Some photos from back in the day…
Negative bonus points if you recognize either one of them… 🙂
Answers below the fold…
RTAFB Utapao, VP-Det office Utapao mid-1970s.
Color pic, Ascension Island, South Atlantic. Don’t hit the hill and don’t go long unless you’re a good swimmer!
I flew out of Utapao for a short while in late 1992 for the UN for UNTAC. Wasn’t much there then. Do remember a herc sitting there with a funny nose and no markings of any kind except a bat on the vertical fin. I remember we were instructed not to take pics of it.
Yeah, the Herc with the bat on the fin was most likely an ECM aircraft full of electronic surprises for enemy radars.
Back in the 70’s, they used to fly on our radar site for training.
Dave/Mike- LOL, toys and more toys…
Trust me! I never carried classified stuff thru there. In fact, I was never in any of those other places, either, and there are no witnesses.
Usta watch the B-52 swarms take off there. Loooong takeoff rolls.
Got a call in Maintenance one day, MC yells “Any one work on IFF?”
I was just passing thru the spaces but since I had been to APX-72 training during transition I said “Sure, I do…”
Turns out the Thai S-2 squadron had a problem with their test bench and couldn’t repair any IFF boxes so all their A/C were down. I was able to fix the test bench and they were so appreciative their MO took me to their O Club for lunch. Damn, they like HOT stuff.
Those were Per Diem Navy.
I was strictly CONUS for my 20, 8 of which were underground, Titan IIs and Minuteman Modernized, Arizona and Missouri, respectively. 33 holes in the ground…
Ted- Uh huh…
Flugel- OMG, yes!!! The beef salad! Roasted ALL the way through you…
Jet- Damn right! 😉
Sam- I would have gone bat nuts!!! Kudos to you for putting up with that!
One night in Arizona, north of Tucson, my topside intrusion alarms went off. I called HQ, and they said “we can’t send the SPs out there because of the snow. Strap on your pistol and have one enlisted strap one on, and go topside.
So, we did. Got topside, saw nothing but 6” of pristine snow everywhere. We went over to the alarm horns, cleared the snow out of all 8 of them, went back down, and called HQ that we fixed that. Our relief crew showed up about noon, and we slowly drove back to base.
Buf’s out of UT. I see B-2 are hot fueling on Wake Island for training, the more things change the more they are the same.
After an afternoon of drinking at the RAF officers mess bar on Ascension, I took a mountain bike to the top of green mountain and free wheeled down again. I went back the following day, nursing a hangover, and was horrified to see how many potholes I’d avoided on the way down; God looks.out for drinks and fools. Also got thrown out of the Volcano club on the US base side…. another story.