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I'm glad you hog fanatics enjoyed the "Last Tiger from Alex" pic. I am also quite pleased the main drivers of this terrific site are "maintainers". I flew the A-10 at D-M, Alex and Suwon (ROK) and our maintenance was the best in the Air Force ...ALWAYS! So , I guess it only fitting you troops are doing the same to keep the heritage of our beloved jet alive. Dice suggested I post some stories you may find interesting in the hog's history...I hesitate to do it beause this isn't about me...just I was very lucky to "be there" on some momentous occasions in the history of the A-10. S, with your indulgence, I will recount a few and maybe that will spur some questions/discussion of the early days!.
First, I was a member of the USAF TEST TEAM for the A-7/A-10 "Flyoff" at Ft Riley KS in March-April 1974. The A-10 was fresh from its flyoff against the Northrup A-9( I missed that one!)I was doing my Forward Air Controller tour in the O-2A and controlled about 1/3 of the A-10/A-7 Flyoff sorties as the airborne FAC. The procedures were carefully controlled to insure neither A/C had an advantage...but the A-10 was given some minor "advantages" to insure it won....we can discuss those someday!!
I went to the A-7 at Myrtle Beach(356TFS "Green Demons") which in early 1977 was selected to become the first Operational Squadron in the A-10..to keep the squadron "combat ready for the max time" we were half A-7/half A-10 as more newly trained pilots arrived....quite a group of Hog Pilots....there were some superstars///LT COL Bob Sapp was the first commander..and Major Dave "Bubba" Jenny the ops officer(Mr A-10 ) in the early years....interestingly, a young 1Lt was in the DEmons too...John Rosa(Today LtGen John Rosa, superintendent at the Air Force Academy!)..Lt John Hodges( the best hog pilot I ever knew!) was there tooo..He had been the lead singer and one of the founding members of the Southern Rock Band for "The Marshall Tucker Band".I can tell you some incredible stories about this youngster!
I watched him loop a Mig-21 once! Anyway....I will stop here before I ramble too much...If there is interest in some other key events in the hog, I'll tell some more stories later...Once again, my compliments to Dice and all who are "saving" hog memories...esp those of you , who like I, STILL consider Alex and the "Flying Tigers" home!...Cheers !



Col R. C. Lemon

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On God's wing, to Heaven i fly.

RCsience, glad to see you posting in the Hog chat area, your experances are a pleasure to read, at least for this old histroy buff.

OK, I'll start the Q&A ball rolling, you said the A-10 was given some "minor" advantages over the A-7 to insure it won, without going into these advantages (later) did the A-10 need them to win?

My understanding is if you use the five (at the trime) CAS aircraft standards used to build the Hawg, maintainability, reliabitity, survivability, lorter time, weapons load, there was NO WAY the A-7 could have won.

Ugly But Well Hung

Yeah I dont see how it could have won on any of the 5 points, except maintanability and that would only have been because all the A-7 parts were allready common to the supply systems of the three services that flew them. It would certainly not have been because it was easier to work on .
Weapons load..........no brainer
Survivability.........no brainer
Loiter time...........no brainer (not sure about the A-7F though)
Reliability...........the A-7 at least had a track record whereas the A-10 was new, but the redundancy of the A-10 would again have made this a no brainer. IMHO

By this time tomorrow I shall have gained either a pearage or Westminster Abbey........Nelson

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YGBSM !

