For anyone interested in the USSS Columbia AIB…

For those who, like me, followed our space program, HERE is Accident Investigation Board final report link for USSS Columbia.

It’s very detailed and you will spend quite a bit of time drilling down, but I think they did one hellva job with this.  Sadly, as with any AIB report, it’s always after the fact; but lessons learned here should and I hope WILL impact any missions/development going forward when/if we ever get an administration that supports the space program with anything other that lip service…

I would leave you with this quote-

Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree
than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect.
~Captain A. G. Lamplugh, London, 1930’s

May all those who perished Rest In Peace.

Looking for the positive…

A friend emailed me this, and it’s truly about Americans coming together to get things done…

Honestly, I can’t think of anything SINCE 9/11 that has actually done much to bring folks on all sides to work together…

Think about it, will ya???  I ‘know’ that spirit has to still exist and we DO have the capability to come together to get things done.  We need to re-ignite that spirit and move this country forward.

YGTBSM!!!

To ‘rah-rah American’ for the 9/11 Museum???

9 11 flag

According to the NYT article, that was the exact sentiment…

Michael Shulan, the museum’s creative director, was among staffers who considered the Tom Franklin photograph too kitschy and “rah-rah America,” according to “Battle for Ground Zero” (St. Martin’s Press) by Elizabeth Greenspan, out next month.

“I really believe that the way America will look best, the way we can really do best, is to not be Americans so vigilantly and so vehemently,” Shulan said.

Read the whole thing HERE

Howinthehell do people like this get in positions of power to make decisions about how history is remembered???

I’d love for somebody to ‘splain that to me…

Non-PC thoughts…

The United States ranks 3rd in murders throughout the World.

But if you take out Chicago, Detroit, Washington D.C. and New Orleans, the United States is 4th from the bottom (in the world) for murders. These 4 cities also have the toughest gun control laws in the United States, and are all controlled by Democrats.      Rocket Science Anyone????

h/t JP

And there is a big hooraw in DC with all the usual suspects coming in to hold hearings on SYG, why black youths are being ‘targeted’ and ‘profiled’, and what “WE” are supposed to do to stop being racist, ala Zimmerman…

And ABC put up an interview guaranteed to churn up the masses… But THIS article at American Thinker calls them out!

And then there was THIS on Saturday from NBC4 in DC… Hate bias??? What the hell is that???

Police said a man, 28, from Bethesda, Md., was attacked in the 1700 block of Euclid Street, Northwest, in Adams Morgan. The victim said he was approached by three black males who kicked and punched him to the ground.

According the victim, one of the attackers yelled, “This is for Trayvon,” during the assault. The victim suffered lacerations to the face from the attack. Police said the suspects took the man’s wallet and iPhone. The police report lists the incident as robbery force violence, hate bias incident.

Or this one HERE.

Once again, I’d like to know who is paying to fly all these people in; and why there is NO admission that these ‘youth’ are in fact committing crimes including murder on a daily basis (see above)… What about the actions these ‘youth’ do every day that are caught on video, arrested for, etc… Where is the admission that they ARE being profiled because they ARE the ones committing these crimes?

/crickets

Where is the outcry in the black community over the murders in Chicago? In Detroit? In DC???

/crickets

Colin Noir and other blacks who actually speak out about this are called Uncle Toms, and put down in their own communities.  The same treatment is received by the blacks in the military, especially those that are successful; friends of mine have told me they were accused of ‘selling out’ to the man and not ‘standing up’ to the racism in the military…

The only one I know who was actually positively received was one who’s dad was a Baptist preacher in the South who had been involved in the civil rights movement. THAT family was proud of their son and all he had accomplished!

Worse, folks like this who could contribute to real resolution (like Dr. Ben Carson from JHU) are NEVER allowed in these meetings… Two weeks ago the NAACP excluded black conservatives because they didn’t fit the ‘agenda’…

Sharpton/Jackson et al make MONEY off racial hatred and division, they don’t want their $$ cut off, so they continue to foment the hatred, blame and continue to stir the pot, along with the usual suspects in congress (CBC and their minions)…

HERE’s an interesting OPED piece in the Washington Times… Not that it will make any difference, but it DOES bring law rather than emotion into the picture…

You want things to change? Then start by cleaning your own damn house… Stop making drug dealers icons in the community, stop letting gangs and gang leaders be the ‘family’ these kids look up to, stop sweeping the violence under the rug…

For me, “I” will do my best to stay out of the parts of town/or cities as a whole that could put me in jeopardy, but I’m NOT willing to give up my right to defend myself…  Just sayin…

Other thoughts…

It appears the military in the Pentagon has been told to make the military contractors that support operations to ‘feel the pain’, and are rewriting contracts to require contractors to also be furloughed one day a week for the remainder of the year… And warnings have gone out at least unofficially that furloughs will most probably continue into FY-14.

