A "twofer" today … (Aug 2 – multiple sources but h/t to The DEW Line) The Navy has announced Northrop-Grumman’s X-47B won the bid over Boeing’s X-45 for the $635M UCAS-D contract. Couple of items to note — when Boeing lost the JSF bid to Lockheed, they immediately jumped on the UCAV bandwagon and hoped…
Something here for everyone – props & jets, straight deck carriers and battleships ("…a typical task force consisted of 3-4 carriers and a couple of battleships…" *sigh* those were the days – ed.), UNREPing a Gearing-class DD and more. Transferred from home movies shot by an F9F pilot during the period 1953-54, the narrative is…
Desperate times call for desperate measures… In 1940 Britain was in a desperate fight for survival. Isolated from the Continent, Britain was relying on a lifeline extended from the States via merchant convoys. Plying the North Atlantic, out of range of land-based air cover, the convoys were subject to attack from German submarines, operating…
20 July 1969 102:42:08 Duke: Roger. Copy. (Pause) Eagle, Houston. You’re Go for landing. Over. 102:42:13 Armstrong (on-board): Okay. 3000 at 70. 102:42:17 Aldrin: Roger. Understand. Go for landing. 3000 feet. 102:42:19 Duke: Copy.
This week we’re going to jump ahead a bit and look at the next generation Hawkeye a little more in depth. To recap, the E-2 was first delivered to the Navy in 1964 and the current generation, epitomized by the Hawkeye 2000, has been flying since the delivery of the first E-2C in 1973. That…
3 June 1941. Citizen Kane was playing in the theaters and the Browns score 9 runs in the 7th to drive Bob Feller out of the box and beat the Indians‚ 12-6; Joe Grace has a double in homer in the big inning. In northern Africa British and Australian troops fight losing battles against Rommel’s Afrika Korps,…
OK – so this week we’re doing something a little different by going Joint (before Joint was cool, so to speak). During the Midway postings, a commenter (commentator?) asked if YHS would provide a little more on skip bombing. Since 5th AF pretty much originated the tactic for counter-ship attacks (ASUW) and had such success…
Usually these spaces are given over to aircraft or the operations and battles they have flown in. The aviators normally are well represented as well, but there is another group, without whom from the dawn of aviation, none of this would have been possible – aviation maintenance personnel. Long before the mission is flown and…
Massive floating airship carriers deploying squadrons of fighters – a scene from some fantastic grade-B thriller? Well, maybe. But back in the mid-1930’s it wasn’t all that far fetched. The Navy, in the midst of transformational experimentation with aircraft carriers, was well into the trials with lighter-than-air ships. Of these, the USS Akron and USS…
(ed: OK, so it’s not Friday and this is an older Flightdeck Friday, but for some of the new folks arriving at the new site for the first time, here is what Flightdeck Friday’s are all about. Read, enjoy [hopefully] and comment – Please… – SJS) Well, we have Friday Musings , Fullbore Fridays, Beer…
