CorvetteForum - Chevrolet Corvette Forum Discussion - OT - My 6 week "vacation" in Puerto Rico

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OT - My 6 week "vacation" in Puerto Rico

Back on the afternoon of 28 SEP, I was informed that the following morning we would be launching 4 MH-53E helicopters to fly south and join the hurricane relief efforts already in progress around Puerto Rico and the US/British Virgin Islands. We flew from Norfolk to Jacksonville and then down to Homestead FL before island hopping our way south to meet the ship just south of Turks and Caicos. All told, my fall adventure ended yesterday, exactly 6 weeks later, with a stop in Key West on the way home to drop off an aircraft to a training detachment we have working down there through the end of next week.

The below pictures and video link show some of the work we did down there. Ill leave all political commentary out of this post, but hopefully we did some good work for the people of Puerto Rico. Cool side note, that is actually me flying in the video....I didn't realize it at the time, but for that particular day's missions, the Marines on the ground had a rep from "Combat Camera" with them. :flag: (I'm far right, back row in the group photo. Left side...without the dirty stache in the cockpit photo)

Very cool, thanks for your service.

Thanks' for sharing and for your service.....:flag:

Great shots. Thanks for the pictures------and for your hard work!

God Bless America on Veteran's Day!
No other country in the world does what we do.

What a stud! I can't imagine having a job that important. Thanx for the post and the view down the keys is pretty cool also.

Congratulation on a job well done... :thumbs: and thanks for the great photos!

One of the things I miss more than anything else from my time on active duty, was that smell as you cross the deck of a ship at sea for landing. It's a smell unique to anything else I encountered in my 31 years of flying. It seemed that every ship had that same smell.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.cor...b38490014d.jpg

That and landing at night between two other helo's with their spinning rotors 10-15 feet from my own. What did we say, ...90% boredom, followed by 10% shear stark terror... :ack:

Semper Fi... GUSTO

That is one big ass chopper, makes this Vietnam era Huey look tiny.
Thanks for your brave service, God Bless America:flag:

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.cor...40839859cc.jpg

Quote:

Originally Posted by GUSTO14 (Post 1595950323)

Hahaha....I wouldn't say I "miss the smell" so much, but I would agree that it is very familiar. And you are correct, every ship...at least the "L-class" ships, all smell the same. It definitely takes two washings to get it out of your clothes.

Fortunately we weren't doing any night flying on this particular Det, but due to the afternoon rain storms, we did break out at less than 1 mile behind the boat on more than one occasion....gotta earn that flight pay at some point I suppose :thumbs:

Quote:

Originally Posted by FLYNAVY30 (Post 1595950544)

Funny you say that, my Infantry brethren were quick to say they never questioned us earning our flight pay, ...it was our base pay they had a problem with!!! :D

GUSTO

haha! Thats probably fair!

Thank you for your service!

GOD BLESS YOU for your service and for helping those folks in PR! It's been a horrible year with all of the suffering caused by natural disasters in Texas and PR! Nothing like the feeling you get from helping out your fellow man!

I know you're biting your tongue not commenting on the politics!!!

Many didn't even know American heroes were quietly going about their jobs helping citizens through the disaster...

Good for you!

Thank you for your service!

Your pics are so inspirational. Thx. My first engineering job out of school was working on the Nimitz. The enormity and complexity of Navy stuff and what they do is amazing. I so clearly remember seeing one Nimitz anchor chain link and being blown away. Isn’t the Sea Stallion our nation’s largest Helo? So.... does that refueling probe extend? Inflight refueling in a helo with all that stuff spinning and do it at night must be a rush. Anyway... thanks for your service. You guys make us proud.

THANK YOU!!! God bless you and God bless America. :flag:

Thank you for posting these super pix, and for what you did there. Keeping all political comments out of it too must be hard. It would be so easy to make a comment.

Well done, and thanks for your vigilant service to our Country. :thumbs: