Cool. Almost 50 years in the US Navy, retired 8 or 9 years ago, I think. But still in carrier use in the Brazillian Navy - somewhat modernized. I built a model of one when I was a kid, the box, at that time, said it was the smallest plane capable of carrying a nuclear weapon.
I flew them in the Navy as an aggressor pilot in the early 80's at NAS Lemoore, CA. As others have confirmed, it is a real A4. (Single seat version) Looks like an C or early E as it does not have the hump back of the later E / F models which is also shared by the Marine Corps "M" version, although that could have been removed as we did on our "Super Fox" models - anything to cut down the weight to improve our performance. I'd be interested to see if it is a flyer or just a static display bird. The comment about the slats being up is a very good catch, and yes they could be a PITA if not rigged properly. Part of the walk around was to exercise them up and down. I gained a new callsign - "Flip" - in that squadron because of a bad slat... All in all, the most fun I ever had in a jet - strap it on and go fly. We shocked an awful lot of fancier fighters in it. Image Unavailable, Please Login
different plane, same place, so I'll tack it on to this thread. this plane showed up at the flight museum last week. again, i wasn't there when it arrived so no clue how it got there; presumably on a flatbed given its condition. anyway....what is it? Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
An F-86H Sabre that has seen better times! The vertical tail appears to be too short and is probably not original.
What a cool job. I've always really liked the A-4. I, and surely others here, would LOVE to hear some of these stories....I'd say that warrants its own thread!
I see you're in MS. Don't know how close you are to Pensacola, but if you haven't gone to the Naval Aviation Museum I highly recommend it.
I LOVE that museum. It really is spectacular. We are actually in Pensacola a couple of times a month or so. My dad has a place there so we go down quite a bit of the weekends, as it's only about 2.5-3 hours from where we are. Pensacola is a fantastic little city, the beaches and bay are beautiful, and the museum is world class. I actually do need to make another trip there soon, I have seen them advertise that they recently completed a large expansion of the museum, and I haven't been since they did that. My wife and I really enjoy watching the Blue Angels, so we try to time our museum visits to days when they are having open public practices. Makes for a great day!
Great that you get there regularly. I did my "Officer and a Gentleman" thing there in 1976. Now the base is a comparative ghost town. My DI was Gunny Hill. Built like a brick outhouse. Scary as hell. Made officers out of a bunch of college boys in a hurry. 24 started. 12 finished. Ferrari Content: I never saw ONE Ferrari the entire time I was there. Newly commissioned Ensigns had a high probability of buying a new Corvette. Iranians were also going through pilot training at that time. To a man they bought Trans-Am's with T tops and the huge bird decal on the shaker hood. Yuck! I bought a Kawasaki KZ900 and left them all in the dust.... Image Unavailable, Please Login
On the 109 they also made a big "BANG" sound when deploying in some instances, like during violent maneuvering involving high G turns during combat. Gunther Rall once explained that in his opinion the 109E was equal in higher speed initial turning capability to the Spitfire, but the pilot had to fly it correctly to manage the leading edge slat deployment and to not persist in a turning engagement as with the slats deployed the drag was increased and 109 would rapidly bleed energy compared to the Spit. He also said that the asymmetric deployment tended to frighten many new pilots, but that experts learned how to predict and utilize it to advantage. The leading edge slats could negate the inherent advantage the Spitfire had relative to lower wing loading. The 109 was a fantastic fighter - in the hands of a real expert. But it was hell on the novice, and that was really its big downfall. Terry
I do believe that the museum is named after my wife's uncle, Roy "Butch" Voris, the first "boss" of the blues. Art
