Don't worry, you'll deploy plenty no matter where you go. Not all of your missions will be spent flying into flak so thick you can walk on it, but you can be sure you'll deploy.
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Navy Helos and support to Special Operations
- Thread starter torpedo0126
- Start date
Don't worry, you'll deploy plenty no matter where you go. Not all of your missions will be spent flying into flak so thick you can walk on it, but you can be sure you'll deploy.
MasterBates
Well-Known Member
What is this "Deploy"?
I have to do that at some point?
I have to do that at some point?
abracadabra11
Member
At 22 our mission (this is copy-pasted from my orders) is to "provide detachments for NSW, VERTREP, Amphibious SAR, and Utility services".
However, unless you're at 84 or few other exceptions here and there (increasing these days), your NSW dets are going to be in support of NSW guys' IDTC, such as going to FT Knox. You're not gonna take a det into the shit and fly with these guys every night. That's 84 and 160th work. Your long cruises will primarily be some combo of VERTREP, SAR, and Utility (now including air ambulance).
Firehawk
New Member
84 does an incredible job with the resources they've been given. Glad they're still around. They survived the HMP axe. We didn't, but that's OK; at least the mission did.
In the meantime, enjoy.
www.hcs-5.org
In the meantime, enjoy.
www.hcs-5.org
84 does an incredible job with the resources they've been given. Glad they're still around. They survived the HMP axe. We didn't, but that's OK; at least the mission did.
In the meantime, enjoy.
www.hcs-5.org
Amen. There are those working to change that. For those asking, you will not be able to select directly. What happened was a one time thing. Expect to see senior people going.
All I can say is, if "not deploying enough" is your biggest worry, don't sweat it - the Navy will help you out with that.
I always hear "I want to be in the shit", until you're on NVGs, chalk 3 of 6 on the approach to a formation assault, browning out at 100' from the lead and hoping feverishly that when you do touchdown in the compound that you don't hit the bird in front of you. I get alot of "f*%k you have the controls!" during the first few months of assaults with our new pilots, and these are typically 2-3K hour guys.
MasterBates
Well-Known Member
How does one do those? I know how to do it single ship, but when I was HSL we did form about as often as I got laid.
^^ Pray!
To echo Stearman -- it took over a year to get our HSL first tour cross overs up to speed where we could send them to the desert, and they will tell you that they were behind the curve for a while once deployed (some wrote an article about it in Rotor Review). We had really good sticks -- and it still took us that long, so it is the same everwhere....
To echo Stearman -- it took over a year to get our HSL first tour cross overs up to speed where we could send them to the desert, and they will tell you that they were behind the curve for a while once deployed (some wrote an article about it in Rotor Review). We had really good sticks -- and it still took us that long, so it is the same everwhere....
Very carefully and lots of practice. One of the few things that still gets me sucking in the seat cushion.
I talked to HCS -5 when I got off active duty and they really do like lots of goggle and terf time. Then they went away.
My buddies in the 160th said they did some great work with them in the desert.
We get alot of "It must be easy in the MH-47Gs with the glass panel, auto hover, etc". Actually, I might as well have a Piper Cub panel the last 30 seconds of the assault. It's all gross motor skills at that point.
The 47 creates unbeleivable brown out, single ship not to mention tight formations. I always brief "Lead will get in, the rest of you are on your own". For us, it's all about tightening up before the approach commences. As soon as you see lead's pitch attitude change to decel, you bottom out the collective and basically try to beat him to the ground. If you delay and start to see the "angel wings" form on the lead...you're screwed.
As the rest of the assault guys can tell you...it wouldn' tmatter if Haiji launched a Silkworm at you from 100 meters, it takes every ounce of your concentration to get it on the ground.
We've had some particularly rough landings, ripped several sets of landing gear off. When the violent motion stops and the back enders have picked themselves off the floor, all you can do is look over at your co-pilot and mouth "Holy Sh*t!". When the dust clears is when the real fun starts; then you can see what wall the probe is sitting on(or jammed through), how close you are to the houses you landed next to inside the compound, and which which jackass is setting up to take his shot at you.
And then you take off and do it 3 more times that night. Yep, young grasshopper, hurry up and come get in the "shit", cuz' the rest of us are getting too long in the tooth for it much longer!
The 47 creates unbeleivable brown out, single ship not to mention tight formations. I always brief "Lead will get in, the rest of you are on your own". For us, it's all about tightening up before the approach commences. As soon as you see lead's pitch attitude change to decel, you bottom out the collective and basically try to beat him to the ground. If you delay and start to see the "angel wings" form on the lead...you're screwed.
As the rest of the assault guys can tell you...it wouldn' tmatter if Haiji launched a Silkworm at you from 100 meters, it takes every ounce of your concentration to get it on the ground.
We've had some particularly rough landings, ripped several sets of landing gear off. When the violent motion stops and the back enders have picked themselves off the floor, all you can do is look over at your co-pilot and mouth "Holy Sh*t!". When the dust clears is when the real fun starts; then you can see what wall the probe is sitting on(or jammed through), how close you are to the houses you landed next to inside the compound, and which which jackass is setting up to take his shot at you.
And then you take off and do it 3 more times that night. Yep, young grasshopper, hurry up and come get in the "shit", cuz' the rest of us are getting too long in the tooth for it much longer!
Beating lead to the ground is one way to do the formation thing, another technique is to land in front of lead, the theory being you fly through his cloud then at least you can see again the last 40 or 50 ft. No wind, or Afghanistan and the land in front of lead thing don't work very well. Since we pretty much fly as a two ship, the technique I was using in Iraq was to land at lead's six or abeam but with 20-30 degrees of crossing heading so I had a better go-around option. But we still joked that it was a law of averages type thing, you do enough of them and sooner or later you're going to break something.
I've never done dual ship brownouts, but single ship brownouts on goggles are definately a challenging skill. I was doing some re-quals with another pilot who didn't feel like flying the profile because it wasn't "really that tactical" and that "the 160th shoots theirs steeper, etc". There's nothing like coming into a hover at 20' with no ground reference. Tactics be damned, during the re-qual I'm a lot more worried about the dust cloud coming from behind me and the uneven terrain beneath me. I'm about 100% sure no one is going to shoot a missile at me right now, but us ending up upside down hanging from the straps or without a landing gear is a real possibility.