HEAVY ATTACK SAILORS

[OLDNAVYMCPO]

Heck yes, Heavy 12 here. USS Independence, USS Constellation, NAS Albany and NAS Key West. I was an AKAN, AK3 & AK2. I was discharged right before the World Cruise on the USS Enterprise to show off the then brand new F14 Tomcat. I was TAD to Ship's Aviation Supply when we were WestPac on the Connie.

PM me.....

VN Vet, you got to check out the link Model 520 fan posted. If you click on the Heavy 12 emblem it will take you to another page, halfway down click on the PDF file for the news letter from '73 Connie cruise. It will blow you away.

 

[rwsmith]

The fallacy of fighting....

MacNamara cost this country and the Vietnamese hundreds of thousands of killed and wounded with his stupidity. May he rot in hell.

The fallacy of fighting a 'correct' war against a determined enemy.

 

[Lt JL]

Ummmm, are you guys speaking English?

 

[STCM(SW)]

Ummmm, are you guys speaking English?

Must be a Land Lubber.....
Red sky at night, sailors delight.
Red sky in morning, sailor take warning.
Red right returning...
Red to red, green to green.
If in doubt, go in between.

 

[OLDNAVYMCPO]

For those of you that like photos of aircraft, here's one of RVAH12's RA5C returning aboard the USS Constellation after a photo-recon mission over Viet Nam in 1973. Shortly after this photo was made, this very same aircraft (605) was lost at sea on April 21, 1973. The aircraft caught fire during a catapult launch off a bow cat when the internal fuel cell broke loose in the fuselage. The pilot and RAN safely ejected in under 300 foot elevation and were rescued. I have a bunch of photos of the event but they are all on 35mm slides.

 

[AJ]

For those of you that like photos of aircraft, here's one of RVAH12's RA5C returning aboard the USS Constellation after a photo-recon mission over Viet Nam in 1973. Shortly after this photo was made, this very same aircraft (605) was lost at sea on April 21, 1973. The aircraft caught fire during a catapult launch off a bow cat when the internal fuel cell broke loose in the fuselage. The pilot and RAN safely ejected in under 300 foot elevation and were rescued. I have a bunch of photos of the event but they are all on 35mm slides.

Ah, the ole 35 MM slides. Have friend that took hundreds of those while at Chu Lai with A6's there. They just sit in boxes now.......

 

[Lee in Quartzsite]

Ah, the ole 35 MM slides. Have friend that took hundreds of those while at Chu Lai with A6's there. They just sit in boxes now.......

Same here, close to 1000 35mm slides. I bought a small scanner that will scan each slide and convert it to digital format for the computer. The one I have does one at a time and it is a slow process, but the results are very good. The editing can be done on the computer to enhance the photo.

I also took a lot of Super 8mm movies that I first had made into VHS tapes, then years later on DVD's. The video quality isn't the best. Some are on YouTube.....here is one of my plane, SF-1:

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiFDpYdr0qE[/ame]

 

[OLDNAVYMCPO]

Lee, That was just too cool. About the slides, I'm thinking about buying a Wolverine F2D mighty 20mp 7in1 to download my 35mm slides to digital on a thumb drive and then onto my computer so I can edit them.

 

[cwo4uscgret]

Ah yes...my formative days. No heavy Recon experience; first time I ever saw a Vigilante was sitting on the tarmac at NAS Cubi Point the first time when MIDWAY pulled into Cubi in 1972. At the time we had F4Bs, A6, A7, RF8, E2, and A3 Whales onboard. I was an AO Striker in the Ship's Guided Missile (GM) Division.

I had a bunch of photos from those days but all were lost in a move. A special photo or two were of the damaged aircraft - including two HC-7 up armored H3 Heavy Combat Rescue Helos - damaged when a Whale pilot landed 2 feet to the right of the center line. His right wing tip sliced through 5 aircraft. I believe the Admiral onboard came down from his spot on the bridge and ripped the pilot's wings off of his flight suit...

My first WESTPAC was on MIDWAY; I reported onboard on 8 April 1972, we left two days later on the 10th, and returned to Alameda on 3 March 1973 only to leave again in September of 1973 for homeport in Yokosuka, Japan. In July of that year I celebrated my 21st birthday anchored off of San Diego during REFTRA.

Although I had no intentions to make the service a career after my Navy experiences; I did enjoy my time on MIDWAY. At least 1 or 2 times a month I talk with the Chief of the GM Division who over the years we have become friends. When I went back in the service (Coast Guard) in 1975 I was able to use a lot of what I learned from him about leadership and work ethics during my career. In 1991 as an SKC I made CWO2 and was stationed in Los Angeles on a Coast Guard Cutter. Somewhere around here I still have the invitation I received to MIDWAY'S decommissioning ceremony but I wasn't able to attend. I retired in 2001 after a total of 30 years of active duty as a CWO4 (F&S); while serving as the Supply Officer on a Coast Guard Cutter home-ported in Key West. No regrets at all about my service.

 

[Kernel Crittenden]

Ah, the ole 35 MM slides. Have friend that took hundreds of those while at Chu Lai with A6's there. They just sit in boxes now.......

There are ways to digitize those. There's various hardware devises that will scan them.

The simplest way is to just project the picture on a white surface in a dark room, with the imaged maybe 8 inches across. Then take a picture of it with a digital camera mounted on a tripod. Sure, it's jury rigged, but it actually doesn't look half bad. Many of those old slide didn't have real great resolution anyway, so you're not loosing much.

One tip. Wipe the dust of the slide. Those old 35mm slides are dust magnates.