Time For Confessions!!
OK Spaz - yes, I was CQ'ing.
Having done so in the A-4M, I then went on to do it in the A-7.
On LEX, to get you around the deck in an A-4, they put a bar on the nose wheel with a competent matelot who steered you around. Simples!!
With the A-7, with refined nose wheel steering and a nose wheel launch bar rather than a strop, everything was controlled finely by a chap on the deck telling you what to do by wriggling his nose in the direction he wanted you to go. Add to that the pressure of having to fold the wings when moving, but lowering and locking them when behind a JBD (Jet Blast Deflector) with another aircraft at full power on the cat, and life got a little hectic. Certainly taxed my brain!!
So, after finally getting to the cat for my first shot, I wound the engine up to full power against the brakes, saluted the chap on the deck, and off I went. As I turned downwind ready for an approach to trap, the boat said "Didn't slow you down a knot, did it!!" I was concentrating on setting myself up for my second A-7 trap, so I didn't understand what that meant, and didn't have the brain cells to think about it any further.
Made a second trap, and went for another launch.
Then I noticed a pair of black lines down either side of Cat 1 - and realised that I had taken a shot with my wheel brakes fully locked.
Not my finest moment!!
But an example of the brain shutting down because of the stress of carrier ops.
I salute those who do it as a day - and more so, night - job on a regular basis with the added stress of real combat ops.