Ever ride in a warbird? Or fly?

I was THAT CLOSE to a ride in a B-17! We had arrangedd for myself and a buddy to fly. But believe it or not they overbooked the flight and it would've meant leaving my buddy behind. Neither of us would go without the other. Although I missed the ride, I saw the colors of a true friend, and I'll never forget that.

Oh, and the guy who went in "our" place? He got airsick and lost antimatter containment in the back of the plane!!

That's funny. There will be other opportunities.
Which B-17 was it?

Hey Tim,

First, did you get that last email I sent, with the scans? If not I'll resend it.

The only "warbird" I've flown in is a little 'ole L-2. I was 14, I think.

Anyhoo, the pilot of this bird had flown into the Geneseo show with his wife, but she got sick and didn't want to fly back. (She's my Dad's cousin, and he was also my 8th grade art teacher. ie; they were local) So I got a ride in this tiny L-2, my first airplane ride ever. Did pretty good until five minutes out...

Hey, flying sideways on a bumpy, rickety old wooden roller coaster (pretty windy up there) swingin' back and forth and up and down at 2500 feet or so will make anyone's fly-in breakfast... nevermind.

But it was my birthday and besides that, it was a great present!




Fade to Black...

As an associate member of the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum , I'm entitled to a yearly FREE ride in one of their trainers. Unfortunatly, I live almost 2000 miles from Hamilton, Ontario and haven't had the time or money to get there yet. Someday......

Hey dogsbody,

I don't live too far away from Hamilton, I'd be more than happy to take that ride for 'ya by proxy!!


Fade to Black...

blackwolfscd,

haven't recieved any emails from ya

Hmmm... okay. Will resend!


Fade to Black...

Have not rode in one yet, a little expensive at the moment. CAF charges around $425.00-$450.00 to ride in the B-17 at Falcon Field and besides I rather wait and take a ride on the newly restored B-25 combat veteran that should be in the air not to long from now.

For those who have had thoughts to visit the Champlin Fighter Museum at Falcon Field- DONT- their not here anymore. They are heading for Seattle to become part of the Boeing/Red Barn collection.

I'm dyin to go up in a WWII fighter.

Someday.

I've crewed a B-17(Fuddy Duddy) and C-47 for a summer while working at the National Warplane Museum a number of years ago. WHAT A RUSH. Been in every position on Fuddy except the left seat and ball turret, while she was flying. Gotta tell ya, sitting down on that seat and reaching to grab those twin .50s in the tail was a rush... just as my hands made contact, we were told to strap in, as we'd be landing in five minutes... almost got to see those 109's comin in at me... oh well...
had to go back to my seat in the waist....

I was able to get a couple of rides in an F-4E while Stationed at Seymour Johnson AirPlane Patch. This wasTHE most amazing thing I have ever done. Everyone said the F-4 was a lumbering old relic but when we lit the burners for takeoff it felt like I was being pushed down the runway by a freight train. It seemed pretty nimble to me, but then again, it wasn't something I did everyday. I can't imagine what an F-16 must be like. Out of each of the about 1 hour flights I would say the pilot let me fly about 30 minutes each time. Since I was in maintenance and an aircrew debriefer, I knew the pilots pretty well and they liked to kid around while flying. Always trying to get you sick or breaking hard to make you smack your head against the canopy. I would give almost anything to do it again.

I live just a few miles from Chino airport where the Planes of Fame museum is located. They give warbird rides - all it takes is $$$$, which I don't have ! Their razorback P-47 is a two-seater - maybe someday........

Jim

My father paid for me to ride on a B-17 back in 1992 for my birthday/christmas present. I was 23 and had been working on my private license (which I never finished due to financial problems, but I plan on getting them someday). It was here in Zanesville, OH with a B-24 (The All-American...I think). I will have to look at the name of the B-17...I was thinking it was called the 909, but I am not positive since I read so much about the air war in Europe...I could easily get names mixed up. I had a great time with the flight and trying to imagine what it must have been like in combat. I took a lot of video and some stills...they were on 110 film. I will try to find them in the old photo box. I still remember the flight today, the sounds, the hubs turning, how it looked from all postions...except the tail-gunner section and the ball turret. It was just an awesome ride.

