Behold! The Empty Tomb…


Occasionally questions arise from those unfamiliar with Naval Aviation and, just as occasionally, we shall endeavor to address them here. One item that, certainly today, seems to be self-evident is the need for an angled deck for carrier operations. Like many other features of modern day CV/CVNs (e.g., armored flight deck), the angled flight deck…
Part 6 and Part 7 YV-411, airborne SE of Martinique. There is a saying in aviation that if everything seems to be going perfectly, then look out, for something really bad is about happen. These were the thoughts of the Beechcraft’s pilot as the plane was inbound to its illicit rendezvous. Cockpit lights turned so low…
15 November 1960. The USS George Washington (SSBN-598) deployed from Charleston, SC with a load-out of 16 UGM-67 Polaris A-1s on the first strategic deterrence patrol. The first US nuclear-powered submarine armed with long-range ballistic missiles, the GW was ordered on 31 December 1957, with orders to convert two attack submarine hulls to missile-carrying FBM…
Franklin Roosevelt’s D-Day Prayer My fellow Americans: Last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far. And so, in this…
OK, so why all of a sudden all the posts with Coral Sea playing a significant role? Well, in part, because YHS was once a Seabat (VAW-127) and participated in her decom (along w/CVW-13 and eventually the ‘Bats themselves). In part because the Coral Maru had a personality all her own, decidedly more raw-edged than…
Sad word today that Neil Armstrong – Naval Aviator, test pilot and first man on the Moon, has passed. Neil Armstrong typified the “quiet professional” whose coolness in extremis events were exemplified in flying the X-15 and especially so on orbit as commander of Gemini VIII when things suddenly went very, very wrong (@ the…