Hi troops...your observations are on target for the most part, and I am sure at the highest levels considerations were made to all the points you mention were made. My involvement was only at the "tip" of the sword...operations and considerations of "over the target" matters, but a few observations..I teach American History (as well as highschool science ourses) and I always caution my students to not judge historical events throught the prism of what we know( and value today)..you have to puit yourself in the times in which these events happened(as much as humanly possible). First, I truly believe the new CAS jaet in the early 70's was largely a "bone" thrown to the Army to convince then the AF was serious about Close Air Surpport. The Army at the time was considering developing a fixed wing CAS platform to supplement attack helicopters because they weren't very satified the AF WAS interested..by the way, those of us in the CAS mission at the time kinda sensed our leadership put CAS at the bottom of their priorities( it was an F-4 Air Force and the"double ugly" was terrible at the mission..the platform wasn't very well suited and the pilots spent relatively little training time on the mission.
The other prevailing "wisdom" at the time was "speed is life"..if your jet wasn't pointy...it wasn't survivable...(btw...both the A-7 and A-10 suffer from this malady!)I always countered that a mach 7 SAM didn't worry much about the extra 100 knots!!! The Senior AF was pushing at the same time for the F-15 and shortly after the lightweight fighter(ultimately the F-16)..and really the lightweight had to be forced down their throats before its wisdom was recognized.
I believe the AF leadership felt if the didn't also build a CAS a/c they would lose the mission( and the $$$$ and planes) to the Army..So in that context...the A-10/A-7 flyoff was developed to demonstrate our "interest" in CAS. Think about it , if the A-7 wins(operationally only, now!) it is still a multi-role attack jet...we trained in missions like airfield attack and interdiction as well as CAS...and the SLUF was good at them. We buy more A-7's and the Army says..."AHA, see you are still gonna use the force to do non-CAS stuff!" ( very well true).
Well, too much politics and history there...but that WAS the context in which the flyoff was held.
The flyoff was held at Ft Riley , KS, in Mar-Apr 1974. Four USAF pilots were selected to fly both jets. The criteria wer that they could not have any previous time in either jet...they were all USAF Weapons School(our version of TOP GUN!)grads and I believe 3 of the 4 ( and maybe all 4) were also USAF Test Pilot School grads..so these were bright shiny young officers(3 were Capts and one a Major as I recall). The flew a mission against an " aggressor" array of tanks, and APC's and air defense weapons in soviet style ground array at a specific time on one day in the A-7 and the very next day against the same formations in the A-10.This meant the shadow angles etc would be identically think there were like 6-8 different scenarios we flew(remember, I was only the airborne FAC controlling the strike!).There were 8 ordnance passes made in each scenario. One of the things designed to show the superiority of the A-10 was what was called a "minimun time reattack" between passes 7 and 8. The idea was to bring ordnance to bear(the gun primarily)as quickly as possible on the target..The Hog's superior turning capability made this a "cinch" winner (yaaay, hog!)..however as I was walking out to my O-2A to fly the 3rd day's missions, the Test Director ran out and grabbed me and said, "you have to come see this". The air defense weapons all had cameras through their gunsights, and he had just received the film from the first 2 days missions. The min-time reattack was done so quickly...and in such a short turning radius that wasn't generating any "angle" movement in the guns...they just sat there and hosed the hog in the center mil ring of their sights...DAMN, maybe the "speed is life" guys had a point!! Anyway he said he had already briefed the A_10 pilots that day that the min-time reattak was out ...take them out and regenerated some"smash"(pilot talk for airspeed) befrore making the reattack...so one major factor designed to be an advantage for the hog was quickly found to be a huge disadvantage and the test was changed to accomodate.
I remember thinking to myself..." it is good that the A-10 has all these features to make it survivable...'cause it's sure gonna take more hits than anyone else on the battlefield" ( also keep in mind we were in the mindset of low level attack to avoid missiles..in Desert Storm and after a coordinated and integrated air defense system hasn't been a major threat most of the time...it surely would have been over SovietTank Army!
Anyway, I think the A-10 was destined to win the competition for all the reasons i mentioned,,,and I can tell you whether fighting Sovs in Europe or anyone anywhere else I would have preferred the A-10 to the A-7 and I flew both of them operationally!...Sorry to have written a book chapter here....I'll try to do better next time....Cheers, gentlemen(and ladies!)
.



Col R. C. Lemon

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On God's wing, to Heaven i fly.

One funny story from that test. One of the pilots had worked out a "low" pass over the tank formation..i think tankers had wanted to take some pics maybe. Anyway, unknown to the pilot the Test Director had gone to the "field" to watch the missions that day and was in the commander's cupola on the turrent of the lead tank....the tank chosen for the "low pass. I knew nothing about the plan or the fact the Director had gone with the tanks that day...and fortunately a had made a "knock it off " call when i saw how low he was on the pass. When i got back to Ft Riley the director was at the debriefing we had after each mission with the army tank commander. While we we waiting the test didector who had helicoptered back was furiou about that kid shining his ass" and was complentating a Article 15...etc etc etc...he asked me how low i though tthe pass had been....well, the plane and its shadow had nearly merged on the ground so i estimated maybe 50 feet above the tank...well, it took about ten minutes to get him cooled off again...about that time the army Tank Company commender (a young Captain) walked into the briefing room and the first thing he said was, "Tell that A-10 pilot when he flew by MY tank I noticed there was a panel loose...ON TOP OF HIS WING!"...he was an good old country kid and thought this was really funny...THE TEST DIRECTOR DIDN'T and went through the roof...fortunately he didn't courtmatrial the pilot as he threatened and the tests went on!

Col R. C. Lemon

_________________
On God's wing, to Heaven i fly.

Thanks for the reply, got any pictures from that time?

Ugly But Well Hung

soory, Dice....no photos from that flyoff. I was young and no clue that what we were doing might be of interest 30 years later. I will check with some of the other pilots to ee if they might have some...but I remember no one with a camera..
I'll get you some pics from the last A-10 out of the Fairchild-Republic (Mar 1984)factory soon....when I get to a scanner again!
Adios Amigo!

Col R. C. Lemon

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On God's wing, to Heaven i fly.

Thanks Rcscience looking forward to seeing the pics. Looks like I need to build a new page of pictures on my site just for the pic you send me! <img src=newicons/bounce.gif border=0 align=middle> Sorry I have posted much this weekend...been very busy..but I do have a ton of questions for ya! <img src=icon_smile_approve.gif border=0 align=middle>

Ugly But Well Hung

A bunch of young fire pissing pilots on a test program with no cameras ? Whooda whatda.....................? <img src=newicons/tard.gif border=0 align=middle>

By this time tomorrow I shall have gained either a pearage or Westminster Abbey........Nelson

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YGBSM !