From the Pages of My Logbook: Three Sea Stories

By CDR “Dangerous Dave” Diamond, USNR (Ret.)

Green Flight Suit to Orange Jump Suit?

For anyone receiving orders as a training command flight instructor, I would say you aren’t really an instructor until you’ve taken students cross country. There is something about getting away from your home field that offers so many more options for things to go awry.

My first cross country flight was a good example. I decided to stack the deck in my favor. I would fly short legs to a place I knew people. What could possibly go wrong?

I had the students plan four legs from NAS Whiting Field to Charleston AFB in South Carolina. There were four planned legs. Whiting to Tallahassee Regional, Tallahassee Regional to Southwest Georgia Regional in Albany Georgia, Southwest Georgia Regional to Savannah International, and ending with Savannah International to Charleston AFB.

The first leg was delayed for weather but went smoothly to Tallahassee. We closed the flight in Tallahassee and the students got practice filing with Flight Service. The students offered a way for us to make up time and instead of flying to Southwest Georgia, they offered Vidalia, Georgia. I asked: “Do they have an instrument approach and contract fuel?” They said “Yes,” so I ok'd the change.

When we turned up the aircraft and called for clearance, they had nothing in the system. The students didn’t realize we had changed time zones and filed for a departure time an hour later than we wanted to depart. We re-filed and launched to Vidalia. As we shot the ONYUN Non-Directional Beacon (NDB) Approach, I had a bad feeling. The airport looked like a scene out of High Plains Drifter. I saw no signs of life there. I asked, what time does the field close? The student at the controls said confidently “1700." The student in the back said, “That was an hour ago.” The time change had bitten us twice on this leg.

When we landed, I asked the student in the back to see if there was anyone that could refuel us. I shut down the aircraft to save what fuel we had. I sent the student that had been flying to call Flight Service and close out our flight plan. Center had asked us to do that since Vidalia didn’t have a manned tower to call them.

There was no one available to fuel us and I really didn’t want to spend my weekend in Vidalia. So, we broke out our charts and figured out a plan. That’s when I realized we didn’t have a VFR sectional that would get us from Vidalia to Savannah and didn’t have enough fuel to file IFR to Savannah and meet fuel reserve requirements. We laid out the charts we had, found a waypoint that was common to both charts, then filed a composite flight plan to that point where we would change from an IFR to VFR flight plan and land in Savannah with the required minimums.

Red line marks the restricted area at transient aircraft ramps.

I expected something to go wrong, but maybe we were in the clear. That’s when the Sheriff showed up and asked are you the crew of Navy 1 Echo 057? Great, am I going from a green flight suit to an orange jump suit? There was a 57 painted in big black numbers on the side of the aircraft, so I figured truth was the best option. “Yes, that’s us, why do you ask?” He explained Flight Service had launched a SAR effort on us because they didn’t receive a safe on deck call. My student confirmed he had called, somehow, they didn’t get the confirmation. Then the Sheriff said he was actually happy to see us. The last time they called him, he didn’t see anyone at the airfield, and later they discovered the aircraft had crashed prior to reaching the airport. I thanked him and gave him my squadron patch.

So, now we executed our composite flight plan to Savannah and the rest of the cross country went without further issues. I called the CO and told him about the SAR effort, and he took it well. I figured it was best if he heard it from me first.

I made many additional cross-country flights to Charleston AFB, and usually they went without issue, save for a few times. Once I forgot to train my students about the red lines on the flight line and found my Marine students face down spread eagle with armed Air Force security personnel detaining them for crossing the red line. Another time, we had a weather delay and had to launch out of Savannah International using closed field procedures. We had gotten a weather brief from Flight Service. After launching we were informed that we were flying in a SIGMET (Significant Meteorological Information). We got vectors around the cells and landed safely in Charleston.

When you fly students cross country, make sure they understand if you are crossing a time zone. Make sure you have VFR and IFR sectionals and approach plates for every leg of your route and within two hundred miles either side of your planned route. You never know when you will need to make a major re-route for weather. Expect things to go wrong and keep a sense of humor when they do. Your students can learn a lot when things don’t go as they planned.

On some legs, I would point to a lake or another feature on their chart while we were flying to see how they handled rerouting. Also, take that time to talk to them about what they want to fly and ask why. You might influence their community choice by having that conversation. And by all means, warn your students about those red lines on Air Force base flight lines!

The Great Pumpkin Incident

In October 1992, I was embarked on USS Ponce (LPD 15) in the Caribbean as part of a Counter Drug Operations Group. The group consisted of two SH-2F Seasprites from HSL-34 and two CH-46E Sea Knights from HC-8.

One night at the end of a drug patrol, one of the Seasprites reported what appeared to be a person in the water near the ship with a chemlight. They were at the end of their flight and low on fuel. They requested a quick refuel and to load a rescue swimmer to perform the rescue.

That is when things got strange. The ship refused their request, ordered them to recover and shutdown. The flight crew was told the rescue would be performed by the ship, because that would be quicker. The flight crew and later all the aviators from the LAMPS detachment waited in the wardroom and witnessed the disaster that ensued as the ship tried to launch a boat to perform the rescue.

