Thursday, August 17, 2006
Go Get Him!
Not much time to write tonight, I've got a 0640 brief for my formation solo check ride and the solo formation flight immediately following that. Got to get some sleep tonight.
Once again things have sped up. Since I finished RIs and am close to finishing Primary, my name went up on the big board as eligible to select in the near future. I am projected to finish on Tuesday so that I can select on Thursday. It's possible, but I've done a lot of flying to get it done. I flew six flights last week, had Saturday off, and then flew two flights Sunday night. I'm scheduled to fly two form flights tomorrow and unless a massive thunderstorm moves in we'll get them done, which makes seven flights in five days. I'll likely fly Saturday and Sunday as well, then finish with two night flights on Monday night. When it's all over with that will be twenty flights in two weeks. Lots of flying.
I finished aerobatics last week and started formation flight this week. It's pretty hairy, flying that close to another aircraft, especially when there's a seven foot propeller spinning at 2200 RPM out there on the front of your plane. We fly with ten feet of step down, twenty feet of nose to tail separation, and four feet of wingtip separation. It's not the closest I will fly in formation, but it's pretty damn close for your first time.
My form partner is a Navy guy from a class much further behind than mine and he hasn't finished RIs yet. As a result he's being dragged along for the ride, hustling through the nine formation flights in the syllabus. I'm not sure if it's a good thing for him or not. By not having any time between our flights it means that we don't have time for our skills to get rusty, but it also means that there isn't much time to catch up on your studying if you are behind.
As a result, my partner, Ensign Novellino, struggles at lead. We alternate who is lead and who is wingman for each flight, and he is a fine wingman. Go figure, the squid is good at following the Marine. There are a lot more responsibilities as lead; you are responsible for the radio communications and getting the flight out to the working area. Once we are out there, we execute a sequence of turns, change positions twice, and conduct a break up and rendezvous before conducting a lead change. So the guy who is wing on the way out does get some time as lead in the working area, but once we are done in the working area, lead is given back to the lead on the way out to the working area and he takes the flight home.
It's fine though, I enjoy having the lead. Besides the whole thing of being the one in charge, I'm better at it than he is and the flight goes better when I'm in lead.
One of the cooler things we do is the break up and rendezvous. It's just to practice breaking out of formation, say to roll in on a target and drop some bombs, then joining back up to a circling lead. When it's time to go lead gives the hand signal for the B&R, your arm straight up and down with two fingers extended circled three times. Once wing nods his head to acknowledge that he have received and understood the signal, lead "kisses off" by placing his fist next to his helmet then pushing his hand towards wing while extending all five fingers.
As soon as the signal is given, lead breaks into a 45 degree angle of bank turn away. After lead passes abeam wing's wing, he turns and gives chase. All of my instructors love to say "go get him!" when it's time to break. It does look pretty cool to see another aircraft bank like that and turn away from you. Then to go and chase him down is even cooler. We get to do it again when we come in to land. We stay in formation as we fly over the runway at 1000' and lead kisses off to do the break. It's really cool to see from the ground too.
That's all for now, no time to slack off right now. As soon as I finish tomorrow I'll have to start studying cruise forms. But I'm ok with it because this time next week I'll be done with Primary and have my next assignment. Life is good.
