12 O'Clock at seven miles. [Archive]

glad rag

25th Oct 2018, 15:09

Having spent more than a few days at the Fort Bragg Drop Zones.....and nights.....then Missus Sasless almost collected on my Life Insurance.

DZ's during mass drops are not places to hang around day dreaming....as it rains Army Kit of all sizes and descriptions.

The sequence where the Wheel Loader goes for an un-manned tour of the DZ causes me to laugh everytime I view this.

that is so funny [in a militarily humour sort of way ie f#####g epic!]

you can imagine the PC brigade saying that someone could get hurt, All the whilst there's men and kit whistling down from the skies "Yeah Really" :ok:

it's ok. I've stopped crying now...

dragartist

25th Oct 2018, 15:54

SAS, I remember AA62 putting some pictures up on the C130 thread of a UK platform trashing the commanders jeep parked at or near the DZ marker board.
I have heard a few rumours from my time in Airdrop that a few DZs in UK and overseas have been missed by airdropped stores. Never got reported or covered up because it may lead to too much paperwork.
Do they still run the Malfunction conference at Ft Lee? The reports from there were always funny. (Ha ha) Not much of a formal investigation but the assembly would take a vote on the probable cause.
i remember trying to construct the Safety Case for the dash 4a when we first had the J model. The number of inadvertent early releases was staggering. What they never recorded was the number of drops conducted each year. In reality the rate was small. Uk would undertake as many drops in a year as the US did in a day.

Roadster280

25th Oct 2018, 16:23

Question for Air Despatchers or Loadies. Or even WSOps these days.

In the video clip in the OP, three blokes follow the "chalk" of vehicles down the hold toward the open ramp. They don't appear to be attached to the aircraft at all, with the ramp open and the load gone on that side.

Is that "ops normal"? Or should they have been wearing some form of harness/restraint?

Danny42C

25th Oct 2018, 17:27

Long, long ago a Canberra dropped a practice bomb on the Theddlethorpe ranges.

It went rather wide, landing on the "Prussian Queen" pub (to be exact, on the Ladies, luckily unoccupied at the time). It destroyed the porcelain, but the seat was recovered and given pride of place behind the Lounge Bar.

Questions were asked in the House (there is a Hansard record, which I cannot readily trace now). Older readers may recall the incident (1950s).

Just thought I'd mention it.

oldbeefer

25th Oct 2018, 18:46

Then there were the two A10s who, after landing at Shawbury, asked for taxy instruction to be told 'you're not here - you must have landed at Sleap' (civvy airfield 5 nm from SHY with similar runway layout).

57mm

25th Oct 2018, 18:55

As did OC2 Sqn at Valley in his Gnat......

BEagle

25th Oct 2018, 19:02

Whilst our regular Nav Plotter was away on the anti-honking course, we were issued with some old git who'd been on Lincolns. On one occasion, back in his Lincoln days, they'd been tasked with some night radar bombing practice and had identified the range target, before releasing a significant number of real 1000 lb bombs....

Except that it wasn't the range at all. It was a similar looking European island, but with one crucial difference....

….it was a wildlife sanctuary. Unfortunately several hundred, if not thousand, wildfowl were sadly obliterated. Questions were asked in very high places - but received the usual (for those days) "Shouldn't have lost the war, eh Fritz?" response and the incident was brushed aside with no further ado...

BEagle

25th Oct 2018, 19:07

As did OC2 Sqn at Valley in his Gnat......

He did indeed. According to a mate who was there at the time, the 1 Sqn 4FTS students wanted to prepare a banner to welcome him back to Valley, which read "WELCOME TO RAF ST MAWGAN!", but were advised that this would NOT be a very good idea...

Chugalug2

25th Oct 2018, 19:59

Great video SASless. The concept of driverless vehicles simply...well, driving off the moment they land, could surely be developed further. Combined with smart technology they could close with the enemy, engage, and run up the appropriate flag when successful. What could possibly go wrong?