The ship had difficulty launching the motor whaleboat and for over an hour, anyone remotely responsible for the boat was called to the bridge. The Air Detachment Officer In Charge (OINC) repeatedly offered to launch for the recovery and was denied every time.

After about an hour, the ship finally successfully launched the recovery boat and pulled the “survivor” from the water. The survivor turned out to be a jack-o'-lantern illuminated by a chemlight.

To improve ship morale, the ship had held a jack-o'-lantern carving contest earlier that evening and, for safety reasons, decided to illuminate the entries with chemlights rather than open flamed candles. Apparently, one of the contestants that lost tossed his entry overboard with the chemlight still installed and none of the watch standers noticed the splash on entry or saw the chemlight of the orange Oscar. It wasn’t until the aircrew was approaching the ship at the end of their mission that it was discovered.

What I don’t remember happening during this fiasco was a muster to determine who could have been in the water. However, when the ship departed Santo Domingo, stowaways were found on the ship, so, even if everyone was accounted for, that doesn’t mean an additional undetected stowaway couldn’t have fallen overboard.

That cruise had many interesting stories, but the “great pumpkin incident” is one that always comes to mind.

Uncle Buck In A Flight Suit

This is the story of the two times I had the same malfunction indication and performed Precautionary Emergency Landings (PELs) with two very different outcomes. The first time was flying a TH-57B with a student, the second was flying a TH-57C with another instructor. Both times the same malfunction occurred on a powerlines course rules return to NAS Whiting Field. The malfunction was fluctuating engine oil pressure.

The first time it happened, I was returning from a familiarization (FAM) flight at Pace Outlying Field (OLF). The Engine Oil Pressure Gauge fluctuated right as I was passing Berry Hill Elementary School. Since that was the only option for a place to land, I did a 180 degree turn and set up to do a PEL. I ended the PEL with a no hover landing in the playground as far away from the students as possible. Upon safely landing and shutting down the aircraft, the children approached saying, “I want a ride!”

“Not in that one," I replied and added, “I don’t want to ride in that one anymore, it’s broken.”

After getting the blade tied down and post-flighting the aircraft, I found no evidence of an oil leak. I let my student give the students a static display tour of the aircraft while I made arrangements for it to be towed back to Whiting Field. This was before cellphones became popular. So, like a misbehaving child, I had to go to the principal’s office and call the squadron. As I made my walk of shame to the principal’s office and saw the short lockers and small chairs in the classrooms, I felt like Uncle Buck in a flight suit.

The aircraft was towed back to Whiting and since the student didn’t break it, I rode in the “truck of shame.” For those that don’t remember, when they tow an aircraft to Whiting, they send two trucks. One is attached to the trailer with the aircraft, and the other follows behind the towing truck. The truck with the trailer is the “truck of shame,” because that is the one everyone notices as it goes by. If the student broke the bird, I let them ride in the truck of shame, if I broke it or nobody broke it, I would ride in the truck of shame.

I checked with Maintenance Control the following day and they were unable to duplicate the malfunction. So, I never figured out what caused that fluctuation. However, I would find out the cause the next time it happened to me.

It was a slow day, and I was on the Functional Check Pilot schedule. Another instructor from my squadron (HT-18) had been assigned a TH-57C that had the engine replaced and asked if I wanted to help. There were no other birds up for the test, so I was happy to at least get some flight time. We took the bird through all the required checks and decided to ake it to Pace Outlying Field (OLF) and back to get a little time on the engine.

We were established on the power lines entry to Whiting when the Engine Oil Pressure Gauge started to fluctuate. We were past Berry Hill Elementary this time and decided Spencer OLF was the best choice for landing since they had a crash crew. I was on the controls and called Spencer Crash. I told them about our issue and explained I would not be splitting but entering directly from the northwest to the right side of the pattern for landing. They cleared traffic out of my way. We were getting major fluctuations but no other indications as we crossed the field boundary. I asked the other pilot if he wanted to do the landing since he had signed for the bird. He said, “no, you’re a FAM guy with more practice at autos.” I kept the controls and completed a no hover landing without any other issues.

We tied down the blade and post-flighted the aircraft. Again, there was no evidence of a leak. This time when they sent a maintenance crew, they could not find any evidence of oil in the tank. Apparently, an internal seal on the rebuilt engine had failed and the engine was consuming the oil. The fluctuations we saw were when the pump was cavitating because it was pumping air rather than oil.

Neither of us rode the truck of shame that day since Spencer had lots of aircraft offering rides back to Whiting at the end of their flights. So, two different aircraft with the same malfunction indication in roughly the same location forced PELs to different locations with different outcomes. If you experience this malfunction, make sure to treat it as if it was the second cause.

About the Author

CDR David D. Diamond (NHA Lifetime Member #367) flew the SH-2F Seasprite (LAMPS MKI) with HSL-30 DET ALFA, Neptune’s Horsemen, and HSL-34, the Greencheckers. He was a Selected Reservist assigned to CTW-5 NR DET 282, the Elks, and provided direct support to HT-18, the Vigilant Eagles. He retired with over 3,600 mishap free hours of flight time. He also holds the unique distinction of wearing five different ranks and holding three different designators while assigned to HT-18.