Joined the USAF in 1960. After a month or so of basic training at Lackland AFB in San Antonio, Texas, I was flown via DC3 ( an old 2 engine prop job with a less than 10,000 foot ceiling) on my birthday (my first ever flight) to Lowrey Airforce Base at Denver, Colorado (as we approached the base the ground was so close it felt like we were on a bus! ) and spent most of a year in training as an aircraft weapons mechanic. I was taught how to maintain and repair 4 different models of aircraft machine guns, along with basic knowledge of mechanics, hydraulics, pneumatics, electronics, and corrosion control as these things pertained to aircraft weapons systems.
I was sent to Luke Air Force Base ( a training facility where planes would fly to weapons drop zones in the desert to safely drop bombs, fire rockets, missiles and machine guns without explosives not too far from (out of range of hearing of course) Phoenix, Arizona where I spent my last three years of my first enlistment as an Aircraft Weapons Mechanic. Many memories (including being flown to the Homestead AFB in Florida for the Cuban Crisis, where we loaded all the fighter planes with so much weaponry that we had to remove some of them when it was determined that few of our planes would make it back to Homestead after delivering their load in Cuba!!!)
I finished my tour of duty at Luke and got a job doing the same work as an Aircraft Weapons Tech. for Lockheed Aircraft Training Program teaching German Pilots how to fly the F-104 Starfighter fighter plane. This plane was small with a 14 foot total wing span, sharp leading edges on the wings, a gatling gun type of weapon that shot 20MM rounds at 6,000 rounds a minute!! It could carry rocket launchers under the wings and was the fastest fighter aircraft around in those days.
After nearly 2 years I left Arizona to return home to the Texas where I knocked around for a year or so and decided to re-enlist and was sent to Mc Dill AFB in Tampa, Florida where I spent 6-7 months, met and got engaged to the love of my life and was sent to Cahm Rahn Bay, Vietnam for a year to put all the knowledge I had so far to good use!!
One year of working on a weapons loading team placing rockets, missiles. napalm, and ammo on F-4 fighter/bomber aircraft.
Sorry folks!!
This started in my mind as a brief description of how a poor Texas country boy has found his way in the world, but I got carried away and the tale is hardly started!!
CJ
PS Got out in 1970 and settled in the shoreline of Connecticut where in the early 1980's I started metal detecting!!
I was sent to Luke Air Force Base ( a training facility where planes would fly to weapons drop zones in the desert to safely drop bombs, fire rockets, missiles and machine guns without explosives not too far from (out of range of hearing of course) Phoenix, Arizona where I spent my last three years of my first enlistment as an Aircraft Weapons Mechanic. Many memories (including being flown to the Homestead AFB in Florida for the Cuban Crisis, where we loaded all the fighter planes with so much weaponry that we had to remove some of them when it was determined that few of our planes would make it back to Homestead after delivering their load in Cuba!!!)
I finished my tour of duty at Luke and got a job doing the same work as an Aircraft Weapons Tech. for Lockheed Aircraft Training Program teaching German Pilots how to fly the F-104 Starfighter fighter plane. This plane was small with a 14 foot total wing span, sharp leading edges on the wings, a gatling gun type of weapon that shot 20MM rounds at 6,000 rounds a minute!! It could carry rocket launchers under the wings and was the fastest fighter aircraft around in those days.
After nearly 2 years I left Arizona to return home to the Texas where I knocked around for a year or so and decided to re-enlist and was sent to Mc Dill AFB in Tampa, Florida where I spent 6-7 months, met and got engaged to the love of my life and was sent to Cahm Rahn Bay, Vietnam for a year to put all the knowledge I had so far to good use!!
One year of working on a weapons loading team placing rockets, missiles. napalm, and ammo on F-4 fighter/bomber aircraft.
Sorry folks!!
This started in my mind as a brief description of how a poor Texas country boy has found his way in the world, but I got carried away and the tale is hardly started!!
CJ
PS Got out in 1970 and settled in the shoreline of Connecticut where in the early 1980's I started metal detecting!!
