How Low Do You Go?

[Lt. James Cater]

 

You know how we all talk about getting low to avoid the worst?

 

This is the result of having to listen to a seemingly endless series of SAM warnings, pilots reporting damage, planes going down, an insane number of FOX calls, and a near heartstopping encounter with a Mig-25 pilot who was quite intent on making me the reason for his promotion.

 

All this on the first sortie!

 

PS-Put all ordnance dead center on the target.

Edited February 23, 2009 by Lt. James Cater

[+ST0RM]

Typically, 20 or so feet is the norm for me. I try and keep below any higher ground and then pop up at the last minute.

 

-S

[+Syrinx]

If you haven't returned to base with virtual tumbleweed wrapped around your pitot then you haven't been low enough.

[+Brain32]

I set my limit at about 10m lower than that and I get a bit too nervous inspite of all this being just a game lol

[fallenphoenix1986]

camel blood streaked along the underneath of the fuselage :)

 

Craig

[Viper6]

Snake skins were removed from my F-4's tail hook

[Jarhead1]

My crewchief found a camel spider in my intake.

[jomni]

I'm playing the ODS campaign as an F-16 pilot doing strike missions and I don't see heavy SAM cover everyone is talking about.

 

Or is it in the Single Missions?

[+Spectre_USA]

You must have something set on easy, as I have them on occasion still, and I am 6 weeks past the real life stop date, 14 Apr 91.

 

Speaking of real life, we once had an F-111F have a, get this, deer strike!

 

Blastin' down the runway with 10 foot lances of fire, and just started to rotate. >BAM< The nose started yawing back and forth, and they got it in the air. But the gear

would not come up. Pulled the throttle back and made a circuit, dumping fuel on the desert. Got it down OK, and saw it at EOR.

 

Gore all over the speed brake, and up in side the main wheel well? Looked like a slaughterhouse. That was no Bambi, for sure...

[Caveman]

my plane capt. had to put a periscope on my jet....lol

[Viper6]

Me and my RIO wear miners helmets

[Caesar]

You must have something set on easy, as I have them on occasion still, and I am 6 weeks past the real life stop date, 14 Apr 91.

 

Speaking of real life, we once had an F-111F have a, get this, deer strike!

 

Blastin' down the runway with 10 foot lances of fire, and just started to rotate. >BAM< The nose started yawing back and forth, and they got it in the air. But the gear

would not come up. Pulled the throttle back and made a circuit, dumping fuel on the desert. Got it down OK, and saw it at EOR.

 

Gore all over the speed brake, and up in side the main wheel well? Looked like a slaughterhouse. That was no Bambi, for sure...

 

Haha, now those are rare, but I do know of a Tomcat that did nearly the same thing, so named "Deerslayer" (BuNo 158616, if my research was accurate) eats a deer on the runway, which severs the right-side break line, then the a/c crashes into a VF-41 jet (AC 106), which was just returned to flying status after extensive maint. Both got fixed and returned to flight status, and no one was injured in the crash...actually I tacked Deerslayer into my fictional VF-1 squadron skins as NK107.

 

With regard to flying low in game, I'll need to get some screenies, but I can think of a few double-digit altitudes for SAM evasion I had to pull...

Edited February 24, 2009 by Caesar

[+Dave]

My WSO and I wear these under our wings.

[Viper6]

Me and my RIO were treated for Magma burns after a mission

[+EricJ]

I'm playing the ODS campaign as an F-16 pilot doing strike missions and I don't see heavy SAM cover everyone is talking about.

 

Or is it in the Single Missions?

 

Single missions, though if you fly right, you don't have to worry about them too much (I'm more concerned with air threats rather than ground threats, though even then I don't fly low due to seriously... it's a desert...). Now the AI on the other hand.... They'll have issues. Hell even VietnamSEA isn't that bad, even with modern SAM/AAA.... Well as long as you don't hang around that is... I think the SAMs I put up on my Range map are more freakier than the ones on normal maps. SoCal I need to get off my butt and add more sites, even though I cruise pretty well through it anyways, AmericaNW... it's okay but you fly right anyways, you don't have to worry too much, but not get too lax, SA-17s aren't friendly...

[serverandenforcer]

How low do I go?... so low that my aircraft is not only equiped with Terrain Following Radar, but also Hell Following Radar. I can pick up a pitch fork for ya as a suvenire if you want one and maybe some red hots while I'm at it.

 

 

 

 

 

EDIT: I got Satan's autograph on my vertical stabilizer! Muwahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Edited February 24, 2009 by serverandenforcer

[+EricJ]

[MaverickMike]

Gore all over the speed brake, and up in side the main wheel well? Looked like a slaughterhouse. That was no Bambi, for sure...

 

Maybe thats the real reason Bambi's mother died......

[New Guy]

Once I almost zapped a water tower from the middle, but normally about 20-30ft is the lowest I would go

[BattlerBritain]

Did you know that Buccaneer pilots used to use the Royal Automobile Club annual roadmaps as their air navigation maps?

 

I did hear a true story about when the Buccs got to the sandpit in '91 that they knew they were flying low enough when truck drivers kept flashing their headlights at them to get out the way. Pukka gen that is.

 

[macelena]

Did you know that Buccaneer pilots used to use the Royal Automobile Club annual roadmaps as their air navigation maps?

 

I did hear a true story about when the Buccs got to the sandpit in '91 that they knew they were flying low enough when truck drivers kept flashing their headlights at them to get out the way. Pukka gen that is.

 

 

That´s true. Also Mirage F-1 pilots used to fly under highway bridges, wich explains their brutal attrition, including a recent incident.

Jags were meant to do the same, but i´m not sure why, they ended up doing not.

 

About tornados, i heard about some exercises in wich a flight of GR1A, trying to hit a dam in rough terrain, were decimated until the

mission was aborted, by a Mistral SAM battery. It seems from ODS, but it happened in 1988. If NATO learnt of his experiences, the

casualties by tornado units from RAF and AMI in Desert Storm would have been so high.

 

So stop moving mud and just try to make it on and back

[+EricJ]

So stop moving mud and just try to make it on and back

 

Amen to that, it doesn't matter how low you go, it's going low and getting home, well said

[Slartibartfast]

As to the Buccaneer's they used to be tracked visually at Red Flag as they used to look for rooster tails in the desert and there are a few sand tracks when they banked... On a personal note I was on exercise around 93/94 I think and I remember looking out to sea and seeing a rooster tail in the water and then a Bucc flying below the height of spit of land I was stood on and remember I could have waved down to the crew... ever since then I renamed them Fuccaneer's. When you can go that low who needs Fighters??? They used to in 70's out run F-4's on the deck... as the F-4 couldn't get a lock and they where bouncing around... I reckon if they had updated the electronics etc they would still be a very viable strike aircraft today...

[Lt. James Cater]

 

 

Being low is one thing. Being low and flying by stick and rudder is another.

 

I've yet to mod my F-111 with a HUD setup and so i have to do by sight and feel. Zooming down low over the desert is a pain due to the sheer monotony of the terrain. It's damn hard to make out some elevation changes and in certain areas going higher than 400 ft is not healthy. Sooner or later you have to climb and that's when the chop will come in time. In the first 10 missions of ODS i was hit twice by ground fire over the target. The first time was seconds before weapons release and the second time was during the the turn to begin egress. I've also lost two wingman to fighters.

 

Want the true high speed weed machine? The F-105 Thundercheif. Fastest low level aircraft of it's day. Able to go supersonic right off the treetops and rock steady as well. Virtually uncatchable once it was rid of it's bombload.

 

If you wanted to get the hell out of Dodge as quickly as possible, it was unmatched.

Edited March 2, 2009 by Lt. James Cater

[+Dave]

Being low is one thing. Being low and flying by stick and rudder is another.

 

I've yet to mod my F-111 with a HUD setup and so i have to do by sight and feel. Zooming down low over the desert is a pain due to the sheer monotony of the terrain. It's damn hard to make out some elevation changes and in certain areas going higher than 400 ft is not healthy. sooner or later you have to climb and that's when the chop will come sooner or later. In the first 10 missions of ODS i was hit twice by ground fire over the target. The first time was seconds before weapons release and the second time was during the the turn to begin egress. I've also lost two wingman to fighters.

 

Want the true high speed weed machine? The F-105 Thundercheif. Fastest low level aircraft of it's day. Able to go supersonic right off the treetops and rock steady as well. Virtually uncatchable once it was rid of it's bombload.

 

If you wanted to get the hell out of Dodge as quickly as possible, it was unmatched.

 

I use the terrain avoidance radar and the altimeter. No HUD mod needed.

 

The F-111A was faster at tree tops, with a bombload.