London - Another Cross-Country

Like the last cross-country I went on, it pays to be a volunteer and in the right place at the right time. This time around, they were looking for another flight lead to fly as #3 to Lakenheath, UK and then on to Spain and southern Italy again to fight the Eurofighters. Well, after a short round of rock-paper-scissors with another guy in the squadron, I won and was in as #3. I was looking forward to this cross-country a lot because Capt Chapman, my good friend way back from OTS, is a WSO in the F-15E squadron at Lakenheath. He and I are in the picture below. The plan was to fly in on Thursday, do some dissimilar aircraft training (DACT) with the F-15 Eagles and then leave Friday night for Spain. Well due to some maintenance issues, two of us ended up staying the weekend and then flying back to Aviano on Monday after my wingman's jet was fixed. We ended up spending our time at my friend's place for the weekend and got to see London and Cambridge where many of England's well know colleges are. Well known men like Isaac Newton attended school here. There's also a popular pub called The Eagles Nest well known to fighter pilots because it's a place where the Royal Air Force and US Air Force flighter pilots from WWII went to relax after a stressful flight fighting the Germans. There are many names of pilots who flew burned into the ceiling by candles still readable. We also did what they call "punting" on the river that runs through Cambridge...it looks a lot like steering a gondola in Venice...no one fell in, but almost!

The next day, we headed to London to check out some of the well known sites in the city. We saw Big Ben, Tower Bridge (most think it's called London Bridge, but it's not) and a few other places. Compared to Rome, London is very different. I wish I'd have had more time to see St. Paul's cathedral and some of the WWII sites like Churchill's command bunker. The rest of the weekend we spent our time close to the base and waited for the jet to be fixed before flying home on Monday. Yet another paid trip by the Air Force...no complaints here!

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Cambridge & London

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Rome

Rome, what an amazing city! Lana and I have seen a lot of great places here in Europe, but when it comes to cities with history Rome definitely takes 1st place. Since life had been so busy with the FLUG and working in the scheduling shop, I took a couple days off for my birthday so Lana and I could fly to Rome together. It was definitely a city we wanted to visit during our time here in Italy. We landed around 12 on Saturday, checked into our hotel which was close to the center of town, and got right to work seeing the sites. The first day we saw Fontana di Trevi, the Pantheon, Piazza dal Popolo and the Spanish Steps. Many of the things we saw during our trip date back to B.C. times while others were built during the early A.D. time frame. It was also humbling to be walking through the very places Peter and Paul would have walked through as they were taken to prison and eventually martyred. It's amazing the structures that were built back 2000 years ago, especially mathematical feats such as the Pantheon. Rome is a much see city!

The second day was packed with more site seeing. After breakfast at the hotel we hit the road to see Basilica Santa Maria Maggiore, Basilica of St. John Lateran, the Roman Baths of Caracalla, and the Catacombs of San Callisto before making our way to the Circo Massimo and the Colosseum. Each stop had it's own interesting parts, but I thought the Romans baths and Colosseum were the highlights of the day. One our way to the catacombs we walked on one of the oldest Roman roads still in existence today called the Appian Way. The Roman elite really had it rough spending the day at the baths...the buildings they built for the baths were covered in marble and had pillars similar to what you'd see inside an old church somewhere in Europe today...pretty amazing. The baths didn't really compare to the Colosseum other than in age. While walking around inside, I imagined screen shots from the movie Gladiator where gladiatorial fights took place against wild animals and other gladiators as the crowds looked on and cheered. It's hard to imagine the types of things which were common back in the Roman times. Along with the games at the Colosseum, they used to burn Christians alive at the steak at night and use their burning bodies to light main roads throughout the city. On a lighter note, Lana and I enjoyed a nice meal out on the town that night before heading back to the hotel to get some rest for the next day.

