My first hundred hours in the Herk differed slightly from those of most students. I started down the typical path: I went to BFE at the Arkansas Air National Guard. In 2005, the guard and reserves sent FE students to the Arkansas Air Guard unit as opposed to Altus. BFE was an interesting mix of too much new information and the realization that I might be an enlisted military flyer.
I was introduced to the phrase “drinking from a fire hose” here. BFE was 6 weeks. There was a block test about twice a week. All block tests had to be passed. When I went through it, the washout rate was about 25%. My class started with 9, and 6 graduated.
Another concept introduced to me was that our minds are like an iceberg. The iceberg is only so big and can only hold so many penguins. The penguins represent new ideas, and the iceberg is our individual memory capacity. Growing older is kind of like global warming; the iceberg is melting as we age, whether we believe it or not.
My Dad pinned on my wings when I graduated from BFE. He was an ECM maintenance troop on the B-47 in the early 1950s. My parents gave me a Torgoen watch for my new flying career. It was perfect for the 130, big NVG-friendly numbers with a large red hand for Z time. Twenty years later, this is still my daily-wear watch.
Next was Fairchild Air Force Base, Washington, for Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape. It was here that things started to take a turn south. I feared this school more than any other; I heard too many bad things about it. It was here I injured my shoulder. I was running from the bad guys during an evasion exercise, and while trying to jump over a log and pull my pack back on my shoulder, I pulled or tore something. I was trying to avoid capture. They caught me. I hadn’t even been through the worst of it yet. I was still in the “fun” part of the course. We were in the field for 6 days, camping basically. I hate camping, but I was sure it was going to be more fun than being held prisoner for 36 hours during the next part of the course. The injury was documented by the flight doc at Fairchild. He gave me some Ranger Candy and sent me on my way. Of course, I stayed in the course! I didn’t want to ever come back here again, ever.
Next was back to Little Rock for the flying portion of the program. It was during my 4th flight that I realized I would not be able to continue. Besides the pain, I couldn’t lift my right hand high enough to touch any of the controls above my head. I saw the flight doctor at Little Rock, and he sent me to an ortho doctor. After an X-ray and MRI, the orthodox said I tore my rotator cuff in addition to other damage to the boot. He wanted to open me up the next day. I was not going to have significant surgery while living on base 500 miles from home. I called Peoria, and they said to come home and get it fixed there. I went to a great sports clinic and saw a surgeon who would rather not do surgery if he could avoid it. So, after about 4 months of PT and other procedures, I was good enough to get back into the game. Instead of being sent back to Little Rock, I finished my training at Peoria. It was great to be able to fly there instead of Little Rock. It was an excellent time for the FE section in Peoria. The instructors and Chief were very tight, and they were all on the same page for the most part.
It didn’t take long before I was referred to as “Black Cloud.” This would be the first of many things I’d be called over the course of my military flying career. Most of the things I was called were decent, not too demeaning. We’re all familiar with Murphy’s Law: If anything could go wrong, it will. Interesting side note: I know the original Murphy’s daughter.
Instructors started to talk to each other about what other equipment they should carry when flying with me. On an early flight, we had to run the Smoke & Fumes Elimination checklist; of course, we were above 10,000′ and needed to get on O2. The instructor I was flying with discovered her O2 hose wasn’t long enough to reach what she needed to see during the emergency. An extension o2 hose was discussed with the instructors as a good item to carry when flying with me.
I saw a few thousand feet close to my tenth flight. Most of the training hours in the Herk are at low altitudes, under a couple of thousand feet for the most part. We were doing a cross-country for the Nav. We were not going anywhere except to burn holes in the clouds. I was giggling like a little schoolgirl as the altimeter cracked 10,000′. Pushed my mike button and said, “I’ve never been this high in the 130.” There was complete silence. Then the AC turned, looked at me, and said: “Welcome to the club.” I wanted to ask him something other than what he meant. He was usually a douche. He also happened to be the squadron commander. He left for a headquarters job before I was fully qualified, and I never had to fly with him again.
What was so amazing was the view. From the FE seat, I could see over the pilot’s heads. I could see the open sky from one outboard engine to the other, over 180º. I wanted to look out the windows more, but my eyes were fixated inside that aircraft.
“Are you Blown’ smoke?” My instructor asked? I did some stupid rookie thing and didn’t want him to know it, nor did I want to own up to it. Of course, he knew exactly what I did and what I was doing at that moment. I told him, “Yes! I was blowing smoke.” On the ramp is where the “Real” debrief happened, just student and instructor. It took just a few minutes to get back to Ops from the aircraft, but this is where the pearls of wisdom would be shared. But only if the student was really listening. These lessons weren’t in the books; they were attained the hard way. We then discussed crew integrity and how all our lives in that airplane depended on each other’s actions. I couldn’t afford to lie to the crew through omission or outright lie. Someone else on the crew might have the answer to help us all land safely together.
