Speaking of 'bars', the 'singing' bar scene in the movie is not done in the infamous grungy WOXOF bar or even the Miramar main bar. Where exactly I'm not sure, but I would guess it's in one of the fancy back dining rooms if it's at Miramar at all....probably not.

Miramar had quite a reputation for its Wednesday nights in the WOXOF & main bar as well as the parking lot outside.

Friday nights were for Oceana.

Apologies for wandering into the Mil Forum ... but I thought this might raise a smile or two around the parish ...


JAS

OKC: Oceana is in Va Beach, not Miramar CA.
I've been drunk at both. And yes, the Wednesday night insanity at Miramar was justifiably famous. (But it also died the death of a thousand cuts after the Navy started its crusade against drinking shortly after Tail Hook 91. :( )

Yes I know where Oceana is. Provided occasional depressed angle radar adversary support there (as well as for Miramar VFs at Yuma).

Took a flight of four F-4s on a boondoggle A/G gunnery range survey out of OKC for an upcoming ORI and managed to make Miramar Wednesday & Oceana Friday in the same week in the 80s. Stuck at Offutt Thursday night, however they did serve beer at the Global Bar. :)

Just want to thank the Royal Navy for making Miramar what it was. :}

Saw this movie about six months after my exchange tour at VX-4 where I flew the F-14 and F/A-18 and took an F-14 to the Kitty Hawk (CV-63). I checked out in the F-14 at VF-124 at Miramar. For me the best part of the movie is the opening two-three minutes filmed on the carrier deck during operations with Danger Zone playing.

"...Also found the soundtrack in the tape player in the rear of XV Tonka..."

There's a tape player in the back of a Tonka?
As in cassette tape?
Or some other format meant for recording work=related activities that can be nefariously re-purposed for playing music...?
I knew it.
You're not all steely eyed killers - you're just tootling around up there listening to music... :cool:

It's a fair cop guv, mainly used to relieve boredom on long transits, but also on air-to-air gunnery trips....

I knew it!!!
And I'll bet that as Tally Ho is called and you pass each other at the merge, the guy in back pushes play on `Danger Zone' ;)

Well, I left Tonkas yonks ago, so by now they may well have replaced the cassette gubbins with a CD loader.....cool.

But what was an ASTROPHYSICIST doing teaching air combat to fighter pilots?

Nothing wrong with that. The late and much missed Paul Brown (PB), an Oxford Astrophysics grad, did exactly that on 229 OCU.

So sort of... Per Ardua A Astrophysicist for some then?

CG

That's a good training mission! :ok:

The late PB? What happened to him :sad: ??

It was filmed in the 'Kansas City BBQ' in San Diego. It's still open and seems to survive based only on its association with the film. There's a pretty huge selection of patches from visiting aircrew on the wall now and a load of photos showing the filming.
Worth popping in for a beer but the food wasn't up to much.

IIRC, PB was suddenly taken ill with septicaemia while instructing on 229 OCU and sadly passed away in 1995. A gentle giant, rowing blue and a real character.

The PB I knew left 56(F) Phantoms in around 1981 to become a Hawk QFI, later gaining his A1.

A really nice chap, but I don't recall him being giant-sized and he didn't really seem like a rowing blue, so perhaps another PB?

Thanks Blackadder, I missed claron's reference to it earlier also. Did not know that.

The only place I go for Kansas City BBQ is KC. ("Rendezvous" in Memphis is better)

The only places I ever went to in San Diego were the Miramar O'Club, the MCRD Club and the Zoo.....all fairly similar as far as a display of animals.

Blackadder,

Kansas City BBQ was where they filmed the piano scene with Goose & Co belting out Great Balls Of Fire. I think the bar that OK465 was talking about was the Righteous Brothers song; in whites; with shades.

PB ex 56 (F) and Hawk QFI became the 229 Tornado display pilot and was known as the Fat Aerobat; no relation to the late PB.