Right, but again, nomex gloves for the flight crews…
2 Likes
WTF…
1 Like
…and this particular video was shown during a Commander, Pacific Fleet staff meeting.
Admiral Walsh was not impressed.
Still, seeing this video on the big CPF Staff Conference screen was really something to behold! 
3 Likes
I believe (and I’m not a NASA scientist) that the ice will change the wing shape and it no longer is calibrated to the AoA reading? I could be wrong though…
I think it changes the angle of incidence from.memory but feel free to correct me
I dunno…I’d have to go to “The Bible”:
https://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Advisory_Circular/AC_91-74B.pdf
1 Like
lol, I am having a moment too. I am going to have to look it up.
2 Likes
When we select engine anti-ice on in the Citation - I think the AoA vane becomes biased to read “Vref” at Vref + 7 knots. That is all good and fine and should help keep you safe, but then you have to adjust your landing distance for the newly computed Vref since that 7 knots has to be lost in the landing rollout. Or something. LOL… That is why I loveAPG.
1 Like
Apologies for the thread hijack. So what is the angle at which the Tomcat wing will hit the pavement? LOL… 
One more thing that is (maybe) interesting on that topic. It used to be, for many decades, that most of us GA types were allowed to “polish frost” on our wings and still take off. Around ten years ago, apparently someone at some agency decided to do some testing on some airfoils, and they found that “polished frost” was not a good idea. Just plain old frost would reduce lift by 30%, and while polishing it would perhaps reduce that number…reduce it to what? So the FAA decided…no more polished frost for most people (I think light GA guys might still be able to do it). Now we are required to have a “clean wing”.
1 Like
…stories of the carrier up in the Norwegian Sea…a 3 man “chain” of green shirts (squadron aircraft maintenance guys) standing on the wing of a Tomcat (the wing was sticking over the side), with the last (onboard) guy sweeping snow off the wing…Cold War days…I do miss it…
3 Likes
Because naval aviation isn’t hard enough…
“Hey Chief…did you put the snow-chains on the Intruders?”
“It was taken on Jan. 21, 1987, and it depicts an A-6E Intruder of Attack Squadron (VA) 52 on final approach for recovery on the snow-covered flight deck of USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70) operating in the Bering Sea.”
6 Likes
Look like that A6 needs skis instead of wheels.
Wheels
2 Likes
It could be a different scan but, at least for us, it’s meatball - linup - AOA.
You can also bring in the HUD for general SA but, until recently in the Rhino, it’s not really been a primary instrument you rely on to land at the boat.
Thankfully, no, I’ve never had to land without a working HUD. It does happen, though. I had a HUD fail during a catshot from the boat at night, which was really uncomfortable. Thankfully the magic turn it off and on again fixed it.
10 Likes
So I guess the follow up question would be - have you ever had a stuck or erroneous reading AoA indication?
Would this ever happen where one aircraft was also on the other waist catapult at the same time? Looks sorta sketchy…but I thought I saw a video once of a very closely spaced 4-cat shot once…
2 Likes
Again, thankfully no but it does happen.
Definitely. They’ll shoot cat 3 (the more forward Tomcat), drop the jet blast deflector, and star the process to launch cat 4. It’s not particularly quick between those two, normally one of the bow catapults will launch while they’re getting 4 ready.
6 Likes
It is common to use both waist cats at during a launch, but not simultaneously.
Cat 4 has a shorter stroke so higher acceleration 
That said, they would not put both CATs “in tension” at the same time as it appears they have done here. So the F-14 on Cat 4 would likely have the wings still swept, the JBD might be down…maybe not…but the shuttle would not be in tension.
EDIT: Basically what @boomerang10 said.
6 Likes
Nah, it was probably the AT’s who were replacing the VDI and the rest of the electronics that were causing issues, and likely came like that from the AIMD shop. At the time, the plane captain was busy standing in line for two hours in front a locked door in Hangar Bay 2, because some nice Petty Officers with very pale skin and tired eyes told them that Supply was going to open the door and give out free sodas. But they couldn’t hang around themselves because they had to go on watch.
1 Like