Aircraft pics

[GearheadSS]

Went to check out some cool aircraft at the Ft. Worth Aviation Museum. I've been fascinated with the F-14 since I was a kid but had never seen one up close. You just don't understand the scale and size of one until you see it in person. Amazing aircraft.

This is buno 159600 and was the longest serving Tomcat in the Navy. It started life as an F-14A in 1975, converted to an F-14D in 1994 and remain in service until the Tomcat was retired in 2006.

[JRSully]

I would ReFi my house to get a ride in an F14, that will probably never happen as EVERY static F14 left on display in the US has had it's main wing spine cut in half so it cannot ever fly again and all the retired ones in the desert were dropped into giant tub grinders so the Iranians cannot get the parts on the black market, sad...

[GearheadSS]

Originally Posted by JRSully

I would ReFi my house to get a ride in an F14, that will probably never happen as EVERY static F14 left on display in the US has had it's main wing spine cut in half so it cannot ever fly again and all the retired ones in the desert were dropped into giant tub grinders so the Iranians cannot get the parts on the black market, sad...

Me too. I really wish I had put my mind to becoming a Naval Aviator and trying to fly F-14s. I wanted to fly them so badly when I was a kid and then my interests turned more to cars and girls as I got closer to high school. I look back now and that's probably the one thing I would change about my career path and life after high school.

[Lee Stewart]

Built in beautiful Bethpage Long Island

[169indy]

Go "Teddy" & the Big Stick CVN71!

[JRSully]

Yes, they were built in both Bethpage and Calverton further east out on the Island. Unfortunately, both have some serious ground water pollution issues happening... I was lucky enough to attend the Grumman party back in 2006 to watch the last LI F14 fly over and airshow. The landed the plane at Republic Arpt, taxied it up, ran the engines to they ran out of fuel, removed the avionics, fogged the canopy and put it on display down the road at the Grumman facilities where it sat until a month ago. Somebody bought the bldg and wanted it gone

[GearheadSS]

Originally Posted by JRSully

Yes, they were built in both Bethpage and Calverton further east out on the Island. Unfortunately, both have some serious ground water pollution issues happening... I was lucky enough to attend the Grumman party back in 2006 to watch the last LI F14 fly over and airshow. The landed the plane at Republic Arpt, taxied it up, ran the engines to they ran out of fuel, removed the avionics, fogged the canopy and put it on display down the road at the Grumman facilities where it sat until a month ago. Somebody bought the bldg and wanted it gone

I think that one is now at the Cradle of Aviation Museum in Long Island.

I watched a vid with Puck Howe(last commanding officer of the last F-14 squadron) and he said that when they flew Tomcats to their final destination before going to museum, after landing they blew the fire bottles in the engines to de-mil them so that they couldn't be flown again. He said he was delivering one to Florida to Snort Snodgrass and he had very specific instructions to blow the bottles because they knew Snort would be flying that thing the next day if they didn't. lol

[SS427]

God rest their souls. Terry Barker, Leonard Root, Curtis Rowe, Craig Hutain, Dan Ragan and Kevin Michels. It is what it is, a very tragic accident. Lets please leave it at that.

[GearheadSS]

Indeed it was. Wife and I were supposed to be there on Sunday.

[SS427]

Originally Posted by GearheadSS

Indeed it was. Wife and I were supposed to be there on Sunday.

Glad you missed it.

It has happened to me once in my lifetime when I was around 10 years old and crashed 50 yards in front of me at an airshow. A replica mail carrier bi-plane killing one of the two people on board. It was many years before I attended another airshow after that as my dad and I had just talked to the pilot an hour before he took off.