Why can’t we make the executive branch and congress play by these same rules??? If THEY were sequestered/furloughed I’m betting this crap would be sorted out quickly!!!

And the desecration of the Lincoln Memorial, and THIS Veterans Memorial just set my teeth on edge…  It’s obvious these punks have NO respect for the US, so I’d be all for revoking their citizenship’s and throwing their asses out of the country… Let them go try that crap somewhere else and see what happens!!!

On the religious front, if you’re a Christian, you’re under siege…  ANY comments about Islam are immediately countered, you are pilloried in the PC press and now folks are trying to force even more ‘freedoms’ for muslims in the US and other countries…

AJ sent me this one, and seeing what is going on in England and France it truly brings home the fact that muslims have NOT changed…

Any idea who said this???

“How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries!  Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy.  The effects are apparent in many countries, improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.

A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement, the next of its dignity and sanctity.  The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.

Individual Muslims may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it.  No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.  Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith.  It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome …”

Sir Winston Churchill; (Source: The River War, first edition, Vol II, pages 248-250 London).

Churchill saw it coming… In 1899!!!

And the Ft Hood shooter has released a statement basically admitting he was ‘at war’ with those who were at war with his religion (but it’s still workplace violence dontcha know)… Article HERE.

And in another social engineering for the military, congress is now weighing in and now they want Atheist Chaplains!  Article HERE! YGTBSM!!!

Oh yeah, and the last one… BO and his minions saying the scandals are ‘Phony’… I’m sorry but phony scandals don’t involve people coming home in BODY BAGS!  Ask Brian Terry’s family, or the families of Ambassador StevensSean SmithGlen Doherty and Tyrone Woods whether THEY think it’s phony… The IRS, Weenie waver, the mayor of San Diego, holding the senate hostage to get a bunch of hard left appointees confirmed… But those aren’t real, they are just things we ‘dreamed’ up??? If you ever wondered what the left’s utopia would be, these are examples!!! IF the conservatives had done any of this, O.M.G. you’d NEVER hear the end of it, it would be 24/7 on every channel, and the Weenie waver would be up on sexual harassment charges instead of continuing to run for Mayor of NYC!!!

Gah… Enough already, driving my BP through the roof…

But I do have a question. Am I really that far off base??? Have I totally lost the concept here???

 keep-calm-and-carry-a-45

Col. George “Bud” Day has passed…

Apparently he died yesterday surrounded by family in Shalimar, FL.  Col. Day was a leader in the vocal minority who was constantly lobbying Congress and others to improve treatment for the Veterans.

Retired Col. George “Bud” Day, a Medal of Honor recipient who spent 5.5 years as a POW in Vietnam and was Arizona Sen. John McCain’s cellmate, has died at the age of 88, his widow said Sunday.

Day, one of the nation’s most highly decorated servicemen since Gen. Douglas MacArthur and later a tireless advocate for veterans’ rights, died Saturday surrounded by family at his home in Shalimar, after a long illness, Doris Day said.

“He would have died in my arms if I could have picked him up,” she said.

Day received the Medal of Honor for escaping his captors for 10 days after the aircraft he was piloting was shot down over North Vietnam. In all, he earned more than 70 medals during service in World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

He was an enlisted Marine serving in the Pacific during World War II and an Air Force pilot in the Korean and Vietnam wars.

In Vietnam, he was McCain’s cellmate at one camp known as the Plantation and later in the infamous Hanoi Hilton, where he was often the highest-ranking captive. During his imprisonment, the once-muscular, 5-foot-9 Day was hung by his arms for days, tearing them from their sockets. He was freed in 1973 — a skeletal figure of the once dashing fighter pilot. His hands and arms never functioned properly again.

Full article HERE.

He always told it like it was, and fought all the way to SCOTUS for better care for Veterans.

Thank you Colonel for your service both in war and peace, RIP sir and know you will be remembered by all of us you’ve helped…

Thoughts and prayers for his family…

This is Strange…

All of a sudden the last day or so I’ve been getting these ‘Unknown’ hits… Like 70 or so of them…

blog visitor entry

Doing some tracing, all of them seem to come back to CLOUDFLARENET, San Francisco, CA, United States…

Anybody else seeing strange hits lately?  Some of them, like this are minutes long, others are 0:00 on the time log.

