Quote:
Originally Posted by bigbill
Commanding Officers of nuclear powered ships have to attend nuclear power school after their Squadron CO tour. I used to take groups of O-4 Squadron XO's on familiarization tours of the power plant to see if they were interested in taking that path. In my enlisted days, I was a nuclear instructor and would be assigned to a Commander Aviator and be his personal instructor. The classroom phase was 6 months, but the OJT part done as soon as the Commander finished all the qualifications. I'd lead them through their qualifications so they could finish early and get to their XO tour. After I made officer, the CO of my first carrier had been one of my students four years prior.
Here's a no-****ter, on the TR, we had Matt Lauer on board when we crossed the Atlantic on the way home from OEF. He was doing broadcasts along with Ann Curry and was a prima donna while Ann was a wonderful human being. On live TV, he was going to fly in the backseat of a Tomcat and then broadcast from the cockpit after they landed. The pilot was the Squadron XO and he catapulted off on afterburners (D model, not needed) and went supersonic at about ten miles out and then went vertical. He did an inverted pass over the ship supersonic and then did some aerobatics, the Tomcat was really good at one thing, airshows. Anyway, the inside of the canopy was splattered with puke and Matt had to be lifted out. He was wrecked for about 45 minutes before he could broadcast. The last thing I did before I retired off the NIMITZ was to work with the next CO of the Reagan, the pilot that broke Matt Lauer.
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You can say that again, never liked tat jet(flew the A+, never the 'D'). Yup, I took Brad Johnson for a flight in a TA-4, when in VF-126..he wanted one while prepping for Flight of Intruder, after he did 'Always'(he owned the Citabria flown in that movie)..and he puked too..funny stuff.
BUT the CAG-XO-NukePower...gig, sounds like it could get pretty 'political'..I'm sure competition for those commands is, that hasn't changed. Seems like the good guys, the good operators retire at O-6..