SASless

25th Oct 2018, 20:43

Talk about being the topic of discussion for missing your intended target......this crew really got the full attention of everyone that day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHMhClzfoi8

VX275

25th Oct 2018, 21:29

The following set of 'Laws' was presented at a RAeS lecture on Aerodynamic Decelerators (a posh name for a parachute). Although these laws were American in origin, during my several years testing Airdrop systems at Boscombe I'm happy to report that they are also applicable to UK systems. Butlers Laws1. The descending parachute and test item will not weathercock; they will, however, home on to the most expensive object on the drop zone.2. The quality of the photographic coverage, telemetry data and all other instrumentation recordings will be inversely proportional to the value of the information obtained.3. The tighter the budget or the time constraints become, the more likely the parachute will malfunction or the instrumentation will fail.4. The higher the rank of a visiting observer, the greater the probability of a catastrophic failure or malfunction. To ensure the maximum damage to the project, have them park their new Mercedes on or near the drop zone (see law 1).5. The personnel recovering the equipment under test will exert maximum effort to obscure any valid conclusions that may be drawn from an examination of the equipment.6. The manufacture of the parachute or load will exert maximum effort to obscure any design errors they have incorporated; they will also exert maximum effort to make subtle changes to their design or test conditions in order to maximise the perceived benefits of their design.7. All personnel involved will exert maximum effort to blame someone else in the event of a cock-up. In the case of a massive cock-up, the degree of creativity exhibited by the explanation is exponentially related to the cost of the cock-up. This creativity is wasted though because the cause of a massive cock-up is obvious even to senior management.9. The schedule and budget will depart from the projected values at an ever increasing rate as the project progresses; the only way to prevent this is to avoid making a schedule and budget in the first place.10. The probability of aircraft support, range time, and support personnel all being available is very high; however, the probability of all these being available at the same time is approximately zero for any given date more than 30 minutes in the future.

oxenos

25th Oct 2018, 22:02

The first VC10 to arrive at Gan was (allegedly) greeted with a large banner saying WELCOME TO COCOS. Courtesy of the 205 Sqn. SAR Shackleton crew.

NutLoose

25th Oct 2018, 22:13

Or the Army Lynx landing on at Odiham in bad weather when asked what they could see, replied the DanAir 737 at Lasham

dragartist

26th Oct 2018, 07:18

Love it VX, have suffered most of those effects, particularly #5 on numerous occasions.
the comments above regarding the crew running to the ramp was always one of my bug bears. They always got in the way of the camera trying to capture the moment it went wrong. No idea why they insisted in doing that. Not sure if they thought they could defy gravity and catch an MSP or PURIBAD before it went over the ramp.
At least our lot wore a harnes!

ancientaviator62

26th Oct 2018, 10:17

dragartist,
if your comment refers to the Loadmasters following the load out of the a/c then I at least used to do it partly out of relief when I saw that all was well and partly to provide an eyewitness account if all was not well ! Especially on trials. Cameras did not always catch all the action. Then on the heavy drop to retrieve the transfer release cable.
Yes on a Volant Rodeo exercise Dougie M put the platform bang on the DZ marker. This did indeed result in the vehicle being a write off. Doug may still have the pic.
I do not know about the USAF rules for the loadmasters but in the RAF in my time on airdrops before any ramp or door was opened you had to be wearing your safety harness and have it hooked up to an anchor cable. This was the SOP, and was an instant fail on any air check if you did not.
The comment by Mogwi is IMHO correct. It is how the fall of stores was reported to the a/c crew based on the clock (and an estimate of the distance from the DZ letter) with twelve o'clock at the farend of the Dz and six o'clock at the start. So in the clip shown the platform is off the far end of the DZ at twelve o'clock.
Best wishes.
Bill

dragartist

26th Oct 2018, 15:57

Good to hear from you AA62, hope things are well.
it was always the same during trials, so many people on board they all wanted a closer look.
in spite of a reminder during the brief they all made a run for it.
not sure if I sent you the film I had of a US loadmaster almost following the load out but saved himself by hanging onto the jack. It was a very early model with no paint and the big conspicuous USAF star. May see it on you tube.
the US loadmasters wore chutes so I believe.
I don’t think the UK version of the MIsshap (Mal Drop) video SAS put up has made it to the tube yet. Equally entertaining.

oldbeefer

26th Oct 2018, 16:14

I also remember a pair of Harriers in RAFG who were tasked to drop dummy bombs on some inflatable Russian tanks. They succeeded in almost hitting a group of Challengers some distance away, having miss identified the vehicles..

cargosales

27th Oct 2018, 00:47

Many years ago our boss, ex 35 Sqn, told us eager studes of dropping live 1000lb ers on a range.. When they set the bomb release for, IIRC, 'groups of 3', to be repeated 7 times, just it didn't quite work as advertised...

Bombs released and they counted as they fell earthwards .. one, two, three .. four, (four?) err five, **** six .. you get the picture. The end of the range was rapidly approaching and the only thing they could think of to stop the bloody things hurting anyone below was to close the bomb doors..

On arrival back at Scampton they called for the armourers to come and have a look because there were loose live bombs below.. Apparantly the armourers took one look at the bomb doors, which by sheer force of pressure were holding one said object in their clutches, half in and half out of the bomb bay, for said gentleman to leg it fast and wait until they got proper support and safety kit.

innuendo

27th Oct 2018, 03:50

Form post by Dook; There was one put in the range carpark at Nordhorn………….

There was a similar event where a '104 lobbed a concrete shape into the Officers Mess parking lot at Vlieland.

ancientaviator62

27th Oct 2018, 10:35

In my time we used to wear parachutes when supply dropping of all types except ULLA and free drop. However as the kit was improved and the drop heights came down it was realised that the parachutes could never open in time to be of any use. So apart from static line para despatching their use was discontinued and we just relied upon the (awful) safety harness.

VX275

27th Oct 2018, 20:22

It might not come as a surprise but the 'Despatcher's Harness' that Ancientaviator describes as 'awful' originated as a pre WW2 GPO linesman safety harness. The only changes over the years were the use of Nylon bbin and a different type of attachment hook. Come to think of it that description fits quite a bit of airdrop kit still in use.

SASless

27th Oct 2018, 21:40

In my days....wise Air Force Loadmasters wore a parachute and harness.....as it was all too often a Para would grab the Load Master as he went out the door or off the ramp providing the Loadie with what was usually his very first parachute jump.

That was long before PC, HSE, and Para's were granted a certain unofficial tolerance for shenanigans unlike today's world.

Lordflasheart

27th Oct 2018, 22:44

.............
Used to fly with an ex-RAF Herk Captain who was involved in a large paratroop drop-ex, in the late sixties.

The very keen Pongo CO was leaping about all over the ship, keeping up morale and monitoring progress to the DZ. On quite a steep turn-in for the drop run the Loadie was heard to say “Ere skipper – Colonel’s fallen out !”

And he had. ........... Said CO had to tab in about 20 miles to catch up with his lads.

...................

ancientaviator62

28th Oct 2018, 07:51

SASless,
yes the ever present danger of being dragged out of the door by the runaway para train meant that we did wear parachutes when engaged in static line parachuting from the para doors.
As for the story of the the Colonel departing the a/c early It is a story that I have never heard before. As we only opened the para doors for the drop at around the two minute point I wonder why the pilot felt it necessary to indulge in such steep turns. At this time the a/c should be straight and level on the run in to the DZ from the TAP. If this Colonel was the No 1 in the stick as suggested he would be stood in the door with the despatcher holding on to his harness awaiting the Red and Green. He could not have been 'leaping about all over the ship' . Given that he probably was not as current as his men I suggest his thoughts may have been elsewhere !

ancientaviator62

28th Oct 2018, 11:04

VX275,
I did not know the origins of the safety harness so thanks. I attended several meetings to try to procure a better harness. However MOD wanted a harness that was common to all the tasks across all the services. This was impossible, so as is the way of these, things nothing was done. Is the same 'awful' harness still in use ?

