"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
There I was at 30,000 feet
Just for fun, a Sunday morning pop quiz: which came first? Answer: the jet, in this case the Vought F7U Cutlass, which entered operational service with the US Navy in July 1951 (the prototype first flew in September 1948). The Cutlass-like Chevrolet hood ornament first appeared on 1955 model year Chevrolets. Based on everything I’ve […]
Time for another Air-Minded diary? Sure it is. This time let’s take a look at a Century Series fighter from the 1950s, the McDonnell F-101 Voodoo. There were three distinct variations of the Voodoo — a fighter-bomber, a tactical reconnaissance aircraft, and an air defense interceptor — but I’m going to concentrate on the interceptor, […]
What does that title even mean? Is the cat named Wednesday? Sure, why not? Let’s go with that. My son can’t believe I haven’t said anything about the F-22’s oxygen problems, or about the two whistleblower Raptor pilots who appeared on 60 Minutes last weekend. My first excuse comes easy: I know very little about […]
In my day, the only video cameras we could use to film our own air-to-air flying were hand-held devices. USAF pilots weren’t (and aren’t, AFAIK) allowed, for safety reasons, to use cameras or video recorders in single-seat cockpits. If you were flying a two-seater, which you might do once a month or so, and you […]
On April 13th, during a practice flight before a weekend air show, a member of the Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team went supersonic over Tucson. The sonic boom frightened people and broke a lot of windows. Going supersonic over populated areas is a huge USAF “be no” (as in “there shall be no …”) and I […]
After my post about the Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star, I asked some friends if they wanted me to blog about any aircraft in particular. My niece Rebecca voted for a floatplane, I imagine because she lives in Seattle and sees them all the time … also, of course, floatplanes being so cool. It happens that […]
Nothing much to say today, so I’ll post four photos instead. Wednesday at the air museum I photographed some aircraft awaiting restoration. It wasn’t till later, downloading the photos, that I realized all three aircraft were British. In the top left photo, sitting in front of the museum’s restoration hangar, are a Hawker Hunter (in […]
The end of the week has come again. The world’s most interesting couple doesn’t eat much steak, but when we do we eat it on Friday night … and with that in mind I took a flank steak out of the freezer this morning. This afternoon I’ll put it in a marinade of soy sauce […]