Military Experience August 1965,by Dave Gurtner
From MemoryArchive
Who: Dave Gurtner What: Military Experienece When: August 1965 Where:
August 1965 -- the heart of the German summer -- what better time to spend two weeks TDY than on a NATO "exchange" with our fellow "cheffes de maintenance" of the French Air Force at Lahr Air Base, near Freiburg in the Black Forest. The French were flying North American F-100D "avions chasseurs-bombardiers dans la frappe nucléaire dans le cadre de l'OTAN" at Lahr, accompanied by a small and very discreet USAF munitions detachment. That muns det looked like nice duty, but I would think it would get just a leettle boring after the first six months of waiting around for WW III to start... IIRC, 2 F-105Fs and 4 F-105Ds formed the "Farmingdale Iron" portion of the contingent -- I had volunteered to crew SSgt Bob Berkowitz' F-105F, 63-8327, for lack of anything else to do back at Bitburg Flugplatz.
A reserve C-124 Globemaster crew hauled us from Bitburg to Lahr. Yes, good old "shakey" -- the only AFR transport on rotation in USAFE at that point in time that could haul us ground types, our baggage, a small WRSK kit, AND a P&W J75 engine in one haul). The sound of those 4 (relatively) synchronized P&W R-4360 radials, mixed with smell of burning avgas/aviation oil and the brake squeals -- more like the moans of an elephant -- was unforgettable! The Armee De L'Air housed us enlisted types in the Lahr AB Hospital -- rumor was it was the only building on the base with showers, and being the cleanliness nuts we Americans are, well.... Chow was at the French enlisted mens' mess -- coffee au lait in soup bowls and croissants for breakfast, and mystery meat with red wine (!) at night. Lunch was at the small underground cafe smack dab in the middle of the main hangar -- when I think back on it now it smells like "former Luftwaffe bomb shelter." Yes, wine was also served with the cheeses, bread, and cold sausages that were on the lunch menu -- and lunch ran from 0900 through 1600!!
Flight operations were pretty routine: two VIP flights per day (FAF or Luftwaffe brass, or MOD politicos) for the Fs, configured with the customary twin 450-gallon pylon tanks and the (for the 36th, seldom-used) 390 gallon internal tank bolted up to the bomb shackle in the bomb bay (B/B). That shackle was at the bottom of a big compressed air-driven "ram" that ran vertically from the top of the B/B right to the top of the Thud. It had a piston cross section of almost a foot across and was driven with 90 PSI air -- it was designed with enough "ooomph" to push a "special device" out into a 1200+ MPH air stream (through the B/B doors, if necessary!). For ground maintenance purposes, a control lever and external compressed air feeder at the top of the Thud (under an access panel just behind the cockpit) were used to raise (install) and lower (remove) the B/B tank. According to the Dash-2, these tanks were never installed or removed when full of JP4. EXCEPT...
On about the fourth day of the TDY, ol' 327's ready to taxi out on an 0900 sortie with a FAF O-6 in the rear cockpit and everything's in a nice little "groovy" routine -- and JP4 starts leaking like mad outta the closed bomb bay! It could be only one thing: the damn bomb bay tank-to-aircraft O-ring had failed. An on-the-spot "checklist" started to run thru my mind: Stay calm, keep the Thud chocked and idling, keep an eyeball on the nearby fire extinguisher, stay calm, call for "Bomb Bay Doors Open" on the mike, verify the crew's hands in full view above the canopy rail and install the B/B door locks (those bay doors opened and closed in a leetle over half a second, so if you were in there during the close half of the cycle you literally kissed yer a-- good-bye), stay calm, visually verify that yes, indeedy, a whole lotta fuel is gushing out from somewhere in the vicinity of the tank/aircraft connect point, stay calm, think about how there's not been a single sortie scrub so far this week... and you're on the spot to preserve the image of "ze powairfool Thundairchef nucleair bombair.." in the eyes of our NATO allies.