SASless

28th Oct 2018, 12:52

You don't reckon the Colonel got booted out the door by someone on purpose perhaps!:ok:

dragartist

28th Oct 2018, 15:02

AA62, in my 11 years the AD fraternity were always resistant to any alternate harness. VX will know when we were developing 02 Boscombe proposed a cut down jacket to carry the regulator. The chopper lot had got the Mk60/61 with a rather nice harness that could be cut away on a three ring had they needed to run away following a crash. It had modular body armour and survival aid pockets. Leg straps were standard for the crewman.
When Irvin were still at Letchworth and separate to GQ they had developed a 5 point harness with D rings to snap on a standard reserve chute.
There had been incidents on the K where the floor fitting had come out. Brought about by a certain twisting condition with the big double gate hook on the end of the strap. This issue went away with the J
The argument was always, if the strap had been adjusted correctly so the operator could not get to the ramp or open doors there was never a problem.
I should have picked up on your comment the other day about TROC retrieval. If you want to retrieve another I have one in my garage I can send you. Probably one I quarantined when we found a batch with English sleeves on metric cable crimped with unknown tooling.
Sad to hear from VX that there has been little progress with AD kit. Must have the longest gestation period of any capability area. So underfunded.
I found the current AP for abseiling from helicopters on the MoD web site the other week. The harness and kit is not a patch on the Petzel stuff I currently use for climbing and abseiling down Telecoms towers. VX would be proud. Still employs the tear ply webbing bock as developed at Old Sarum!

ancientaviator62

29th Oct 2018, 08:16

SASless,
now there is a thought ! I bet more than one trooper has dreamed of doing such a thing. By my experience and reckoning the Colonel ,if he went out early, could at the very maximum, have left two minutes early if he departed as soon as the para door was open.. Given a drop speed of around 120kts this at most would put him four miles from the DZ impact point. Nowhere near the twenty miles quoted.
If the incident did occur it is far more likely he went out at 'Red On' about five seconds before the 'Green On'. This has happened as the troops are so keen to get out of the a/c. You really have to hold on to them once the para door is open and any relaxation of grip and they are gone.
Never happened on my watch thankfully as the paperwork involved in these things would decimate a forest.

ancientaviator62

29th Oct 2018, 08:40

dragartist,
I must regretfully decline your kind offer of one of your 'mongrel' transfer release cables. I have related on the Hercules thread my experience of one that was manufactured approximately nine feet short. The subsequent premature transfer caused the MSP to start to rotate too early and it struck the 'ducksbill on the back of the a/c. Stuff of nightmares really.

SASless

29th Oct 2018, 11:47

Dropping some Reserve (Think Territorials of sorts) Special Forces Troopers at night during one of their Monthly Training Sessions.....they were quite happy to be dropped anywhere near the designated DZ when they showed up late and had to catch up with those that had already been inserted.

When the OC decided (without informing those being dropped) to make it an E&E exercise) we purposely dropped them about ten miles from where they thought they were going to be.

When the Pilots decided the same....without informing the OC as he was jumping....we upped the distance....just being fair minded and all.

He was a very good Sport about it all.....right up until he invited you for a bit of Indian Leg Wrestling near the campfire while the Moonshine Whisky was being passed around.

ancientaviator62

29th Oct 2018, 12:48

SASless,
flew on a blind FF drop trial once using Decca Navigator. If memory serves the troops landed about 30 miles from the DZ, none injured. The trial was suspended and as far as I am aware never resumed

Dougie M

29th Oct 2018, 16:10

AA As any fule kno, DECCA was a surface hyperbolic nav aid for ships at sea. Height Error was applied at 25000ft over Fox Covert but that could not compensate for the dreaded "Lane Slip". When dropping HALO on The Plain a precautionary radar fix was requested from Lyneham whilst running in. I still have the DECCA chart with over printed radials and ranges and a right pigs breakfast it looks too..

