It's September, and it's been hot.

Hi Folks,

Time to catch up since April. In order to keep cool this summer, I've spent a lot of time sitting around San Diego Bay with it's cooling breezes. By doing so, I was able to photograph a lot of US and Foreign Naval Ships as they came in and went out of the Harbor. The US Navy had a major exercise off of Hawaii called Pacific Rim, and so a lot of US Navy ships from San Diego took part, and the Norwegians, Chileans, Mexicans, and other had ships coming to San Diego before departing for Hawaii. ThJapanese had also came for a visit with 3 of their training vessels.

The Planes of Fame had their annual air show, and again, another great performance, but the heat was just kicking my ass. I'm surprised, I made it back to my truck without heat stroke.

After that, was the new San Diego Air Show (formerly "Wings over Gillespi"), and it was a major disappointment. Just a boring show..

Now for the best and worst part. In July, I took off for Las Vegas to attend the Red Flag 14-3 exercise, and it was HOT! it was 107 on the runways, and Media Day got cancelled before it even started due to a security issue. The next day was my scheduled flight onboard a US Air Force KC-135. it was 107 degrees again on the runway, but with the plane sitting in the sun all morning, I entered into the aluminum body of the KCC-135 at 120 degrees, and they even had the main cargo door wide open. When it was time to take off, they closed the doors and we sat for over 30 minutes, waiting to take off. The temp soon rose to over 130 degrees. I honestly thought at this time, heat stroke was going to get me. After we took off and climbed to over 35,000 ft. It was much cooler,a nd I survived.

It's now September and lots of things are happening. Tomorrow, I will embark on the USS Nimitz to photograph some flight ops. looking forward to that. Also, I will be flying in another Air Force KC-135, photographing a C-17 late in the month, and the 2 days of flying with the Marines at their Fall WTI exercises, onboard a C-130 and a CH-53. I'm working aon a US Coast Guard story, but I'll leave that for the next update. Take care folks.

Catching up

Well, after doing my Air Force tanker flight for Red Flag 14-1, I went back to Nellis Air Force Base, and did the Red Flag 14-2 exercise a few weeks later. Not much difference, except the Saudis and United Arab Emirates were participating.

Things slowed down quite bit for me, except I was able to get out to sea quite a bit and shoot a lot of Naval vessels including Cruisers, Destroyers, and Submarines.

In late March, I covered the Marine Helicopter Squadron, "The Purple Foxes" as they did a commemorative flight with their CH-46's, before transitioning to the MV-22 Ospreys later this year. My story was published in the Military Press Newspaper, Vertical Magazine, and Photorecon.net.

 

 

On April 16th, I went to MCAS Miramar, and interviewed the Major in charge of the F/A 18 simulators. this was a pretty cool experience to see these machines and how they operate.. The story will be out soon.

April 17th and 18th, was suppose to be days of really cool experiences. I was scheduled to fly with the Marines at MCAS Yuma in Yuma, Arizona. So I show up on the 17th, ready to fly in a RC-130, and refuel F/A-18's, but then I'm told that it has been cancelled due to having an inexperienced mixed community crew onboard and they feel uncomfortable with a civilian onboard. I reminded them, that I'm a former Marine and have plenty of flight time in C-130's, but it didn't work. So it wasoff of the base and out to the fence line to shoot whatever was flying.

It turned out okay, as I saw and photographed my first Russian Hind helicopter, my first Israeli Kfirs, and I saw a lot of Marine aviation.

On April 18th, I was scheduled to fly in a UH-1 Huey Gunship that was to support a operation at a local park, but the winds had kicked up, and the Huey;s were cancelled, so after much  debating back and forth, I found myself in a RC-130 heading for Twenty-nine Palms, CA, to refuel a squadron of MV-22 Ospreys. 30 minutes into the flight, and the Ospreys scrubbed the mission due to weather conditions. Oh well there's always the fall WTI's.

Now, I'm just waiting for the Planes of Fame Airshow, and working on two other stories for the near future.

Red Flag 14-1 Tanker flight

Well the 3rd time is the charm. At the last two Red Flags in 2013, I was scheduled to fly with the US Air Force in their KC-135 Tanker plane, but due to some major miscommunications, the mission failed, and it was two long angry trips back  to San Diego from Las Vegas.

Here it is, Feb.10, I found myself back at the Nellis Air Force base's parking lot, and getting in a van to go on base and get on a plane. There was 5 of us, one was my editor from Combat Aircraft Magazine, Jaime Hunter, my new friend Ivan Voukadinov, who is one of the best Aviation photographers that I know, and two others.