Hey -- let's fix this sucker, right here, right now!! Fill in the lieutenant in the front seat on the game plan, mike off, canopies up, seat pins in, pull the air compressor over and start it up, clamber up on top of the idling Thud via the boarding ladder to the rear cockpit (on the way, confidently pat the wide-eyed VIP in the back seat on the shoulder, and give him a big fat "thumbs-up"), unbutton the dorsal cover and hook up the air compressor hose, clamber down, send your buddy back up on top after he brings over the new fist-sized O-ring from the spares kit, signal him to slide the control lever to the "DOWN" position... and feel 2,730 pounds of B/B tank and JP4 slowly "shuddder" its way down to the lowest reach of the air ram. Did anybody back at Republic ever plan for this sorta thing? Liberally smear vaseline on the new O-ring and the groove it sits in at the top of the tank feed pipe, slip it on, signal your bud on top to swing the handle to "UP"...
"Voila, mes ami, c'est bon" as they would say on the rest of this flight line... fuel leak fixed, sortie only slightly delayed, never an abort because of "Thud failure" on a NATO exchange!! Off to "lunch" at 10 AM -- the French crew chiefs thought it truly a tres magnufique act -- no charge on the "lunch" tab today... And it was a problem-free sortie, as was the next one that same afternoon...
0700 Next Morning: I'm out preflighting '327 for another VIP sortie set for 0900. Weather is overcast, temperature in the low 70s, probably stay that way all day. The French fuel truck stops by, and I top off the JP4 via the single point refuel receptacle just to the left rear of the B/B. During the fuel top-off, I warily inspect all the nooks and crannies visible around the B/B tank with with my OD GI flashlight that has the 90 degree bend in it -- the bay and tank are dry as a bone. I tell the French fueller "plen" and help him wrap up the hose on the bowser... Suddenly, there's a contingent of people congregating around the bird -- so I ask "What's happening?" A 1st Lieutenant sez there's no VIPs to fly this morning, so would I please pull a name outta the baseball cap full of name slips he extends to me. Being the good troop, I fish around in the cap, pull one out, and hand it to him. "You're it," was all he said, as he turned and walked off... I'm shocked -- did he mean me??
I finished up the preflight according to the checklist, but I checked that drag chute release seven times -- we were flying out of/into a 7,000 foot runway and no one had mentioned any form of arrester gear at either end. 1st Lieutenant Christenson arrives to begin the mission, takes one look at me and advises that I should take along my baseball cap "..just in case." I thought "..just in case of what??" (Clue: there are NO "barf bag" provisions for F-105 crew members!)
I don the spare flight suit and, carrying the white helmet, clamber up the rear ladder. Sitting in the 'pit, I'm checking out the instruments intently -- they suddenly have taken on a new meaning for my immediate future! Christenson leans over the cockpit rail, points to the 2" by 2" red EJECT light on the lower edge of the main instrument panel, and sez "If that sumbitch as much as flickers, I want yer ass outta here." Message most definitely understood... sir. Gulp.
The startup and power-on checks were flawless (I don't recall who was on the groundside for this) and, together with F-105F 63-8319, we taxied onto the Lahr active. We were taking off in echelon, something I had never seen at Bitburg! Takeoff roll was not at all like I imagined it would be -- it was very quiet from inside the bird. As the nose wheel lifted at rotation, I snapped a picture of '319 right alongside us (Jim McKeown had loaned me his 110). We spent over an hour tooling around the German skies at altitudes ranging from 500 feet (pull-out altitude from a GCA letdown thru the pea soup -- no sense of movement outside the canopy) to 36,000 feet, where I tried my "ham hand" at a 2-minute turn/orbit (I did a lousy job -- I wasn't yet aware of that miracle called a trim button). No supersonic time (not allowed under the Status of Forces Agreement with the Germans). Landing was right on the ETR, and the drag chute worked like a charm.... of course. Today I have absolutely no recall of the rest of the TDY and the return to Bitburg. So what? -- the high point of my 27 months at Bitburg and 48 months Air Force duty had just occurred...
Co-opted from Personal Recollections and War Stories
