Just When You Think You’ve Seen It All . . .
. . . something comes along to show you that no, you haven’t. And occasionally, it’s something you can even smile about.
Here’s what appears to be an item of official correspondence promulgated at Thule AB earlier this year. (Click the image for a larger copy.)
OK, here’s the background.
Earlier this year, the USAF Space Command CG – Gen. John Hyten – apparently visited Thule. He was supposed to be there for 2 days.
Due to a number of mechanical delays, he ended up staying six.
A band – called “Blue Steel” – was also apparently stranded there as well. That band apparently often played the old Eagles tune “Hotel California” quite often while Gen. Hyten was there. The song’s final couplet:
You can check out any time you like
But you can never leave
Apparently the Base Commander (or perhaps someone on his staff – the memo isn’t 100% clear on the “who”) ordered the band not to sing the song’s last lines one night. The next day, the mechanical problems with Gen. Hyten’s aircraft were fixed and he was able to depart.
The policy letter followed. Anyway, “That’s their story and they’re sticking to it.” (smile)
It is good to see senior officers with a sense of humor. God knows they sometimes need one.
Like when their command ends up unexpectedly “babysitting” high-level visitors from HQ wearing stars for an extra few days. (smile)
(Original story – from the “John Q. Public” website – can be found here.)
Category: Air Force, Pointless blather, Who knows
” … various and divers aircraft problems.”
Nice.
Well there’s your problem – Navy should have been working on it.
I agree 100%
Good karma? Harmony with the Universe? Oh, dear. There’s a reason it’s called ‘Thule’.
I had a similar experience. Way back in the day, when Hack was younger, skinnier, and the dollar/yen exchange rate was a lot better, Hack was a radio repairman at 1st Tracked Vehicle Battalion, on occasion, we would have a comm problem that just could not be resolved employing logical troubleshooting procedures. Exhausting all options, we would wait for the Roach Coach to come along, purchase a carton of Okinawa milk and a pack of Oreo cookies. Drink our milk, eat our cookies and head back into the vehicle. Miraculously, everything would work. That gave birth to “The Oreo Factor” as a fix action.
So, about 2007 or so, I was doing comm support at The Pentagon, and there was a circuit that was down for several days. I came in for my first day of the work week, got a brief on the situation, read the ticket, and yeah, they tried everything that should have worked. So I related “The Oreo Factor” to my co-worker, then remembered that I had a package of Oreos in my desk drawer. I broke out the cookies, we choked down, went over to patch panel, and no shit, the circuit was up. The end user calls up for the fix action. I tell them “The Orwao Factor”. They ask “WTF is the Oreo factor”? I explain it to them. They say there is no way they are putting that in the log. True story.
Waiting for the problem to fix itself is one of my favorite networking tools.
Had something similar happen too many times to count. Without oreos, though.
Our contract with the Air Force specified Oreos. No Hydrox or generic Try ‘N Save cookies.
The P-3 Orions I crewed all had a 31 channel receiver for the sonobuoy signals. Each channel had a separate circuit board with it’s own, supposedly, crystal.
Every now and then, one of the boards would, for whatever reason, fail.
The most common solution was to remove it, and any other board (they just slid straight out) and swap it with any other board. Every single time I did that, both would then work flawlessly. Put them back in their original slots, and the bad board would remain non-functioning. Swap them back, and you got it! both would work just fine.
The interesting thing was that this would only work when airborne. Once on the ground, you couldn’t duplicate it.
Again, it points out AW1 Tim’s belief that all electronics are FM: Frikkin’ Magic.
…or as maintenance used to record “Checks 4.0 on deck”. Swap ’em or stick them in the freezer always worked, too.
It was a fault in the weight-off-wheels switch :).
Maintenance humor. Ya gotta love it!
well at least they all have a sense of humor!!!!!!
Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha LMAO !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It’s nice to see that one GO had to deal with what everyone else trying to fly out of Iraq, Afghanistan, or Kuwait had to deal with every time we departed the AOR as individuals flying space A.
And hey, the President just made a surprise visit on Air Force One! Smile! Today’s your lucky day!
Must have sucked to be the CO, “babysitting the brass”… anyone serve with him before? Sounds like he has a good sense of humor.
Sounds like a joke memo to me. Not sure but I think this may have been all in fun.
For me it was “Children of Sanchez” played over and over at the El Pescador bar on the beach in Mazatlan for a week circa 1978.
The only residual effect when I hear it (rarely now). is the smell of diesel and a powerful thirst for a Modelo (bottled piss-water).
To Hack Stone and all you other mechanics and electronic wizards: you need to read this.
“Have you inadvertantly let the smoke out of the wires on your classic British car? This, then, is the solution to your problem!”
http://www.mez.co.uk/lucas.html
To Hack Stone and all you other mechanics and electronic wizards: you need to read this.
“Have you inadvertantly let the smoke out of the wires on your classic British car? This, then, is the solution to your problem!”
http://www.mez.co.uk/lucas.html
Blue Steel is part of the Air Force Academy’s Band.