During my first few hundred hours, my eyes only ventured so far beyond the panels inside the plane. I was too worried to look around much, let alone enjoy the ride. One of my responsibilities was the window anti-icing. Occasionally, one of the windows could arc, and the system must be turned off. I saw what looked like static electricity on the outside of the front windows. It didn’t look like arcing; it was too subtle and was traveling all over the windows. It wasn’t localized at the electrical contacts for the anti-icing system. The Nav spoke up first, saying, “We’ve got St Elmo’s Fire.” I thought that it was pretty common and said that I wondered when I’d see it. The Nav said that He’s been flying for 25 years, and this was his first time. I’d see it one more time during my first 100 hours and then never again. What are the conditions for St Elmo’s Fire?
Shut down 10 engines, had smoke on the flight deck, lost a hydraulic system, and several other “interesting” emergencies. On more than one occasion, instructors I was flying with would always say, “I’ve never seen that before,” with a twisted look. Most FEs go years without shutting down an engine. They only see it during their annual trip to the simulator.
There are many things that “Must” be memorized as an FE. One of the first things we worked on in BFE was the C-130 limitations. This was 4 pages of numbers and a few phrases that had to be committed to memory. I will not go through these, but you can download them at the end of this post in the acronyms section and see them for yourself. The next thing thrown into the mix was Boldface. You can also download it. Not only did these get burned into my memory, but I had to know what they could tell me about what was happening with the aircraft at that moment or soon. A good FEs understanding of the aircraft had to be such that the limitations would not only be seen on the indicators, but the FE would intuitively know what was going on with the aircraft based on the indications and whether that indication was within limitations. If the limitations are out of limits, the FE must know how to correct the problem or respond to the emergency.
One of my first ESPs was something that could only happen to me. I saw the number two prop go out of limits; the RPM shot way down, then back up past 102. I looked at Matt, my instructor, in total disbelief at what I saw. He looked at me and asked, “So, what will you do?” I keyed my mic and said, “ESP number two engine!” We had no idea what caused it. But it was out of limits. Numbers 5 and 9 from the “Engine Shutdown Conditions” list. When we landed, we discovered that one of the deice boots from the number two prop had delaminated from the blade and was sucked into the engine.
My black cloud never went away. Eventually, I was able to sit back and enjoy the ride while still being hyper-vigilant. Towards the end of my military career, I moved to San Antonio and transitioned to the C-5. My scanner check ride on the C-5 wasn’t any different. The pilot’s swing window opened just after we broke ground. We logged a 0.2 check ride over.
When any of these things happen:
ENGINE SHUTDOWN CONDITIONS
1. Engine Fire
2. Turbine Overheat
3. Nacelle Overheat
4. Uncontrollable Power
5. Certain Propeller Malfunctions
6. Uncontrollable rise in TIT
7. Uncontrollable Drop in Oil Press
8. Uncontrollable Rise in Oil Temp
9. Unusual Vibration or Roughness
10. Throttle Control Failure
11. Visible Fluid Leak
This has to happen:
ENGINE SHUTDOWN PROCEDURE
1. CONDITION LEVER “FEATHER” (CP)
2. FIRE HANDLE “PULLED” (CP)
3. AGENT “DISCHARGED” (FOR FIRE OR NACELLE OVERHEAT) (CP)
Of course, this is all memorized. As a student, a Bold Face and limitations sheet is filled out and then checked by the AC or an FE instructor before each flight.
Acronyms:
AC – Aircraft Commander
BFE – Basic Flight Engineer Class
C-130 – The Lockheed C-130 Hercules is an American four-engine turboprop military transport aircraft designed and built originally by Lockheed (now Lockheed Martin). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_C-130_Hercules
C-5A – The Lockheed C-5 Galaxy is a large military transport aircraft originally designed and built by Lockheed and now maintained and upgraded by its successor, Lockheed Martin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_C-5_Galaxy
ECM – Electronic Counter Measures
FE – Flight Engineer
Herk – Short for Hercules
LM – LoadMaster
NVG – Night Vision Goggles
Ops – Base Operations section or building
Ranger Candy – 800mg Ibuprofen
SERE – Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape
Sim – Simulator
Z–Zulu Time, Greenwich Mean Time, Universal Coordinated Time