This one is for Ev…
Know anybody in that video???
Back in the early 70s we had a ‘close encounter’ with one of these…
Flying a Market Time patrol off Vietnam, and one of these came chugging directly at us co-altitude and on a collision course! The pilots pulled up and it went under us, then disappeared across the coastline heading incountry. Never did find out where it came from or who ‘lost’ it…
And now we’re doing it again… sigh…
DASH, was aptly named, as they had a propensity for dashing themselves to pieces on landing or dashing off to hell and gone on their own initiative.
When I reported to my first ship, the USS Hawkins DD-873 in Norfolk in the fall of ’73 the DASH hanger was empty, and had not been used for that purpose for a while.
If I remember right, the ASROC with weapons that “we will neither confirm or deny” gave a degree of stand off.
And I can confirm that failing the Nuclear Inspection is a very bad idea. Within a very short time of the failure, a truck showed up at D & S Piers and after the pier was cordoned off by sailors with tommy guns, (1973) several weapons were removed from the ASROC magazine.
I was a pit snipe, but I had also qualified for roving sounding and security watch as the more you could do, the more money you could make from your shipmates when in port. Qualification consisted of shooting five holes in the water with a .45, yes really. Part of the Sounding and Security qualification was to ensure the watchstander understood that if the ASROC magazine hatch was open, and only one person was in the magazine, the watchstander was supposed to kill them without warning or question. Years later I was watching the Hunt for Red October and my wife did not quite understand why I cracked up at the comment, “Hey, Ryan, be careful what you shoot at. Most things in here don’t react too well to bullets.”
I have not thought of DASH in a very long time.
Well done, once again a flood of memories and a big smile.
John in Philly
I don’t know anyone on this video, but the ship is the USS Benner (DD-807). We tried so hard to get those DASH POS’ to work, but they were just a waste of money.
Glenn- Yep! 🙂 Unless there was a damn good pilot, it usually didn’t end well!
John- Thanks for that, and you’re welcome!
CP- LOL, thanks for the update!
A lot of the old Fletcher Class/Sumner Class DD’s were supposed to be upgraded and enhanced by the DASH. Pity that they didn’t work.
Bet all those analog circuits were a challenge to work on.
The Army tried to use these (or similar) things to launch anti-tank missiles. Failed spectacularly.
Heh. An acquaintance from another form, also a former P-3 guy, made mention of having problems with drones encroaching in his airspace while doing a private security ISR gig in the A-Stan.
Also, one of the girls who flew Kiowas in the Scout Troop nearly had a a collision with a taxing Predator when she heading to the revetment to park her whirly bird.
Oh yeah the Good(really BAD) Days. The DD I was on was the Harold J Ellison DD-864 a WWII 2250 class can, and I hated every damned minute I was aboard!
The bird in the vid was a C model. The later D model was rigged so that you pushed a button and the umbilical heads popped off automatically. That little tube on the top was a barometric sensing tube which gave you the altitude and was how you made it go up or down. The least little condensation or rain would screw it up so it would jump up or down in big increments when you rolled the altitude wheel, crash, or big grab for the sky resulting!!
The thing that always amazed me was all the aux.gear needed to make this thing work.
I now have in my Airplane hangar, a DJI quad copter that has all those big assed boxes reduced to fit in a box about 8-10″square! And the thing is so smart that it will return to the spot it took off from if it looses contact with the controller! I don’t miss that turkey in the least and it was a wasted three years of my Navy career!! OBTW Jim, thanks anyway, I think! LOL
All- Thanks, and yes Ev, that was for you… LOL
Posted from my iPhone.