Sometimes you get the bear….

Y’know how some days just don’t seem to get any better? No matter what ya do, God seems to be tapping you on the shoulder saying “I tried to tell you to stay in bed. But oh, no, you had to come to work.” There’s a team in Israel probably thinking something along those lines.

Seems an Israeli UH-60 had to make an emergency landing in the West Bank, and a CH-53 Sea Stallion was dispatched to bring ‘er back.

Does the CH-52 have the lift capacity?

The CH-53K was originally cleared to conduct a 27,000-pound external lift, subsequently increased to 36,000 pounds. The CH-53K can also lift heavier objects for longer distances compared to its predecessor. Externally, it is designed to carry up to 27,000 pounds over a distance of 110 nautical miles in a high and hot environment. This is compared to the CH-53E’s ability to carry 9,654 pounds over the same distance.

The UH-60 weighs a bit under 12,000 pounds dry, but remember they aren’t flying it far, more like 11 miles instead of 110. Back to yesterday’s flight:

According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the sling-load operation was originally launched to recover an IAF Yanshuf medium-lift helicopter — the local name for the S-70/UH-60 Black Hawk. The Yanshuf had made an emergency landing earlier this week when it encountered bad weather in the Gush Etzion area, directly south of Jerusalem, in the West Bank. TWZ

If a picture is worth a thousand words….  If you’re not seeing it slung under the CH-53, there’s a reason for that. No word on why or how it got loose, or whether the aircrew deliberately cut it loose due to problems. No injuries reported, which is the good news. However:

I don’t think that’s gonna buff out.

Some of you (ahem) more experienced readers may be reminded of a classic 1972 sports car ad from MG, in which their flagship MGB was dropped by parachute, landed, and driven away to victory, sorta like this.

What they didn’t say in the ad was that that was the SECOND car dropped…and the first one wound up looking like this. (Photos courtesy of Hagerty )

Yeah, they ride low to the ground. Not THAT low, though.

Quick update – we speculated a while back that renaming the Department of Defense to the Department of War might be a pricier proposition than renaming the six Confederate-named bases back to their original surnames (albeit after different people.) That naming reportedly cost the American taxpayer about $40,000,000, up from the original $21,000,000 estimate, and the cost to rename them back added an estimated $22,000,000 or so. The cost of changing DoD to DoW? Depending on how fast and thoroughly the change is implemented (and we know this current lot likes to do things in a big way) is $125,000,000.Military.com That’s a lot of Presidential golf trips.

And in closing, the President is threatening tariffs against countries which don’t support the US taking over Greenland. (Stealing Ed’s excellent graphic!)

During an unrelated event at the White House about rural health care, he recounted Friday how he had threatened European allies with tariffs on pharmaceuticals.

“I may do that for Greenland too,” Trump said. “I may put a tariff on countries if they don’t go along with Greenland, because we need Greenland for national security. So I may do that,” he said.

He had not previously mentioned using tariffs to try to force the issue.

Guess it’s better than threatening military force against an ally and fellow NATO member. Would hate to think Mr. Putin Trump would try physically take over Ukraine Greenland.

Category: "The Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves", Israel, NATO