My first post! Personal aerial pic of groom and papoose...

Well I would like to start with a bang. First a little background info. I flew on kc-135s as a boom operator for six years. Had about 10 tdy's to Edwards AFB in support of F-22 flight testing, among other secret sorties. This is one of my pics of Groom and Papoose lakes. Hope you enjoy and feel free to ask questions.




Enjoy!

reply to post by boomer135


Thanks for the pic, and welcome.

However, its a pic of a pic? Can't you just scan it and upload it?
Would be better quality.

vvv

Welcome to ATS. That is a wonderful photo, thanks for sharing!

I feel almost compelled by the spirit of this website to ask:

In your time flying have you ever witnessed anything "strange"? Have you ever heard workmates or other personnel discuss anything UFO related?

Thanks! I hope you enjoy your time here.

reply to post by VreemdeVlieendeVoorwep


Don't have a scanner and yes it's a pic of a 35mm pic I took with my iPhone. But I'm working on getting a scanner because I have 100's of pictures that I need to digitize.

reply to post by Alushe


Well it depends on how you define "strange". I've seen a lot of classified planes, equipment, etc which might be strange to some people but it was mostly new technology that still isn't declassified. I've got to refuel some cool aircraft and even do some "simulated" refuelings with a certain drone aircraft just to test the slipstream and see if they were stable enough for air-to-air.

As for ufo's, not really. I've been in the air in the Nellis test range more times than I can count but I'm not one to speculate on what I saw if I don't really know what it was...if that makes sense.

Appreciate the pic. Not many get to fly over those parts as I understand, but I have to ask ... what is the "thing" in the top left of your photo, looks a bit um, rude ?

ETA; Sorry mate, I just realised it's a Thumb ... Duh! ( gives self an uppercut )

Whilst I'm here, did you notice anything strange or unnatural to the surrounding environment?

reply to post by Timely


As for the environment, not really. The one thing that I noticed is that there isn't a runway, or even tracks in the sand at papoose at all. Not sure why some think that it has secret hangers besides the whole Lazar thing but I've been right over it pretty low and never saw anything special. However the craters are kinda cool to see from all the nuke tests.

As I said earlier, the things I saw in and around the NTS aren't conclusive so I wouldn't want to speculate on the things I saw. Didn't see any discs or anything like that. But as for secret aircraft...maybe

Being nice

reply to post by boomer135


Yep, I have always been amazed and taken aback whilst checking the google earth images of the 'crater farm' just outside of Vegas. ( was there in '05 and could not help wondering ) - how safe is it today?

reply to post by Domo1


Nice about what??


Who knows how safe that area is. I guess they say it still has areas contaminated but maybe it's just to keep people out.

Boomer, can you explain "Blonde Girl" as heard on the scanner during Red Flag. It has something to do with refueling.

Regarding the NTS, there are plenty of places that are hot. Also there are places where they set off nukes underground but didn't form a crater. The sign says something like "potential subsidence crater". I guess their thinking is a small quake or similar disturbance might make the crater form, so watch out.

Regarding Papoose Lake, I've viewed it from the nearby hills with binocs and photographed it. There is nothing there. Zip, nada. It is not the best place for a base since the area can be seen by commercial air traffic. Of course, none of this deters the faithful.

I'm looking forward to any photos you have of the range, especially Tolicha Peakm the TPECR, Korean AIrfield, Terroist Canyon, etc. . You don't need to spend much for a flatbed scanner these days.

Originally posted by gariac
You don't need to spend much for a flatbed scanner these days.

Or just pick up an all-in-one. I got a Canon Pixma MP250 for like $30 at Walmart. Does great scans, and fairly fast too.

Thanks Boomer..

pretty cool pic!

Very, very cool boomer. Looking forward to hearing your stories!

reply to post by gariac


Blonde girl isn't a tanker call sign. The last time I did red flag (2005) blonde girl was a controller. Can't say exactly which controller but its airborne. It does deal with air refueling but that's not the only thing they deal with.

If you ever get a chance to listen to some red flag recordings you'll hear planes take off and check in with blonde girl. No plane takes off and checks in with a tanker. Especially during red flag when there's so many planes in the air. Tankers also operate on different frequencies than the other planes in the area. We have our own refueling frequencies usually in the 300 range and a secondary freq as well.

reply to post by boomer135


Well that is a start. I didn't know "blonde girl" was airborne. I'm guessing the controller is on the E-3. The E-3 has a few callsigns. There is the pilot (AKA front end). Since the E-3 is the first plane up (perhaps after the range is flown for weather check...I forget the sequence), you hear the E-3 front end. Then both the Red and Blue forces have their own controllers on the plane. [The Red Flag movie did a crappy job of explaining all this, not to mention it completely ignored the enemy ground units (Roulette).]

I have a recording of blonde girl, but it is unfortunately in "real audio" format. I guess real audio was used in 2002. I need to go back and convert all the real audio stuff to mp3. Here is the link, but few people are set up for real audio these days.

www.lazygranch.com...

More Red Flag audio here.
www.lazygranch.com...

The stereo recordings are OGG, but there are plugins to play OGG. At the time, I didn't know how to make MP3 recordings where the left and right channels are totally discrete.

Scanner frequencies are at the top of this page:
www.inplanesight.org...

reply to post by gariac


I can't open the audio on my iPhone but I'll try when I get off work in the morning. Also, one thing to look for when they call the tanker is that most controllers won't have a number behind their callsign like blonde girl. But the tankers use call signs like gassr 14 or raid 16 (non-red flag) call signs. First one is from Altus afb and is the training squadron call sign. Raid is 319 ARW call sign in grand forks afb, nd. Also, if you hear a raid 01, 02, or 03, or any other callsign like that it stands for 01-wing commander, 02-vice wing commander, 03- ops group commander. They are either flying the plane or on board the plane. The red flag call signs I can't divulge without getting in trouble! But I know a lot of the tanker call signs though.

reply to post by boomer135


You should be able to play any of the MP3 audio on that page. Just not the OGG or Real Audio.

Don't worry about the Red Flag callsigns. I have most in my head. Snake is F-16, tankers are usually Arco or some name of a fuel company. The E-3 is Challice or Disco. F-15 is Strike. There are lists floating around the net, most of which are pretty good.

The Saudis just finished a Red Flag and Green Flag. I think they are ready for action. ;-)

reply to post by gariac


Sent you a pm...

The view is excellent but the quality is [snp]. Like what century is that? Can't you extract the image from your digital camera and get a normal picture?