Dang but this is one ginormous plane C5

It's not too impressive wih onl a 70% take off rate. I loved o hate those planes when I served. They were only good to jump out of at high altitudes. And they were noisy as hell due to their jet rotors. Luckily, they are beig modified with bigger and better engines.

ScottsGT wrote in post #9531345
He was a Loadmaster in the USAF, the second to make CMSgt. in the USAF by the way...

The second loadmaster to make CMSgt or the second person in the USAF to make CMSgt?

I never met a loadmaster who did not love his job.

From a long time ago (approx '88 ).

Grey & White C-5A at Richmond RAAF base. Also in shot are USAF C-141B Starlifter, RAAF C130E & H, RSAF C130 and RAAF Caribou. Taken from the 486SQN hangar roof

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Nice Find Wardie!!

This was back when military aircraft had some character!!

I love the smiling C5.

Funny stories -- I watched the first one ever to land at Kadena AFB Okinawa. The big beast landed and broke the front landing gear. There it sat for two days till another plane from the states could bring something over big enough to bring up the nose to repair the front gear. This was in 1970 or 1971. This was the two years I was stationed at Kadena as a technician and a crew member on the RC-135M's

When I first saw a C-5A at Richmond where I was on the flightline, I marshaled it into it's parking place where it shut down and the loadie (or Flight Eng) came out on his long lead, stood in front of it and YELLED "Kneel M*** F***er" and loh and behold, it did!

OMG That's so great!

wardie wrote in post #9551095
When I first saw a C-5A at Richmond where I was on the flightline, I marshaled it into it's parking place where it shut down and the loadie (or Flight Eng) came out on his long lead, stood in front of it and YELLED "Kneel M*** F***er" and loh and behold, it did!

What a great story.

RDKirk wrote in post #9541602
The second loadmaster to make CMSgt or the second person in the USAF to make CMSgt?

I never met a loadmaster who did not love his job.

Second Loadmaster to make Chief. Ever see the wratcheting tie down strap that is in every WalMart, auto parts store and truck stop....
Yep, Dad invented it. Apparently he has a lot of inventions he made while in the USAF that I keep learning about everytime I have a conversation with him.

ScottsGT wrote in post #9565300
Second Loadmaster to make Chief. Ever see the wratcheting tie down strap that is in every WalMart, auto parts store and truck stop....
Yep, Dad invented it. Apparently he has a lot of inventions he made while in the USAF that I keep learning about everytime I have a conversation with him.

That would have been before the USAF suggestion program (in which they paid a member 10% of whatever they saved the first year they used his suggestion.

I knew a USAF camera technician who had invented an automatic exposure system for the SR-71 and U-2 in the early 70s. Before then, exposure was estimated purely by sun angles, which changed enough during the missions that often as much as half the mission was improperly exposed. Sometimes someone goofed on the initial setting and the whole mission was ruined. This cost literally millions of dollars per year.

But this guy--he was a tech sergeant at the time--invented an auto-exposure system that had to have saved well over a million dollars in the first year it was used. I was in Hq SAC in the early 80s and got a call from Hq USAF inquiring whether his device was actually worth the $50,000 they had calculated he should be paid under the suggestion program--I think that was actually the maximum payout possible.

The guy was a chief by then (I knew him and the story of his invention), and my response was, "You haven't paid him yet?"