Tornado walk around

[Pierce]

I was deployed to Kandahar Afghanistan. My work there included Police duties which we shared with the British MPs. They were a great group of people who I learned so much from. I don't think I have ever drank so much tea in my life. But I must say it does the soul good to take a break in the middle of the day drink some tea and have light hearted conversation. Anyways a tour of a Tornado was set up and they let us sit in the cockpit walk on it under it and around it. I know they are no pics of the cockpit. Because the aircraft was on alert to support ground troops all the electronics where in place so all they had to do was start the engines and leave. They said some of the components were sensitive and they did not want pics taken. So here is what I have. I hope it helps somebody out there.

[Gb64c]

Cool sheeeeet

[1001kjk]

Great stuff thanks for posting

[M60Tanker]

Go Huskers!

[ForbesHutton]

Cool pics! In 1993 0r 1994 (don't remember right now) the Yanks sent a F117 to the Hamilton (Ontario, Canada) air show, to be put on public display with walkarounds when it wasn't flying. The USAF want to send some Air Force Security Police with it and when the Canadian government asked why the reply was "to shoot anyone looking in the cockpit". Canada said "no, we can't have Americans shooting Canadians on Canadian soil!".
Some the Americans asked "what if we hire Canadians to shoot Canadians on Canadian soil?". "Mmm, Okay." was the reply and the company I worked for got the contract. Seeing an armed guard in Canada is like seeing a armed policeman in Britain, people do a double-take it's so rare.
So they had the canopy open, but a black tarp draped over the whole cockpit (under the canopy) and we got our brief "shoot to wound anyone looking under the tarp, then drag them over to the RCMP trailer (that's where the plainclothes USAF SP who were "supervising" us were drinking). Shoot to kill anyone who takes a picture under the tarp, then get the camera over to the RCMP trailer."
We looked at them for a minute, looked at the plane for a minute and fired off a couple of questions, "why don't you just move the ladder/platform away from the plane so no one can get up there?", "why don't you close the canopy so no one can move the tarp to see what under it, and it won't blow in the wind?", "why don't you do both of the above?" The major disappeared for 20 minutes to call "a higher up". He came back and said the ladder/platform was to be moved away from the plane. This was this group's 10th or so airshow.
We spent the days sitting in lawn chairs under the wings so we could have some shade. For the nights the plane was pulled into a smaller hanger with just us, some guard dogs and the USAF ground crew, who worked on it at night. The nights were much cooler and the time passed much faster as most of the time was spent playing poker with the ground crew and fetch with the guard dogs.
I am required to deny that any pictures of myself or a German Shepard sitting in the pilot's seat exist. (With the flight helmet squashing the ears down it's hard to tell it's a GSD anyways)

[mincemeat]

Thanks for posting the pictures. I also had an encounter with the F117. It was probably in the late 90's my mom took me to either Midway or O'Hare airport in Chicago to see the F117. I don't recall if pictures were even allowed to be taken of the outside of the aircraft. There were guards under the F117, a velvet rope around it, another set of guards and another velvet rope. From outside of the double velvety ropes, I seem to recall that it didn't seem that big. Was that your recollection as well?

[ForbesHutton]

Most of other planes around were vintage warbirds, so comparing it to a Spitfire isn't fair. It was about the same size as the F-18 (one of the few modern planes we got a good look at). For a bomber, it's tiny, if you get fooled by the "fighter" name then it's about average. And in Hamilton people could take pictures from behind the rope until their cameras ran out of film if they wanted, I think the ropes were set up about 10' from the "footprint" of the plane, other than the cockpit the only concern was people touching the plane (in some places the body was literally paper thin, we weren't allowed to put a soda can on it, nevermind leaning on it), so the ropes were set to always be at least two arms lengths away from the closest part of the plane.

[UKguyInUSA]

Sweet! Would love to fly in one of these! Thanks for sharing