Ivan and I got on our Boeing KC-135, while Jaime jumped on another. Our plane was being piloted by Captain Alex Duke, Co Pilot Robbi Bethancourt, and Boom Operator Airman Ryan Kemp. They were all attached to the 92nd Air Refueling Wing, out of Fairchild AFB, Washington.

We settled into our seats after the safety briefing, and soon we were in the air and climbing high into the sunny blue skies with huge billowy white clouds. We headed north, and I believe we were over Southern Utah, when the first of the fighters started to show up for refueling.

In 3 hours, were refueled fighters from:

The 1st Fighter Wing, 27th Fighter Squadron, F-22As, from Langley AFB, Virginia.
The 20th Fighter Wing, 55th Fighter Squadron, F-16CMs, from Shaw AFB, South Carolina
The 140th Fighter Wing, 120th Fighter Squadron, F-16C, from Buckley AFB, Colorado.

This was my first Air2Air with modern military aircraft, and what a blast it was. I shot through the side windows of the aircraft, and then down though the windows in the tail of the plane where the boom operator is located while refueling is taking place.

After landing, I drove back to San Diego. I was just so happy, that the 5 hour drive felt like only a few. I want to thank the US Air Force, the Base PAO's, and the crew of our tanker flight. Some of the best moments of my life.

Red Flag 14-1

While the Armed Forces sequestration is still in effect, the US Air Force's Red Flag exercise was back on after cancelling the last one in 2013. I drove from San Diego to Nellis Air Force Base, just north of Las Vegas for my 3rd Red Flag. I was especially interested in getting images of the Royal Australian Air Forces F/A-18's that would be participating in the exercise.

I was very lucky to attend, as I was late in getting my paperwork in for registering, but the Air Force took pity on me, due to them changing the way they registered the media and having a very shorten time to do so.

I along with approximately another 30-40 photographers were bused out the middle of the runway, where waves of planes started taking off, one after the another. First it was the big guys, tankers and electronic warfare planes, and then the bombers, followed by the fighters. Not only was their several US units flying, but British Typhoons and Tornados.

Wings of Gold

Well, I haven't written anything for awhile as things have been really slow. I've got several request into the different Military Public Affairs Officers throughout the region, and am waiting on the word that the request have been approved.

The US Air Force Red Flag exercises at Nellis AFB, are back on for 2014 after shutting down in 2013 after two cancelling two of the four planned exercises due to the sequestration. I have already been approved by the US Air Force to attend the exercises in February and March, so that's something at least.

I was very fortunate to have my WTI story published again, first by "Vertical Magazine", but now by "Wings of Gold", a magazine published by Association of Naval Aviation.

 

I recently started a Non Profit Organization called the California Dolphin Project www.caldolphin.org, and have been spending at sea, which has given me a lot of opportunities to shoot several US Navy ships while they are out to sea off of San Diego.

 

I hopefully will have to write about in the near future. Take care my friends and be safe.

Vertical Magazine

My story on the US Marines and their WTI 1-14 training got more coverage as "Vertical" Magazine picked up the story for their website. "Vertical" is the #1 Magazine for any and everything Helicopters. I have been very fortunate in my short career as a freelance photojournalist, and I truly appreciate all of those people who have and are helping me along the way.

"Wings of Gold", a quarterly magazine for Naval and Marine aviators is also running the WTI story in their next issue. Again, thank you to all, including the US Military for all of their access and kindness that they have shown to me.

 

 

 

 

WTI 1-14

Well, with the sequestration still in place for the US military, the Airshows have all been cancelled, if there was any military involved, and this has led to a really slow year for most of the aviation photographers this year.

As for myself, I've been fairly busy. I wrote an article about the 358th going to the gunnery range and it is being published by Combat Aircraft Monthly for November 2013. (The North American version may have a B-1 on the cover).

On October 2, 2013 I was very fortunate to attend the Fall Weapons and Tactics Instructors course for the U.S. Marines at MCAS Yuma, in Yuma, Arizona. I was assigned to fly in a Huey UH-1Y helicopter ( a gunship). We flew into the Chocolate Mountains of southern California. It was really exciting as we would be flying through the canyons and then pop up over a mountain and then descend quickly blasting the targets with rockets, and machine guns. What an experience! Now, I've flown in most of the Marine's Helicopter inventory. The CH-53 and 46 as a Marine and the MV-22 and now the UH-1W as a photojournalist.