90's. Was able to sit in the cockpit while being refueled by a KC-135.
*First Solo flight in Cessna 172 at Brookhaven in 1996.
*Flew from PHL to Frankfurt, GE on American Trans Air L1011 in 96. Took photo at JFK of the same a/c a couple years earlier. Also had chance to sit in the cockpit while flying over my house on Long Island.
*C-130 mission from Ramstein AB, to Istres, FR. Sat in cockpit the entire trip. French controllers vectored us to the wrong airfield; decended to 1000 ft; then went direct to Istris at that altitude. We toured the U-2 hangers; unloaded the A/C; couldn't go off base for some reason, so ate BK for lunch on the rear deck of the C-130. On the way back to Ramstein, we flew into a live MOA with live fire exercise going on. ATC was vectoring us directly into a thunderstorm, and this was the only way around. Then to top off the excitement, we had to shut down and feather one of the engines for low oil pressure. Because of the engine shutdown, we had to declare an emergency landing at Ramstein.
*C-130 mission from Ramstein to Grafenwöhr Army Airfield. This trip is noteable because we got to do an assault landing and T/O on Grafenwöhr's shot runway.
*Cockpit ride in Singapore Airlines 744 over Atlantic Ocean and again from Calverton, LI to JFK in 1997. The captain was a Singapore NG C-130 pilot. This was the first time on a 747. I learned many neat things about the a/c. We broke out of the clowds at 400' and landed on 22L at JFK. Everything was on autopilot until we lined up on the ILS to rwy 22L, then the pilots landed manually. I don't know if this still holds true today, but they mentioned that it was a requirement to land w/o the autopilot engaged. I also found it interesting that the pilots said if we did a missed approach, the 747's main gear would actually be on the ground before the a/c would begin its climb out. The map displays also cought my eye as we taxied to the gate. You could ulmost taxi by your instraments instead of looking outside. This was back in 97, I can imagine what they have now! Very cool flight!

[cancidas]

If you have pix please post them.

no pix, i was "working" and back then didn't own a camera. only took along a spare flightsuit, enough sock and drawers for a couple days.

[moose135]

I've gotten a handful of rides in C-130s, and three or four in C-141s, including at least one riding in the cockpit during a low level training flight (OK, so "low level" was 1,000 feet, but still...) Also got a few UH-1 rides. On the civilian side, my first airplane trip was on a Convair 880.

Maybe the most fun ride I've had was in this:





As a pilot, I've flown the T-37, T-38, and about 4 flavors of -135, both as tanker and receiver.

[Iberia A340-600]

I have been on a few C-5's at SWF and had the opportunity to get on G-BOAD at JFK during Concorde Day 2003 but probably the most interesting plane I have been on was the Polish TU-154. I never thought I would find myself on-board a Russian built aircraft, let alone one acting as a presidential transport aircraft!

[Jetinder]

Been on Concorde, Boeing 737, Boeing 747-400, Airbus A320 (one which looks like a 737) and a glider.

[Nick]

While at Luke I launched out F-16 90-0778. This D model has the distinction of having the first AIM-120 kill by the USAF. I took a NY ANG C-5 to Afghanistan and was lucky ( not ) enough to be on- board for some AR. Talk about turbulence, I nearly puked right there in my seat. At Sheppard we trained on the first F-16 to hit 6,000 Flt Hrs, it came from Edwards and still had it's Chase Plane paint scheme of orange / white. Of course, I've had a few H-60 rides, and flying in a helicopter has been my most enjoyable flight experience to date.

[sirloin]

I've not really been on any particularly noteworthy aircraft during a flight (well, I guess SWA's first 737-500, which I believe was formerly one of the prototypes), but I did get to enjoy a trip on a UA 747-400 from ORD to IAD a couple weeks ago.

[markg]

My best flight was on an Aer Lingus Dragon Rapide out of Manchester (MAN)

Pretty scary having a Boeing 747 following you down the taxiway, but the flight was outstanding.