At last I am at an air station.CGAS St.Petersburg Florida.What
a beautiful place!Palm trees beautifully kept grounds.Giant sea
planes,choppers and I will get to fly in them.(yahoo!!!!)Well the
first thing I found out was how the base was kept so pretty.In
the sea service they call it RopeYarn Sunday.In the old sailing
ship days it was when they sewed the sails repaired the rigging
etc.
Time off is taken by all hands from usual work to do other
necessary work.
At St.Pete it was not uncommon to see officers in trees
lopping branches and other men sweeping cleaning etc. to keep our
base ship shape.It was a genuine all hands effort,and the result
was worth .it.
I enjoyed being a bengal lancer.(walking around with a stick
with a nail in it.Harpooning papers and butts)
It was standard in the days I was in to train the crewmen in
being able to handle most of the jobs that might be necessary.Launching
flares,working radios,fueling,preflighting and many other chores
not rate related to make you more functional as a member of the
crew.
At St.Pete I was trained as a P5M Crewman and an HO4S Crewman
Needless to say " Heavenly"Hevey as I was known as
then, spent a lot of time cajoling whoever was doing the daily
flight schedules to get me a flight.I was on two out of three
duty in those days so it was almost a given that I could be crew
in some thing on those days.(I am going to talk about duty days
later on)On long range searches extra crew were needed also.(need
to guess who raised his hand?)
The sea plane was quite a thing.A huge flying gas tank that
took off and landed in the water.(no wheels)
Launching PBMS and P5MS was a chore unto itself.Large floats
with wheels were attached to the aircraft and with the help of a
tug (tractor)and brakemen, the plane was eased down the ramp into
the water.
Once in the water a small boat and a couple of men in waders
would come out and the plane crew would release the gear, and
they would take them away, and reverse the procedure on the
planes return.It wasn't really too bad, except on days when the
water was a little rough and then we really grunted and groaned.
.Having a bunch of crabs scurrying around in the water wasn't
much of a concern as long as you weren't barefoot.
I had one heck of a scare once when comming in.I opened the
tail hatch to get
ready for retrieval when something
jumped in my face from the water and I jumped and bonked my head
real good,only to find out it was only a mullet.(guess I had seen
too many movies about the killer squids)
One big problem was at St.Pete due to the size of the plane,
most all of the maintenance was done outside.Good thing we were
in Florida.
First Light
A long days flight.
Upandatem its the wee hours of the
morning.A search has been called for.The ready plane is topped
off with gas.The crew is selected.(extra crew for long searches).
First Light means just that!You leave
way before sunrise to be on scene(the most likely place to find
the object of your search)when the sun comes up.
The flight out was just a case of
preparing equipment in the event it was needed.Smoke floats,dye
markers rafts were situated so they could be ejected when
necessary, when we found anything on scene.
Once on scene it was a case of having
been briefd on what we were searching for, and from there on it
was every window with a seat in it was manned and after comming
to a low enough altitude to be able to see the objects we were
looking for it was a case of sit and stare.
Fortunately with a couple of extra crew
you could get spelled occasionly to give your eyes a rest,but
most of the flight was spent intently scouring the sea below,
hunting for sometimes miniscule targets.
After a while it seems that you start
to see things that aren't there, and you, and your brain, and
your eyes have to start having a debate about every
ripple,discoloration,shadow that you think you see.Calling false
alarms on sightings breaks the pattern of progress and is really
a waste of time.No one wants to see things that aren't there.On
other hand what if that was something?God I hope I was right.
You want good weather to search by but
if its a bright sunshiny day it just adds to the problem the sun
bouncing off the water anb burning into your eyes bluring your
vision so that you have to move your gaze to offset what the
light is doing to your eyes.
There is a small galley aboard, so you
get to have some warm chow when you get your break and the ever
present perpetual jug of coffee.Thank God for Juan Valdez!!!
Not every search garners results.Usually
this will go on for at least three days with the search area ever
widening to account for winds and currents etc.There are other
aircraft and CG vessels involved.It is usually an all out effort
as the odds are better early on in the game to find the object of
your search every minute every hour counts.
If you find whatever your looking for(any
ship or plane on scene) and the results are favorable its a great
feeling,but if you go the three days or so with negative results
it can be a real bummer.
Well in a nutshell that what first
light searches are all about.
One last thing I want to add is that
taking off and landing a sea plane is rough at best under good
conditions.wind direction,waves,height of the waves,distance
between waves are all crucial elements to a safe takeoff or
landing.
The techniques were practiced all the
time, and our pilots were certain about what needed to be done to
ensure a safe flight .Their skill was unquestionable dispite the
hazards involved.
JET ASSISTED TAKEOFF
Another test of pilot skill was JATO.
take offs.You have probably seen movies of big planes taking off
with large tanks on their sides spewing out smoke.Well basicly
what those bottles are is tanks of rocket fuel that are ignited
at the point of lift off and they help blast you up into the air.
Well now what you do is add waves,wind
and whatever and do it in a seaplane.Whoo Nelly!!!Rock and roll..
All the ones I was part of were on
training flights(when your not doing things for real you are
practicing)Its no easy task on a nice day, so you go from there.
Wonderfull World Of Whirly Birds
That chopper flying over there reminds me of one of
my first flights in an HO4S.As I said before we were trained in
most all aspects of the duties of the crew.In the rotary wing
aircraft we learned how to operate the radios,the hoist and to
assist the pilot on single pilot flights.Quite often flights were
made with just the pilot and crewman.
I was in the early phase of my training
when lo and behold they scheduled me to go flying with the
Skipper.(Commanding Officer)
Needless to say I was just a might
nervous.We practiced hoisting and then the Captain asked me to
sit with him."What would you do" he asked "If I
had a heart attack or got very ill and couldn't fly?"I
told him I would radio the base and let them know what was going
on,head the helo to the base and wait for orders.
The pilot told me to simulate the
procedure and I pretened to call the base made certain his
harness was tight and took control of the aircraft.After what
seemed an eternity of eratic flying the,Captain said"let me
have it son,before I have a real heart attack"
My skills did improve over the
years,but I will never forget that flight.
I fell in love with helicopters right
from the get go.What a tool for search and rescue.It flies low
and slow,stops on a dime,can stay in one spot, what a jewel.
There were drawbacks such as weight
restrictions and distance you could fly, but hey!!!To me it was
the greatest thing in the world.I know Igor can't take all the
credit but the rotary winged aircraft was the greatest tool ever
invented for the work we needed to do.
St.Pete was a busy place for CG Air.It
seems we were busy most of the time between pleasure
boats,fishing boats and even the sponge divers(do they still do
that?)
My only complaint (if we can call it
that)was it seemed everyone had to retire and come down south,buy
a big boat and without any real training set off into the sunset
and we would have to find them.(Not too bright folks)Poseidon (Neptune)does
not take kindly to mere mortals who venture into his domain
haphazardly.
If I can throw this in FOR YOUR SAKE do
not ever venture out in a boat until you have at least learnd
basic seamanship and the rules of the road and have the necessary
survival tools.
It will cut down on the Coast Guards
business but we don't need it that bad.An unsuccessful search for
overdue or missing boats is very disheartining.