Not that I’m getting paranoid or anything…

Well, one more ‘Sea Story’…

One of the email’s I got based on yesterday’s post reminded me of the crew I once flew with…

Back in the 80’s I had a crew of malcontents and troublemakers, who also happened to be DAMN good at what we did…

At one point, three of the five officers were prior enlisteds (and we had all known each other as enlisteds), plus two USNA graduates.  We were a ‘junior’ crew, e.g. no LCDR or above on the crew, and the other eight regular crewmembers were all E-6 and below.  Our maintenance detachment did have one Chief, but the rest of the kids were pretty young.

We used to do some ‘roadtrips’ that got interesting to say the least! This particular one, we went on what was supposed to be a three day det from our deployed site.  At one point, we ended up in Sicily (I think that was day 12), and the band Kansas was there on a USO tour.

At that time, my Sensor One operator was a fanatic for the band, had every album, etc…

BUT, he’d never managed to see them on concert!  Sooooo, he of course is over the moon, he’s FINALLY going to get to see them!!!

Or not, because we got launched at oh dark 30 for a 12 hour mission… Of course we missed the concert…

To say he was pissed was to put it mildly!!!  So we end up a day later flying an operational flight and terminating in Rota, Spain that night (Day 14).  We head for billeting to grab some sleep, as early the next morning we’re due to launch for yet another location…

The twist to the story starts here; as we’re grabbing a bite in the O’club bar, we notice a bunch of long haired hippies off in the corner.  One of the pilots says, “Damn, I think that’s the band ‘Pup’ has been wanting to see!”

So we go over and sure enough it IS the band! We sat down with them for a bit, and it turned out Phil Ehart, the founder of the band was a former USAF brat, and he knew what it was like to miss bands, etc.  He was the one that got them the USO tour, saying it was his way of honoring those who served! When we told him about ‘Pup’, they decided they would do something for him.  Since we were all leaving about the same time the following morning, we agreed to meet down front at something like 0700.

I called the Chief, and told him rather than meeting at the airplane, for him to bring the E’s over to the BOQ at 0700, and we’d all go in together.

The next morning they show up, and the band is ‘hiding’ inside the lobby. As I gathered everybody around, I told Pup there were a few folks that wanted to meet him.

And the band came out and sang this song a capella for him…

He was literally in tears, and couldn’t thank them enough, but they also gave him a signed CD, and some band swag, and we took a few pictures…

It was a pretty special moment for him, hell for all of us! I ran into Pup about 10 years ago at a function and he reminded me of that morning. I asked, and he said that CD STILL has a place of honor on his mantle, and he’s told that story to his kids!

Twenty-six days later we finally got back to our deployment site, for a whole 12 hours, then went back on the road for another seventeen days…

Anyhoo, enough nostalgia, I’ll try to get a real post up for tomorrow! Go read the folks on the sidebar, they’re GOOD!!!

Sigh…

I DO miss going out and doing ‘fun’ flying…

He’s 200ish feet up 🙂 And flying up a fjord in Norway.  Did that a few times tracking ‘various’ things in that part of the world.

A couple of pics from back in the day…

NAS Moffett Field, CA back in the heydey. The black topped hangar (Hgr 1) is one of the original blimp hangars from the 1930s…

NAS Moffett

And Hangar 1 today…

Hgr 1 today

And one of my old airplanes, now a resident of Tucson…

P3 boneyardBetter known as the Boneyard…

Lots of hours of boredom, in the middle of nowhere, but we DID do some fun stuff!

Area 90

Also known as the North Pole, or 90 North! 🙂  Navigation up there was ‘such’ fun…

And yes, we tracked him all the way up there, along with two others! 🙂

HERE’s what we based our ‘updated’ navigation procedures from… And we were up there almost 50 years later!!!

TGIF…

Stress Management for your weekend…

1 * Accept that some days you’re the pigeon, and some days you’re the statue

2 * Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them.

3 * Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.

4 * Drive carefully. It’s not only cars that can be recalled by their Maker.

5 * If you can’t be kind, at least have the decency to be vague.

6 * If you lend someone $20 and never see that person again, it was probably worth it.

7 * It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.

8 * Never buy a car you can’t push.

9 * Never put both feet in your mouth at the same time, because then you won’t have a leg to stand on.

10 * Nobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and dance.

11 * Since it’s the early worm that gets eaten by the bird, sleep late.

12 * The second mouse gets the cheese.

13 * When everything’s coming your way, you’re in the wrong lane.

14 * Birthdays are good for you. The more you have, the longer you live.

15 * You may be only one person in the world, but you may also be the world to one person.

16 * Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once.

17 * We could learn a lot from crayons. Some are sharp, some are pretty and some are dull. Some have weird names and all are different colors, but they all have to live in the same box .

18 * A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.

Y’all have a good one!

Lunch…

Sometimes lunch outside is worth it…

Long legs, short shorts… Just sayin

Know what I mean Vern?

Now back to your regularly scheduled BS!