Onceapilot

29th Oct 2018, 20:15

Heard at Jurby range, night loft..."unbelievable at six.....!" (Recorded as a NS..:O).

OAP

SASless

30th Oct 2018, 06:27

DECCA.....such wonderful kit!

I used to drop some folks at night that did HAHO jumps with Squares....with Portable GPS units on top of their chest pack reserves.

Some interesting reading is individual accounts of Night HALO jumps by Recon guys during Vietnam Combat Operations.

Those guys are far better Men than I am!

ancientaviator62

30th Oct 2018, 08:03

Dougie,
Greetings trust you are well. I can only assume that for our trial our lords and masters would have considered using Lyneham Radar as cheating. I cannot recall ever flying on another Decca blind drop trial. We used Boscombe Radar for our HALO and HAHO trials.
Have you still got your pic of the Volant Rodeo MSP V USAF truck ? If so could you put it as I think some would like to see it.

VX275

30th Oct 2018, 22:06

Another Boscombe AD dit relevant to this thread.
Shortly after the J Herc arrived at Boscombe a Para drop was planned to try out the aircraft's nav computer ability to compute a CARP.
After a number of passes over the DZ with no jump lights appearing the Paras were getting restless and wanted to know why they couldn't jump. The reply from the front end was "you know we're over the DZ, we know we're over the DZ, the trouble is the aircraft thinks its over Swindon."

Just This Once...

31st Oct 2018, 08:54

...the comments above regarding the crew running to the ramp was always one of my bug bears. They always got in the way of the camera trying to capture the moment it went wrong. No idea why they insisted in doing that. Not sure if they thought they could defy gravity and catch an MSP or PURIBAD before it went over the ramp.

The aircrew are more interested in what may strike or hang-up on the aircraft and those details matter rather quickly.

The AD boys run after the load still wondering if they really did secure all the shackles, string, wires and bodge tape...

Dundiggin'

31st Oct 2018, 16:52

Hi folks. In answer to the never-ending drama with the 'monkey harness' you may like to know that I was a long in the tooth SH helicopter crewman and was posted to Tactics and Trials Flight at Odiham in the '90s. One day sitting in the office with my thumb up my bum and mind nearly in neutral I was wondering why I had been posted to such a prestigious posting. With my experience I was apparently of value. Then it occurred to me that I was in a position to change things. What did I want to change? It dawned on me that to revise the 'monkey harness' would be a damned good idea. I wrote a paper outlining an upper body torso support jerkin with the restraint harness contained within a jacket which could be worn by all aircrew who work close to open doors. I got the funding and set about designing the new jacket. Farnborough and Irvings were involved and subsequently the Mk 61 Jacket emerged and is now in use in the SH fleet. It gives full upper body support, is quick release (3-ring circus) and is better than the US 5 point harness in that it still works if you are upside down.

Fareastdriver

31st Oct 2018, 18:25

If I was upside down outside of an aircraft in a harness the last thing I would want to do is release it.

Bing

31st Oct 2018, 20:23

If I was upside down outside of an aircraft in a harness the last thing I would want to do is release it.

Depends if it's sinking or not.

dragartist

31st Oct 2018, 21:36

Great bit of kit Dundiggin. Well done. This is what I was on about @#37. I was only with the chap at Irvin you refer to the other week. He is retired like me now. We meet up occasionally. Beaufort became the Design Authority for the kit. A double action was required to release it.

