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Military Pics

Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2017 12:00 am
by BrokenolMarine
One thing about the military, we got to go places, see things, and do things, that gave us a lot of opportunities to take cool pictures. I thought I would share a couple I took a LONG time ago, far far away. (NO, not in a galaxy far far away... :roll: ... but sometimes it seemed that way.)

This first pic is of a Nordic Sunset taken in a Fjiord in Norway just prior to a NATO joint forces exercise. It snowed on the flight deck the night before the exercise. Once we moved deeper into the Fjiord and took our position for the night, we woke up the next morning to the second view. When the exercise kicked off, the folks from the area kicked everyone's butt in about an hour, they reset the start time, and after a couple hours for debrief, lessons learned, started over with humbled non-arctic forces ready to learn to operate in sub zero temps. :lol: :D
nordic sunset 2.jpg
noway fiord.jpg
I took the picture standing UNDER The gunmount on the aft deck of the carrier. That's the 5" gun you see over my head in the top of the picture and the safety chains in the bottom of the pic.... ;)

Look closely at the second picture. To get a feel for how steep, and how high the mountains are, there are houses at the base, right around the treeline. There are four or five along the treeline between the two ravines that travel down the mountain on the right side of the picture. The trees at the bottom of the picture... are huge....

The last picture is of an Historic Spanish Castle at the top of a mountain that can only be reached by a single track trail up the mountain. NO motorized vehicles could make the trip. Mules and donkeys only. The castle was in dire need of repair, so as a favor, we scheduled a two day heavy lift training exercise and ferried pallet after pallet of construction materials to the courtyard of the castle from a soccer field in the town below, using the CH53E and the CH46E aircraft from the Carrier. The aircraft would slide in from the cliff's edge, slipping sideways over the castle walls, and drop the pallets into the courtyard. It was something to see the radar altimeter go from 600' to 40' in a snap. It was quite a dropoff, to say the least. :roll:


The Combined arms teams all got needed training, including the ground supply folks handling the cargo with the Spanish Townsfolk, the Translators assigned to the Ship/Ground teams, the Aircrews, the shipboard aircraft handlers... everyone. In return, the Spanish Government paid for the fuel, and the Town threw a giant party in the streets after the two day exercise ended. Food, drink, music and fun for all involved. The party started with lunch, and ran well into the night, and all the way into the wee hours of the morning. Let's just say that more than the mules and donkeys appreciated our help. :P
spanish castle two 2.jpg
This photo I took from my gunner's window on one of the approaches, appeared in the cruise book at the end of the cruise, and was an often requested pic for copies.

Re: Military Pics

Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:24 am
by JEBar
outstanding .... your comments gave life to the pictures