Nodding rapidly when starting take-off run

[hvogt]

A number of times I have seen videos from fighter pilots nodding their heads rather rapidly before beginning the take-off run, and I was wondering if somebody could explain the purpose of that manoeuvre to me. It seems that it is especially French pilots who do this.

An example can be seen here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awDFeHD4y1Q) (1:46 min).

[ShyTorque]

It's a "GO!" signal for the benefit of the other pilot(s) during a formation takeoff. :)

[Background Noise]

It's to signal to the wingman when to do something - in this case it is to release the brakes so that they begin the takeoff roll together.

[BOAC]

Les Anglais formidable are not afraid to remove leur main from the control column of a stationary avion de chasse. Of course, le pilot de chasse could have an escargot stuck up his nose.:)

[mikip]

Why would they need to nod to each other I thought that they would have that new fangled contraption what's it called oh yes 'wireless' that's it and it allowed people to talk to each other I don't know what will they think of next

[hum]

Wireless is unsecure, nods are for secret stuff ;)

[ThreadBaron]

... and are as good as a wink!

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a113/threadbaron/11949864711624136689smiley117svgmed.png

[glad rag]

.....sorry to butt in, but memory tells me there was a short Air Clues article about how to completly do over your wingman on take off with the nod and sundry signals...

..it was well read in the groundcrew crewroom with lots of smiles....:ooh:

[grandfer]

Sometimes the nod is preceded by a couple of taps with a hand on the front of the helmet (Oooh Matron!) at the start of a take-off roll.
:eek::\:eek:

[BEagle]

The 'chop' meant brakes off, the 'nod' meant burners a few seconds later.....

A Jag Mate :ooh: once described how he'd got some complicated 4-ship mission plan worked out in RAFG; leading his formation he also needed to start a stopwatch just before brakes-off for some obscure reason. So, wind-up signal, hack...and he knocked his stopwatch flying, so bent forward to pick it up....:\

When he looked back up, all he could see was 3 pairs of afterburners roaring....well, pottering....off ahead of him down Bruggen's runway.....:hmm:

[Future Hunter]

Radios are all well and good - but a busy frequency malfunctioning box/aircrew or any distraction could lead to your No.1 steaming off without you.

The main principle of formation is looking at each other - it's no.1's job to keep everybody else in - from the word 'go' to landing. Keeping eyes on is the main principle of everything. Pilots even learn how to communicate with gestures to explain they're out of fuel, have a system failure or want to slow down, level off or turn.

Singletons on carrier catapults are doing the same thing with the deck crew - everyone needs to work together and more importantly communicate effectiely. Big, deliberate gestures is the way it's done.

[The B Word]

Posted again! No idea why it was deleted! :confused:

I've seen the odd Pilot with a "twitch" that makes watching for the head tap very important or the whole formation could be "off"!!

[AARON O'DICKYDIDO]

;)

Perhaps the pilots seat is occupied by a nodding dog!

[hvogt]

Thank you, ShyTorque and Background Noise.

[Monty77]

From the back of my logbook, an exerpt from a longer article attributed to Sqn Ldr K.G.Holland, Wildenrath, Feb 1977. The article covers the brief, mission and debrief. This bit concerns the formation take-off.


"Improving the Needle

The best way to spread the already well-sown seeds of confusion is on the take-off. When everybody in the section is ready for the off, tap your head three times, nod it, wait five seconds, then let go the brakes. The take-off should then be a complete shambles but remember that the leader is always right. Anyway, it'll give them something to think about on the climb. The only other thing you can do is to call non-existent aircraft and roast the rest of the formation for not seeing them. The section is now mentally prepared for the fray."

Vintage stuff.

[Old-Duffer]

Unfortunately, killed taking off in a two seater Harrier from a forward site having forgotten to lower the flaps after taxying over wet ground. This was jun 82 and he was OC 4 Sqn by that time

[BOAC]

Only to be outdone by Mr Newman and 'Reheat Reheat GO!..........Now!'

Monty - you don't happen to have a copy of 'The Art of Coarse Combat' you can scan, do you?

KG's son was on here a year or so ago and we talked about it. My boss for a while. A sad loss. Well I recall his 'cosmic top trivia' stamp for useless paperwork. (Usually mine......)

[RetiredF4]

Well, the visual signal stuff was not developped and trained for the time when the radios are not functioning. Those procedures have been developped for combat operations in comm-out conditions.

