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Just wrapped up my three week A-10C APG school...man, I'm loving this jet! They weren't lying when they said it was designed for the Army. I've never seen an aircraft that was so mechanic friendly and easy to work on! Also, my time as an airline mechanic also helped since I used to work on Saab 340As...that Fairchild helped build. Heck, I'm already familiar with the hydraulic system, wheel and brake assy's, and ECS...because Fairchild used almost the exact same designs and pieces for the Saab 340A turbo prop passenger plane.

My instructor was MSgt Mike Hawley who came from Pope. Great guy, and he's going to head up our conversion school in Ft Wayne for our traditional guardsmen and the rest of our technicians for the rest of the summer. Our asst instructor was SSgt Scott Bradbury (I think that's his name)...also from Pope and recently from QA at Moody. They did a bang up job teaching the four of us who went...all with a combined 50+ years of Crew Chief and acft maintenance experience on everything from F-4s, F-16s, and civilian airliners. Kind of felt bad because they'd start teaching us something and we'd jump right in and get the job done without much supervision...heh.

The highlight of my trip was Wednesday when we went to the gunnery range. Nothing much more spectacular than watching a Hawg dive down and pass within a few hundred yards while slinging lead from the gun. Afterwards Mr Tillman who runs the range took us out into the range and let us collect still warm 30mm slugs from the target pits, and took us on a tour of the entire range. I took a ton of pics...need to get them up.

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SoWW #2485
Cave Putorium!

Good to hear that you have a good time.
Saab 340, nice plane.

Gunnery Range, always great to watch planes in action.
Gunsound, smoke, jets, bombs, that is always marvelous.

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73-1664

The sound was awesome! I was snapping pictures and while taking a break during some \"show of force\" passes I saw two different A-10s diving out of the sky. Knowing this was going to be a couple good gun runs I dialed my wife on my cell. *Ring*...*ring*...*ring*...come on...pick up!!! *ring*...

At the same moment I saw the smoke coming off the nose my wife picked up.

**BRRRRRRRAAAPPP!**

I was still hoping she picked up in time, and then I heard \"Cool!\" on my phone. She picked up just in time.

Moody's been doing night flying the past two weeks so we've been hearing the guns well past bedtime...heh. Music to my ears!

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SoWW #2485
Cave Putorium!

It is \"The sound of Freedom\"

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73-1664

Sounds like your wife is a keeper, too! My wife would have said something like \"Well that was rude\", not even knowing what it was.

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\"Those who hammer their guns into plows
will plow for those who do not.\"
- Thomas Jefferson

I LOVE Range Trips!

As CATM we used to take the Cops out to the Bombing Range to do some long range shooting at the same targets the birds dropped on. After hours we'd take hikes around the range.

Here's an old M-113 that met with the wrong end a a GAU-8.

Here's the entrance wounds, note the 5.56mm round on the top for scale.

And some exit wounds:


I even managed to find one shell that'd passed clean through the APC and had buried it's self in the dirt beyond. I still keep it on my desk at work.

One of the most amazing things I managed to find though, was one of the arming wire clips from a live MK-82. These same kinds of clips I used to apply to the arming wire when I worked as a 3 man on the load crews at DM. Good Times

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Slow is Fast, Fast is Slow
Violence may not be the best option, but it IS an option

You have to be impressed with the ball peen hammer-like dents from the 20mm!

Coach

I did walk off with a mark-82 guidance fin...figured they didn't need it...hehe. We picked up a lot of 30mm slugs, and some .50cal brass and tips further down range from the helos. It was my first time at a range, and it was very memorable!

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SoWW #2485
Cave Putorium!