MigBuster

The dramatic story of a US Navy Tomcat RIO, POW during Operation Desert Storm. In the early morning of Jan. 21, 1991, the F-14B (BuNo 161430, at the time designated F-14A Plus) from the VF-103 “Sluggers,” callsign “Slate 46”, flown by Lt. Devon Jones and RIO Lt. Lawrence Slade, was hit by an Iraqi SA-2 Surface to Air Missile. The crew was forced to eject due to the violent flat spin which followed the SAM explosion. During the descent, the two men saw each other for the last time before entering the clouds and once they put their boots on the ground their fate was quite different. In fact, while Lt. Jones was saved with a spectacular Combat SAR mission, Lt. Slade tried to go as far as he could from the Tomcat crash site, walking for about 2 ½ hours in the desert using his radio every hour without receiving any reply. Then, while Slade tried to hide himself near a little knoll, the Iraqis found him. “At about 1030, a white Datsun pickup truck came around the knoll,” Slade says in the book Gulf Air War Debrief. “It was probably bad luck because I don’t think they were looking for me; they were just driving by. Two men stopped and got out. One had a 12-gauge shot gun, the other, an AK-47. […] They approached me, but it never crossed my mind to pull out my pistol. I was obviously had. They made me strip off all my gear.” The two men were very polite and after they put Slade between them in the pickup, took him in their tent where they fed him. Then, after the lunch, they put him again in the pickup and they asked him if he wanted to go to either Saudi Arabia or Baghdad. Of course, he told them Saudi Arabia, choosing the most northern town he could recall. Slade knew that if the trip took three hours, it would have been Baghdad; eight, Saudi Arabia. Sure enough, 3 ½ hours later they pulled into an army camp, and he knew it wasn’t Saudi Arabia. For the rest of the day Slade was shuttled to six different camps, blindfolded and handcuffed. Nevertheless he was for sure a subject of interest, since people came out to see him, take pictures of him and poke at his gear. They’d pick on him, kick him, and if they spoke English they’d say things like “You kill our children.” Slade spent the following three days in Baghdad where he experienced very harsh interrogations, then he was transferred in the first of several prisons where he spent his POW (Prisoner Of War) experience. As he recalls: “In retrospect, I was shot down on the fourth day of the war and they had already had a few prisoners: a couple of Tornado crews, an A-6 crew and a Marine OV-10 crew. ” Lieutenant Slade and his fellow POWs changed different prisons in Baghdad where they also experienced several allied bombs raids, the most intense of which was the one that took place on Feb. 23, when 2,000-lb bombs almost completely destroyed their jail. But for sure the most impressive experience faced by Slade were the interrogations by Iraqi jailers. He had a total of six interrogations, some of what they called soft-sell, where they just asked him questions. Then there were the hard-sells, where they pounded on him. For the most part, they didn’t use any classic torture methods. They just beat him up, tied his hands behind his back and double-blindfolded him to the point where he couldn’t even blink. They beat allied prisoners even when they answered their questions. Slade, as well as the other POWs answered to the questions just to make beatings stop “even though the answers were complete garbage. Some I didn’t know the answer to, and I’d tell them, then I’d make up something. I could hear them writing it down. I thought, ‘You idiots!’ […] Some time toward the end of February, they banged me up against the wall and broke my seventh vertebra.” During these interrogations Slade was blindfolded and never saw his interrogators, probably so that he could not identify them later, or perhaps because the Iraqis understood how terrifying it is to be blind in the hands of a torturer. Lt. Slade endured interrogation, torture and starvation in the Iraqi hands for 43 days: even if his six weeks as a POW were not anywhere as long as six years in North Vietnamese prisons, to Lawrence Slade every week must have seemed like a year. http://theaviationist.com/2015/05/25/the-story-of-an-f-14-tomcat-rio-who-became-prisoner-of-war-during-the-first-gulf-war/

Have had that book a few years - very technical and detailed - includes all the prototype models and details on design - like his other stuff. There is a bit of stuff on operational use - not that they saw much (has a transcript of the Su-15 airliner shootdown).

http://fightersweep.com/2330/first-f-35a-lightning-ii-class-begins/ A milestone was reached for the 61st Fighter Squadron at Luke Air Force Base this past week. The first F-35A Lightning II class has begun, ushering in a new era at the installation tagged to become the F-35’s main training base for both foreign and domestic pilots.

Just some formation flying from Lithuania.

Janes analysis on Iranian combat jet development: http://www.janes.com/article/51515/iranian-combat-aircraft-programmes-bona-fide-or-bluff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3njDrUtT8k

You can modify HUDDATA.ini also (goes in flight) example HUDDATA.zip Read the text here for map options http://combatace.com/files/file/8446-remove-the-red-planes-from-the-in-flight-map/

Not seen this myself - even the laser guided robots sound impressive. 3 days to paint the thing! - imagine that in the BoB

http://feelreal.com/

MiG-29K / KUB I think

Check out the F-15INs :)

Saw in 4DX & 3D = Mind blown

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-32747861 The "King of the Blues", guitarist and singer BB King, has died aged 89. King, known for his hits My Lucille, Sweet Little Angel and Rock Me Baby, died in his sleep in Las Vegas. Born in Mississippi, King began performing in the 1940s, going on to influence a generation of musicians and work with Eric Clapton and U2. Once ranked as the third greatest guitarist of all time, he had been suffering ill health in recent months.

Shift A is an option

That's what I like about DCS - being low is lethal - keeps you on your toes and constantly jinking if you have to be there (See A-10A)!

How cool https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=209&v=Czy0pXRRZcs

oopsy......... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgS9GA3nBco&feature=youtu.be

Different splash screen?

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00X8R5110/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B00X8R5110&linkCode=as2&tag=thirdwireprod-20&linkId=RE4ACARTL5V7GO7T

New satellite imagery shows that India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier has made significant progress since it was launched in August 2013, helping India inch towards the goal of a two carrier battle group. https://www.bellingcat.com/news/rest-of-world/2015/05/09/ins-vikrant-makes-progress-at-cochin-shipyard/

Good stuff https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=329&v=H4LOGfuuugc

Wow - that's terrible RIP

Sales video - might be of interest https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=hox2aghTJTo

Sounds familiar - but no idea how I resolved it years back unfortunately. Remember trying different drivers without much luck. What SF2 patch are you on? Where is the game installed? Have you tried changing in game sound and graphics settings? Have you set up an NVIDIA profile for any of the Games so you can try different things in there? Have you run dxdiag? Anyone on Win 8.1 can confirm whether DX9/10 is supported without having to update DX runtimes. Also does the stuttering occur straight away or after your Laptop starts to heat up?

http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/a-lynx-doing-a-loop-over-stonehenge-is-about-as-crazy-c-1702482722