It is possible to conduct a complete 4-ship low-level mission without doing one single radio call. We trained it, did it and it worked. There are signals for a variety of situations, with the whole aircraft, with hand or head signals, and finally close in with the grease pencil.

Comms can be jammed, can be listened at, can be jiggled with and they give away your position and finally your intention.

franzl

[Talk Reaction]

I once saw a pilot confuse the taps and nod and ended up headbutting his outstretched palm before letting off the brakes and leaving me and my student well behind as we could do nothing but laugh :)

Anymore good dits from the late SL Holland - never heard that before, class :D

[Duplo]

nod head, release brakes, then realise the parking brake is on..! Must be an F3 SOP...!!

[5 Forward 6 Back]

TR, we might know each other then; I've sat in the back with a stude who's done that! Three nods and a tap rather than three taps and a nod, and the rest of the take off roll berating himself...

[peppermint_jam]

Nodding in time to "Highway to the Danger Zone" perhaps? :}

[kharmael]

Parking Brake on the runway? Shocking

[Duplo]

wonder who taught him that..??!!

[BillieBob]

A copy of Dutch Holland's Air Clues article, The Art of Coarse Combat, is available here (http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1980/1980%20-%203869.html)

[Load Toad]

For some reason the thread title brings to mind Romanian orphans, deprived of stimulus...

[Shack37]

Nodding rapidly when starting take-off run



Sounds like ham footed clutchwork to me

[Talk Reaction]

Thanks BillieBob for the link, very amusing. If only I'd had such a guide as I ventured into ACT at Valley. Never before have I enjoyed something so much that I understood so poorly ;)

[Monty77]

With due respect to the originator bit of thread creep, but....

Taxying out one blustery day, front seat elects to re-engage gust lock in a Tucano as it's a long old taxi and the ailerons are windsurfing. Let's narrow this down to say, Yorkshire and the back seat name, well let's call him P*ps, as that's his name.

Line-up, cleared to go, look at the mental hares running about, hand of respect to geezer/geezerette in the caravan. Two hours to Happy Hour. Sweet.

Noise increases. Normal. Speed too. Normal.

Then all of a sudden, not normal anymore. Most of you reading will have been there. It's not normal, it's not in the f*cking FRCs and some bastard has just inserted a four foot icicle of terror up your jacksey.

P*p's day went from kushti to 'stan in about a second. Luckily for the slower amongst us, God stretches time in these situations and generously extends it to anything up to 3 days (7 if you involve the Home Office) while you can contemplate your forthcoming demise at your leisure, light a fag, bang off a Harry Potter sequel, fill in the blanks.

All P*p's got was the bizarre sensation of the aircraft trying to bunny hop down the runway. Right wing trying to get airborne, failing, the tricycle undercarriage giving it full-on Riverdance action, and a strange detached voice concealed by a bright light announcing that the more the speed thing increased, the more this was going to end badly for a certain P*ps.

Well, with Agatha Christie-like powers, all you rock stars have concluded it was Colonel Mustard in the front seat with the gust lock. Quite right! Spare a thought, if you will for P*ps. He is not idly perusing the net on his third glass of merlot. Oh no. He is approaching Vmakeabloodydecisionthathasn'tbeencovered. Apart from the icicle sensation, P*ps has 2 inputs that are prominent in his decision-making 'circle of need' or whatever other crap the hippies have come up with.

They are visual and audio and occur simultaneously. Visual is the disappearance of the flying helmet in front of him in a downwards direction. Audio is the gabbled, 'F*cking Hell! F*cking Hell! F*ckingHell!', which should be the preferred international distress message but is not, thanks in part to liberals and the UN.

This did not help P*ps, who had adopted the callsign 'Oh Well That's Just Fantastic' and had come to the conclusion that Colonel Mustard, having committed attempted Murder on the Runway, was making good his escape courtesy of our mutual friend Martin Baker. (Ed's note: the capital letters in Murder on the Runway are intentional, reflecting the author's intention to publish his memoirs, 'What Bloody Runway? I Was Flying a Helicopter!' and use the runway murder thing as a sequel. If that Andy McNab can do it, so can we.

Well, you can just picture it. There's P*ps, hand on yellow and black, blank seat in front, Tucano fairground ride in progress, and let's face it, the Tuc seat is no guarantor of life at 100 kts.

Got to crimp this short as I can hear mortars. Anyhoo, in standard fashion, the Handling Pilot announced the end of the emergency iaw SOPs and the Tucano got kind of gracefully airborne without ATC twigging a thing. It was, after all a Friday.

True though, most of it