BEagle

31st Oct 2018, 22:37

For those who've never seen it, the sight of a Herc load of meat bombs jumping out of both doors simultaneously is pretty spectacular. I was lucky enough to go along on a night JATFOR EX CHAMPION HURDLE trip back in 1972(?) and the speed of exit was amazing - once the green came on, nothing was going to stop them!

I was in aircraft 33 of 36; the following day we went to the DZ to watch the day part of the exercise. Very impressive, but you'd never get me to jump out of a serviceable aircraft.

ancientaviator62

1st Nov 2018, 08:09

Beagle,
you have witnessed what I call the 'runaway train' . Once an operational stick gets moving it is nigh impossible to stop them even if the Red light comes on. Their only focus is to get out of the 'honk box', get the weight off their legs and not land too far from the RV. Without looking it up in my log books I was almost certainly on that exercise.

Fareastdriver

1st Nov 2018, 09:16

Eons ago when I was in Bomber Command I heard a tale which may or may not have been true about a Valiant with an inert practice bomb.

They were cruising long and there was this loud thump from the back. Eventually the Nav. Radar switched on his bombing control panel to find that the No 5 hook, the one the inert was hung from, had released.

Lots of panic amongst senior officers on the ground who instructed the crew to release it over Wainfleet range by opening the bomb doors and this they did.

There are two endings:

The aircraft flew towards a nominated target and the Nav Radar opened the doors on the calculated release point for a type Zero, i.e. a perfect bomb and it went straight though the target.

The aircraft flew towards a nominated target under control by the bomb function of the autopilot and at five miles to run to the release point the autopilot opened the bomb doors and the inert was never found.

Dougie M

1st Nov 2018, 14:24

On time on target
http://i66.tinypic.com/m7gvlt.jpg

The DZ Safety Officer said that the safest place for his comms jeep was on the impact point because nobody gets that close. The green smoke from the marker is just behind the jeep.

SASless

1st Nov 2018, 14:31

The 82nd Airborne Division, in their demonstrations of mass drops including heave equipment, finally got smart. (Well...as smart as guys who commute to work by parachute can be.)

Their favorite DZ had a bit of ridge running down through the middle of the great open area.

They dropped the Troops onto the side close to the Grand Stand.....and subsequent drops of vehicles took place very near the ridge well away from the Visitors.

Stashed behind the Ridge was all the serviceable vehicles.....and what was dropped was old junked vehicles gleaned from the old policy of dropping good serviceable vehicles.

Shortly after the dummy vehicles landed on the DZ....from behind the ridge came the previously stashed equipment.

All very impressive....and far cheaper in the long run than dropping Ready Unit Vehicles, Artillery Pieces, and the like.

ancientaviator62

1st Nov 2018, 14:37

Doug,
I seem to recall that there was a framed bit of the vehicle's glass windscreen in STS (or whatever it was called then). As I understood it a vehicle was fairly easily written off. Not so the comms kit in it.

KenV

1st Nov 2018, 14:55

The aircraft flew towards a nominated target under control by the bomb function of the autopilot and at five miles to run to the release point the autopilot opened the bomb doors and the inert was never found.This sounds somewhat similar to a very recent event involving a C-17. The C-17 was testing a new air drop platform and during the run-in to the dropzone the platform with HMMWV aboard was released over a local civilian neighborhood in North Carolina. No injuries and no damage other than to someone's ego and maybe their career. LINK (https://theaviationist.com/2018/10/25/c-17-globemaster-iii-cargo-aircraft-accidentally-drops-humvee-over-north-carolina-neighborhood/)

Fareastdriver

1st Nov 2018, 16:51

There is a place called Long Sumado in Sabah, Borneo. It's only claim to fame is because it is where the RAF, using a Beverley, dropped their 'Air Portable Grader'.

It did not go well owing to the habit of parachute shrouds sticking together in the holds of Beverley's overnight. It launched out of the back, the parachutes candled and the grader ballisticlised itself into the landing strip.

A took two days for the local Ghurkha platoon to fill in the hole.

The grader is still at the bottom.