One of my favorite areas to fly.

 

Edited November 13, 20205 yr by DJJose

those shots are just ridiculous. Oh my.

Fantastic set Todd!

Naples was one of my favorite duty stations....spent 6 months on a Det. at the Capo airport.

When we deployed to various places in the Med...we took care of COMSIXTHFLT.  It was Admiral Kelso, who later became CNO.  I met him a few times and even had brief chats with him (I mean...he was only a 3 Star then, LOL).  Still I was reluctant to advise him on how to run the Navy should he ever make CNO. 🤣  It was basically a lot of "Yes Sir's" from me, with a few "Fine Sir" mixed it. 🙂 

Here was his personal helo....

This pic is interesting because the OINC was flying this mission...and after about 6 wave offs because the seas were so rough...when he put it down this time....it was pretty "firmly"...and if you notice the right main landing gear is almost touching the centerline...which means the other wheel is on the white circle.   If this were calm seas (or even moderate), the pilot would usually lift off a few inches and center the aircraft (and never land this far off the center in the 1st place).

In fact, the LSO gave the "up" command just after he landed, anticipating that's what the pilot would do...nope....he vehemently gave the "cut" signal as if he was really trying to cut his throat! 🤣

The Admiral cancelled his next flight later that day. 😉 (to all the crew's relief!)  

I believe on this trip we were heading to Spit, Yugoslavia 

NOTE:  You notice all the "high point tiedowns"...the ones near the top of the fuse?  We rarely used them unless the seas were extremely rough because they put undo pressure on the mounts and the fuse skin around them (a good way to invite fatigue cracks that are invisible... until the tail falls off!).  We normally did "Low Point" tie downs on the main landing gear struts as they are extremely robust...and on the tail wheel strut as well. And of course the chocks. 🙂 

Oh and one final note just because you guys have not heard enough about the intricacies of working in a Naval Helo Detachment...LOL

We'd usually fold the blades before shutting down....but as you may have guessed...the weather even prevented us from doing that.  So we "booted" them in place until those boat drivers up front drove the ship out of the storm. 🤪 

Edited November 14, 20205 yr by Steve Dra

@Todd2

Nice photos of Naples. I was just there last Christmas/New Years and went to Vesuvius and Sorrento while there. 

Must say that Naples has the craziest taxi drivers. My driver from the train to my AirBnB side swiped to parked cars and kept going. He said it was “normal” and wasn’t a big deal 😂😂

Naples wasn’t bad and am glad I went but I enjoyed other Italian destinations more that there, namely Florence, Rome, Sienna and places like that up north.

Beautiful presentation - well done 🙂