Jerry

Yes
I rode back seat in Leroy Penhall's P-51D in 1974. It was painted up as Bob Hoover's "Ole' Yeller" as his was laid up. Steve Hinton took me up. I was 24 and Steve 21 at the time. We Rat raced with Corky Fornoff in his F8F Bearcat and chased a couple of P-40's across the Detroit river. I have a photo taken while inverted over the P-40's (although only one shows in the picture) while we rolled around thei formation.
The day before I rode backseat in Tom Camp's P-40E with Hinton in the P-51 on one wing and Max Hoffman on the other flying Jack Flaherty's P-63F (I had been crewing for the P-63 and Jack got me the rides in appreciation).
I have never rode in a two seat Spitfire yet but was ground crew on a MK IX s/n MK923 for 22 years and now have been involved with Mike Potter's Mk XVI s/n SL721. He had me in charge of repainting it to an authentic Canadian scheme. There is a rule of thumb in modelling....The larger the scale, the harder the detail is, and this really applys to 1:1 scale.
Cheers
Bob S.

My camera got 8 hours in the back seat of a Phantom. I got a couple of nice pictures

Close, but no cigar!

My cousin used to fly an OS2U Kingfisher during WW2. After the war, he stayed in the reserves and flew an F4U Corsair. One saturday morning he took me to Floyd Bennet Field to give me a ride while he put in some flight time ( I was a very small ten-year-old at the time). He put me on the forward edge of the seat, between his legs, fired up the engine and taxied out to the runway. While waiting to take off, he said "Oops, we have to go back, they caught us". Someone in the tower saw me in the cockpit. I was crushed. He was in very hot water. I never got that ride.

By the way guys. I do remember that the interior of that F4U was all black, no interior green anywhere! Lots of bare metal showing through the black, pretty beat up.

Eurecka! In a couple of weeks, I am getting a ride in an SNJ out of Republic Airport in Farmingdale. That is where Republic made all of those "Jugs". I hope the pilot will do some fancy flying, not just straight and level.

Pete

I have always wanted to volunteer some time to help work on these planes, ...but I have not spare time.

"I don't have a spare square. I don't have a square to spare!"

I was never able to get a ride in a WW ll type aircraft. I would love to fly a P-38, P-47, P-51, or a F-4U. I got several hundred hours (actually over 400 hours) in T-33A's and TF-102A's as a tow target operater. I also got several flights in the F-4D and F-4E. I have more than my share of hours in AF cargo type aircraft. Ah, the feel of the web jump seats.

What was towing targets like?

Not a fighter but from that era - a Boeing/Stearman PT-17. It was major cool!! Open cockpit flying and they took a picture of me with the leather helmet and gogles. It was owned by and Airline pilot and his stewardess wife. They gave rides to help pay for it's maintenance. It was years ago (early 80's) in Danbury, CT durring the final year of the Danbury State Fair.

The engine fumes were strong. I can see why some new pilots lost their cookies in the thing (I heard the PT-17's nickname was the 'washing machine' for many pilots being 'washed out' of the pilot program durring WWII. I've been in a MASH style helicopter, gliders and various small private aircraft but that PT-17 was the best! You don't just hear the wind you feel it. Complete 360 visibility. I felt like I was part of the plane. The plane was a design almost 30 years after WWI but It still must have felt like that back then.

Found this cool link while trying to find the Stearman's designation:

www.warbirdalley.com

QUOTE: Originally posted by timodeller What was towing targets like?

I loved it when I was on flight status. I was put on status as a form of punishment. I came in late and hungover one morning. As punishment I was sent to help out in the T-33 section. An old SSgt checked me out and the next week he failed his flight phy. I was the only other one that knew how the system worked so the next morning I had a flight phy and the altitude chamber that afternoon. I was flying the next day. About six months later we modified a TF-102A to carry the Delmar Target System. The only time I got really scared was when we were 180 NM out over the North Sea in December. The engine flamed out and without thinking I cleaned the acft off, switched to guard and started squaking IFE, at the same time calling out air speed and altimeter readings to the pilot. We were able to get an air start and made it home safely. All through debrief with maintenance, safety, and ops, I was fine. After getting back to the ready room and getting a cup of coffee was when it hit me. I was shaking so bad I could not hold the coffee cup. The Squadron CO came in and told me to get my gear as we were going back up again. For the next hour and a half we turned jet fuel into noise. But I calmed down as soon as we got airborn.

The Delmar Target System looked like a half droptank with a Day Glo Orange 2,000 pound bomb stuck in the tail of it. There was 2,000 feet of cable that was let out to the full length. The target "flew" about 200 feet higher than the tow acft. Prior to calling in the shooters we would make a slow left turn. That would throw the target out to our right and high. I had instruments that would tell how close the rockets came to the target.

