Yesterday, I met an AC-119 Gunship operator who flew in Viet Nam. I did not really have a chance to talk to him but his Tee shirt said it all.

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I saw one of the last, then the AC 130's came in. They did do an AC-47, but I never saw it. They didn't last from what I heard. We called the C-119 'ten thousand bolts in lose formation.' I did a Link-trainer orientation of one, then rode in one on a short hop. Never again.

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My father flew an AC-47 Gunship, I think it was the first one built. He told me the story and I think I posted it here.
There is one at the USAF Armament Museum. The first AC-130 Gunship is on display there too!

My former FIL crashed in C-119 when Manchester Airport was Gernier Field AFB.

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If it flies, I can crash it!

During the Vietnam war the AC-130 flew out of ONE base only; Ubon Royal Thai AFB.
That was the same base my father and Col. Robin Olds were stationed at.
"Normal" operational aircraft at the base were F-4 Phantom IIs (that I have several photos from my father of them taking off fully loaded and landing devoid of ordnance ), AC-130 Spectres, and OV-10 Broncos.
One of the AC-130 Spectres exploded almost immediately after landing. All crew except the loadmaster survived the incident.
They would have the occasional F-104, F-105 (one of the biggest POS aircraft EVER designed/built), and F-111 land there when they had to land at the closest base.

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When in doubt, WHACK the GAS and DITCH the brake !!!

Yes, there is such a thing as NORMAL, if you have to ask what is "NORMAL" , you probably aren't !
Failure may not be an OPTION, but it is ALWAYS a POSSIBILITY.
ALL systems are GO for MAYHEM, CHAOS, TURMOIL, FIASCOS, and HAVOC !

gh, F-105, called the "Thunder Thud'" "Thud," Thunderchicken." Fast, could deliver a payload, but not a whole lot more going for it.

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First of all, it should have had a "B" designation instead of an "F". It was designed to deliver a single nuke and get the heck out of there at mach 2. It would have been pretty good at that. However, it was used to deliver conventional weapons and was made to fly the exact same path over enemy territory day after day. Even an F-117 stealth fighter would have been shot down with orders like that. Earlier models didn't even have self sealing tanks, cause....who's going to worry about that when you zoom in and drop an nuke?

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The F-105 Thud was about as maneuverable as a Cement Truck speeding down the freeway at 90mph. Total POS.
They had virtually no-chance dogfighting with anything other than an unarmed Piper Cub.

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When in doubt, WHACK the GAS and DITCH the brake !!!

Yes, there is such a thing as NORMAL, if you have to ask what is "NORMAL" , you probably aren't !
Failure may not be an OPTION, but it is ALWAYS a POSSIBILITY.
ALL systems are GO for MAYHEM, CHAOS, TURMOIL, FIASCOS, and HAVOC !

Once again, the "F" is a misnomer. It was designed to deliver a nuclear paylod in an internal bomb bay. Low and fast going in, super fast going out. It shouldn't even had been designed with a gun on it. If it had been used as intended, it would have been very good at its job. Instead, it carried out the majority of low level bombing missions in the north with conventional bombs. Idiots in charge made the pilots take the same routes into and out of the same northern targets over and over while carrying up to 14,000 lbs of iron. The North wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth and set up heavy AA along the routes along with MiGs ready to drop in on them. Other planes available at the time would have suffered even higher loss rates if they had been forced to do the same missions.

As for dogfighting with quick turning MiG's of the era, you wouldn't do that with other planes designed for bombing such as the B-58, F-111, or the F-117 unless you wanted them shot down. Same goes for the F-105. The Strike Eagle is about the only plane I can think of that could have done the job as well or better, running the gauntlet down low and fast, dropping a huge amount of iron, and killing MiGs on the way out to meet the tanker. However, it would still take a few losses if forced to run the same path in and out like the Thud had to do.

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Exactly...

Take a plane designed specifically for high-speed nuclear weapon delivery behind the lines in Eastern Europe and the western Soviet Union and try to make it a conventional bomber, and hamper it with orders like what you mentioned, and of course it's going to have problems...

The "Thud" wasn't exactly a small plane, either... in fact it was one of the largest single-seat combat aircraft ever fielded IIRC...

There's a thread on the paper modelers forum where someone built a "Thud" and had it side-by-side with some of its MiG opponents and other aircraft all in the same scale, and the "Thud" was like twice the size of the MiG's...

Bigger plane, bigger target...

Later! OL J R

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Dan,

You should have been hanging out with the Eglin Aero Modellers in 2012. We hosted an event for the AC-119 Association's annual reunion, which featured the final flight of an AC-119K originally built by John Hupe, an AC-119 navigator during his tour of duty during the Viet Nam war.

Here is the link to the article in the Model Aviation archives:


http://library.modelaviation.com/ma/2013/11/1?page=44

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