Our last two days in Rome were spent seeing more of the Roman Forum and Palatino, the prison where they think Peter and Paul were held captive at different times, Piazza Navona and Farnese, Castel Sant'Angelo, the Sistine Chapel and Saint Peter's Basilica. Saint Peter's is the biggest Catholic church in the world and is quite a site to see. We decided to take a paid tour of the museum, the chapel and the church so that we'd get the most information possible. The museum is full of art, statutes and many other things the Popes have gathered over many years. Millions of dollars worth of stuff in the church's museum... The paintings of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel were very impressive...especially since they were recently cleaned bringing out the colors of the paintings. It's amazing the amount of art inside the small chapel...the ceiling and all the walls are covered. I don't have a picture of it since we weren't allowed to take any. From the chapel we moved into the church itself...wow! A huge church built supposedly on the site where Peter was martyred by being crucified upside down on a cross. I obviously don't know if it's the exact site or not, but the church is VERY impressive. However, there is so much glitz and glory surrounding the church that it seems the focus is in the wrong place. It's put on the Pope, Peter and other Saints instead of the real Saviour of the world, Jesus Christ. He seems to be merely a side thought...sad in a way. I personally think many people completely miss the truth of Jesus (Romans 10:9-10) and just see a beautiful church and the Pope. I don't mean to get on my soap box, but Lana and I both felt that way while we toured around. A great but disheartening place at the same time.

I don't have any complaints about my 28th birthday...Rome was definitely a good way to spend the weekend and a couple days off work. Like I said before, if you make it to Europe you need to take the time and see Rome!

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Rome

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Common Configuration Implementation Program

Since the fall of 2007, our base jets have been undergoing the common configuration implementation program (CCIP) to modernize them and extend their ability to complete with new fighters for many years to come. The paragraph below was taken from airforce-technology.com and explains the upgrade in a little more detail...

"650 USAF block 40/50 F-16s are being upgraded under the common configuration implementation programme (CCIP). The first phase of the program (first aircraft completed in January 2002) provides core computer and color cockpit modifications. The second, which began in September 2002, involves fitting the advanced AN/APX-113 interrogator / transponder and Lockheed Martin Sniper XR advanced FLIR targeting pod. The third, which started in July 2003, adds Link 16 datalink, the Boeing joint helmet-mounted cueing system, an electronic horizontal situation indicator and AIM-9X IR missile. Operational testing of the upgraded fighters was completed in September 2004. Deliveries are planned to complete in 2010."

So far, about half of our jets have been modified and it is a great jump in technology compared to our old block 40 F-16s. The color displays, new helmet and Link 16 greatly aid in our ability to get the job done...at the same time it's a lot of new information to bring into your cockpit cross-check. Our jets are being upgraded in Greece in order to save money by not flying them across the Atlantic back to the US. I'll hopefully have the opportunity to make a trip down there and bring some of the newly modified jets back here to Aviano!

The new helmet displays flight information on the back of the visor, similar to the info seen in heads up display (HUD). It provides altitude, airspeed, heading and much more no matter where you look. The only time it turns off is when you're looking at the HUD or at something in the cockpit. It can also be used to cue different aircraft sensors such as the air-to-air radar and air-to-ground targeting pod...wherever you turn your cranium, they follow and point in the same direction.

For the Link 16...it's a big airborne computer network connecting all the airborne fighter jets. It allows the exchange of information such as aircraft position among many other things without using the radios to communicate. It greatly increases the amount of situational awareness a pilot has regarding the location of his other flight members or other "blue" aircraft when all this information is displayed on the new color displays in the cockpit...from a "god's eye" perspective. This system is not only used by the USA but by our other allies as well, meaning when we go to war together in the future we'll all have the capability to operate within the same airborne network.

I'm going to wrap it up for now...Lana and I are planning to take a trip to Rome for my birthday, so I'll have much to share I'm sure. Until the next time...

Leading My First Cross-Country

Sometimes it really pays to be in the right place at the right time...like doing your job in the scheduling office when the DO walks in and says, "Who wants to take a 4-ship cross-country 14-17 March?" After a little thought (.51 seconds to be exact...Buzzards Rule!) I threw up my hand with a "I'm all over it Sir!" That's all it took and I was in charge of coming up with a plan to lead 4 jets around Europe for a weekend on my second cross-country. Mind you, I had just finished the FLUG a few weeks earlier so it was pretty cool to get the chance to lead something like this as a young flight lead. After a few iterations on the planning, my final draft for the trip looked like this:

Friday: Fly to Rota Naval Air Station, Spain and get gas at Garons Air Base, France on the way. Saturday: Relax in Cadiz, Spain on the beach and drive later to Gibraltar to check out the Rock. Sunday: Fly to Grosseto Air Base, Italy and get gas at Zaragoza Air Base, Spain on the way. Monday: "fight" the Italian Eurofighters stationed at Grosseto twice and then fly back to Aviano.

Rota NAS was the perfect spot to fly into...it's on the Southwest coast of Spain and close to a lot of cool places. One of those places is Cadiz where we stayed for a couple nights. The weather was nice and warm; the beach great. Thankfully for us it wasn't peak tourist season, so we found a really nice hotel for cheap as you can see above. The first night we grabbed some good Spanish food and sangria before hanging out in town until it was pretty late. After sleeping in the next day, I went for a run on the beach before we headed to the old city...the town goes way back to even before the Roman Empire. After the sightseeing, we decided to take a nap the then press on to Gibraltar, a little peninsula the British have owned for many hundreds of years in a very strategic military location...right on the straights which enter the Med called The Straights of Gibraltar. I didn't know it was a British colony until the planning phase of the trip, and while there we learned some pretty interesting stuff about it. Back during WWI and WWII it was used to port Allied battle ships and house bomber planes using a runway about 2 miles long which spans the width of the peninsula on the Northern end. Seriously, once you drive across the border the road crosses the runway. From this position they could control any traffic entering or leaving the Med during the wars. Inside the rock today are hollowed out sections used for military storage of munitions, fuel, water etc. Most of this we learned the Royal Army guys we met who were celebrating at a local pub over a rugby match England had just won.

After our time in Spain, we took off from Rota on our way back to Grosseto, Italy. The weather was perfect, so I coordinated with air traffic control to fly at 500' along the coast and around the Rock of Gibraltar...what a memory. As we passed, the northern part of Africa was easily seen only a few miles to the south. We eventually made it to Italy after getting gas in Zaragoza and spent the evening enjoying the town. The next day we had arranged to take off our travel pods in preparation to "fight" with the Eurofighters. The jet is very capable, and I learned a lot...I have to say we were pretty much even since it can turn better at low speeds than the F-16. We landed from our first sortie, had pasta in their squadron bar and then flew a 4 vs 4 as their red air support before flying back to Aviano.

Leading the cross-country was a great learning experience for me as a young flight lead. Thankfully all the planning and preparation went as advertised and we were able to get some good training with different fighter jets. What a cool job getting handed the keys to 4 multi-million dollar fighters and being told, "Be safe, have fun, get some training out of it and we'll see you on Monday!"

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Cross-Country Mar '08

Snowboarding in Zermatt, Switzerland

Lana and I had such a good time snowboarding in Nassfeld, Austria that we decided to drive a little further over to Zermatt, Switzerland for a weekend in early March. It was a great drive (actually had to stop and buy snow chains since I couldn't make it through the pass in the mountains) there with the mountians and snow giving great scenery along the way. We had tried to book a hotel room online a few days prior to the trip, but we couldn't find anything within our budget. So, we decided to be spontaneous and find a place when we arrived. That spontaneity worked out well, and we found ourselves a nice pensione about 30 min from the Zermatt ski lifts. Zermatt is a completely electric town, so we had to park our car and take the train the two days we snowboarded. The Zermatt ski slopes are right in and around the base of the well known mountain called the Matterhorn...what a cool place to snowboard! The slopes were endless, the snow was fresh and the scenery again was amazing.

After the first night of snowboarding, we enjoyed a good typical Swiss dinner along with some local wine. The next day was the same with more snowboarding checking out new runs...the park went on forever. We found out at the top of the mountain we could have actually skied down the far side into Italy, but decided to stay on the Swiss side since we had a lot more still to see. We enjoyed a nice dinner in Zermatt that night before heading back to our pensione just down the street. Sadly, we were on the road by mid morning the next day back to Italy...about a 5-6 hour drive. We hope to get back to Zermatt before leaving Italy if we can, or at least to another ski part somewhere in Switzerland.

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Zermatt, Switzerland

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