I'm an old Huey Crew Chief, crewed 3 months in Nam the rest of time I was in Maint. Later spent 7 years in the Reserves crewing UH-1H's in a Medevac Unit. I got a lot of stick time in the late 70's. I was extremely lucky and got a ride in a P-51D in late 74. And then in 79 I got to ride in the CAF's then newly painted B-17 during an Airshow. I was at the right place at the wrong time. A couple of us were an hour early and they took off 55 min. early. We were the only "passengers" so we had the whole bird to our self. I wrote a poem about it later, it might be on my Unit's Web page at http://www.americal.org/174 with some others I wrote. Look for Poems of a Crew Chief. Also got a short hop in a PT-17 a few years back. Would have loved to ride in a B-25, my Dad did a lot of work on them in WW II in the 5th AAF. He did a lot of the original straffer conversions on A-20's and B-25's.

Well, the closest that i´ve ever been to a "warbird" was a camouflaged Cessna 150 (N3303J) that i flew from Plymouth Mass. to Brownsville TX. (je je) looked so ugly that every one in every airport laugh at me :-( . I remember one guy who told me: "Hey man i would be ashamed to fly that thing, are you insane...???"..
At least that´s something for me....( LOL ) hope it counts :-(

My Best Regards
Hector Reymundo

I got to fly a t-6 last year, it was great, maneuvering was super fun, i liked the rolls a bit better than the loops, but it was all great, i wanted to dogfight them, but there was only one here that day, alas. the sound wasn't that bad, it was pretty neat opening the canopy and feeling the cooler air up at altitude, it gets awfully hot here in the summer, and it was a very pleasent switch. we made a guns pass on a cessna that was coming around to land at the strip, i put my finger on the trigger as i pulled a perfect lead, but i didn't pull, just in case. it was fantastic, couldn't have wiped the smile off my face with a ball peen hammer. i've been inside a b-17 and an a-26, but didn't have the bucks to fly either of them at the time. any chance you get to fly or ride in one of the old planes, absolutely take it. like the sign in the a-26 said, jets are for cheaters.


maddafinga

When I was an Explorer Scout in the fifties, our troop went down to what is now Grissom AFS in Indiana (was Bunker Hill AFB then). We rode in a C-46 which wasn't too memorable to me. During the 60's, in the Navy, I rode a C-1 (the cargo version of the S2F) from NAS Whidbey Island, WN to Fairchild AFB in Spokane. The ride was noisy and cold, until I asked the copilot to turn on the heat. In the late 60's, I was in the Phillipines and hitched a ride from Clark AFB to Cubi Point NAS on a SA-16B Albatross. The memorable thing of that flight was that the windows would bubble out at altitude so that I could put my head in the bubble and look straight down. I also rode a C-141 and a C-5A Galaxy. You ride backward in AF planes (which makes sense) but they were cold and noisy. But fun!!!

Hahaha!!! The only airplanes I've been in are 747's, 767's, A310's, and A320's.... That too cos I visit my homeland in India quite often.... As far as combat aircraft are concerned, the closest I've come is sitting in the cockpit of a Mirage 2000 and thats about it. Looking forward to flying a MiG in Russia or get a job with the Airforce now that I've enlisted with the Army!!! So wish me luck!! hahahah!!!!

Cheers,
Nandakumar

Flown in CH-53D's., Once, while strapped into a gunners belt, looked straight down over the ramp edge 7000 feet to the Salton Sea. Very cool! Also CH-46's several times and once disembarked while pilot had main mounts on a mountain top and nose gear in thin air! KC-10's and was able to get into the boom operators area during refueling. Also flown in KC-130.

Closest I ever got to flying in an actual warbird was a trap on the Eisenhower in a COD (E-3). That last turn is a doozy! It actually made 3 of the passengers pass out. It's not the landing that will get you. It's that sudden stop at the end.

I rode in and was able to take the controls an old Navy trainer "Texan"....
Very cool... It hits you when the guy tells you how to jump out of the plane on the wing if there is any kind of problem and cute down to earth....... $150 for 20 min.

I rode in a B-17 in 1988. I was a volunteer at the museum at March AFB, CA and a warbird collector kept several planes there, including a B-17. The museum director arranged the flight as a "thank you" for the work I had done around the place. Does a Russian An-2 count? I flew one around Kiev Ukraine in '91. Ugly airplane but a joy to fly.