Back in the day…
Well, actually about 12,045 days ago… 🙂
The ‘military’ side of Keflavik, IC.
The first hangar, center bottom, was the VP hangar. Needless to say, this is a ‘summer’ shot!
An aerial view of the ramp areas and facilities of the P-3 and 57th Fighter Interceptor Squadron ramps, with other facilities in the background.
Aeroflot used to try to ‘taxi’ through our ramp, by ‘mistaking’ the tower’s directions to the terminal, which is just out of the picture, lower right.
Fuel trucks, airplanes, and occasionally USAF Security Police were used to ‘block’ their access, to prevent them taking pictures of the airplanes and inside of the hangar.
Flying out of Kef in the winter was always fun, considering the closests alternate airport was 772nm away (Kinloss) which was 2 1/2 hours. Made for some LONG days…
One funny note, they actually do have golf courses up there, and in the summer, you could tee off at midnight, and finish in ‘twilight’ about 0400 in the morning. Drinking in the bar was problematic, since you could stagger out at 1130 or 2330, and not be able to tell the difference… 🙂
(Re)living the dream.
I finally have to ask, what does TBT mean? I have not been ale to figure it out.
Throw Back Thursday Postings of older stuff.
In the Land of the Midnight Sun, the sun is always over the yard arm!
Cool photo.
Properly done it’s possible to not be able to tell 1130 from 2330 in Miami as well.
It simply takes much more booze to achieve.
Great pic!
More deals are made on the golf course, cause that’s where you can drink while driving over the speed limit, whack at other peoples balls, scare water fowl and worms, have mulligans, all without the oversight of the little woman…
Think it means ThrowBack Thursday. I.e. what old NFO used to do for fun and profit.
Danni
I was a brat at Keflavik for 3 years about 10 years before that photo. It’s very cool to see. There was a SAR detachment there as well, and a deployed EC-121, and while I was there the 57thFIS transitioned from F-102s to F-4s. That’s when they put the 102 on a stick… don’t see it there anymore on google earth. I got chased off the ramp more than once while taking pictures of the many cool airplanes that passed through, lol.
Midnight golf was a trip. You didn’t mention the part about having to dodge sheep on the fairway or the results of hitting a ball out of bounds into the rocks.
So they do have a summer. For how many hours?
Should have use industrial-sized spike strips.
Yep, had that same problem in summer-time Alaska, working rotating shifts and waking up without a clue as to whether it was 0300 or 1500.
Yep, Alaska is like that. We at least have 90 minutes of twilight (01:30 to 03:00) in the summer. Up Fairbanks way, it hardly gets darker at all.
Which came first, the golf course or the runway?
R- Throw Back Thursday… 🙂
CP-Thanks
LL- Yep! 😀
McThag- I can’t drink THAT much… LOL
Dammit- True! 😛
ttl- I can’t imagine being there as a kid! And yes the sheep were moving hazards. Ball in the rocks? Fuggedaboutit…
CP- July the 4th… LOL
GR6- LOL, I wish! And yes the same held true in Adak and Eielson!
WSF- In ‘this’ case, the airfield…LOL
Looking at that photo, I would guess late 60’s or early 70’s. My first trip there was in 1975. By that time, there was a red line painted between the Navy and Air force areas and an armed sentry with a small (phone booth size) heated shed at the corner. He had orders to shoot anyone that crossed the red line.
The one thing I didn’t miss about summer was “Ma Kef”. The lovely, wafting smell of rendered and drying fish from the processing plant over on the coast. When the wind was right, you could see this slightly greenish cloud moving across the landscape towards the base. It was like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. I have seen grown men stop in their tracks, drop to their knees, and begin projectile vomiting when they were caught. You couldn’t escape it. Indoors, outdoors, it didn’t matter. By the 80’s they had closed up the rendering plant but still used the air drying racks.
LOL, fond memories. I did 2 deployments and 2 tours with the ASW ops center. I love that place.
Thank-you for sharing these memories with us.
Ray- That pic is from 1982. The Red Line was there then. Oh ghad… The drying fish… I had ‘forgotten’ that…
Rick- You’re welcome!
Was there 73-74 with the 57 FIS. Was NCOIC of the welding shop. Since the AF welding shop had burned down (so I was told) we worked out of the navy air-frame shop. I came back from Christmas leave Dec. 73 and found the 102 on a stick had fallen down. It is no fun welding outside in January. I always felt that my year in Iceland was just prep for my 6 years at Wurtsmith AFB in Michigan
Thanks for your kind words today on Facebook
You need to write your memoirs of your time in service.
I know I’d buy it.
Joe- Who did you piss off??? Geez…
Mark- Nah, most of it would be redacted…LOL
Ahh,remember Kef well. 1975-1977. In December you had to go out at 1200 to see any sunlight.
I flew Awacs out of Keflavik 83-88 or so.
2 weeks tdy to stand alert and scramble when Bears would come out and head towards the radar gap between Greenland and Iceland.
I had quite a lot of nice times with the navy ladies there. They enjoyed having some “strange” for a change.
We called the fish factory ‘Kef Katy”.
Lotsa fun, but dang it was windy and cold.
Meryl- And that was only for an hour or so, low on the horizon…LOL
Mark- Yep, I remember you guys. 🙂 Y’all liked the Brass Nut! LOL