From an air traffic controller working in the tower at Billings, MT.



B-1 Bomber that got put up for sale here locally a while
back.

About 14 years ago a B-1 bomber was in Billings, MT, doing
practice instrument approaches and touch and go landings. On one of the
landings the pilot sets his brakes on fire. He taxis in, and the airport
parks him on a taxiway and then puts cones around him until parts and
mechanics can be brought in from Ellsworth AFB the next day.

The next day is a Saturday, which doesn't have much going on, so we
get to laughing in the tower that maybe somebody should hang a For Sale
sign on the plane. We convince one of our guys who's well known for doing
things like this that it would be a good idea.

So he takes off for the hardware store to buy a For Sale sign. On the
way back he stops at a car dealer and gets one of those "As is/No
Warranty" signs that hang in all used cars. On that sign was written
something like low miles, new engines, needs brakes and tires. Those
signs were taped together, and off goes our hero.

He climbs over the fence, leaving some skin on the barbed wire, and
makes his way the 1000 feet or so to the aircraft. As he's doing that, we
see a couple of airport vehicles starting to gather with the recently
arrived mechanics as well as the plane's crew. Not looking good for our
intrepid airplane salesman. He gets to the nose wheel and tapes the sign
to the nose strut.

Then he starts to make his way back from the plane as the vehicles
start to head out from the shop on the way to the bomber. Somehow he
makes it without being seen.

The vehicles arrive at the plane, and of course notice the sign right
away. The Air Force guys are in stitches, funniest thing they've seen in
a long time. Airport guys are not sure what to think. Airport management
is livid as they've been tasked with security.

Pretty soon a camera appears and all the Air Force guys are taking
pictures of each other by the sign.

Our hero is back in the tower now, and notices the bomber's commander
is talking on a cell phone. Our guy gets on the radio to the airport
truck and asks for that guy's phone number. As soon as he finishes that
call, our guy calls the aircraft commander. When he answers, our guy says
"I'm calling about the plane you have for sale." Aircraft
commander about falls over from the laughter. It just so happened that
the chief photographer for our local newspaper is a pilot and he may have
been called prior to the sign being placed.

He was told to get up here with a big lens. Here's one of the pics he
got.

An article showed on the front page of the Sunday paper. When that
came out, the Colonel running Ellsworth called the airport director and
read him the riot act, wondering what kind of dog and pony show he was
running up there.

We were later informed by the crew that the sign was framed and is
now permanently mounted inside the aircraft. Hard to have that kind of
fun anymore.

Epic

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His plane, his rules

I guess the higher up the COC you go, the less humor you have.

I don't see it being that big of a deal myself

If that happened now, someone would be looking for a new job.

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I’ll be the buzz kill on this.  During Refurbishment everything (patches, stickers, ect.) is removed from the interior of the aircraft.  Only safety and stickers prescribed by the T.O. are reapplied.  It sucks because we lose a lot of the history but at least we get nose art.

Awesome!!!

The big deal is someone was allowed to approach a +$300M bomber.

Haha great story

What were they gonna do, steal it?



No Red Lines there eh?  

Thats what the cones are for

Funny story, we have B-52s visitng here so all the old red lines (from +10 years ago) got repainted.  Lots of people got put down the next week.
ETA: spelling

You mean one of the guys that works at the airfield?

Oh teh noez, not THAT!11!!!!1!!

That's why we clean all of the stuff off off the jet before it goes to depot (at least we get the same tails back so we can put the history back on).  

That said a while back some of our guys found some old SAC days artwork on part of the nav table that had been covered years ago.

Its easier than you would think.

I've left my jet on FBO ramps before with just a couple of combination locks keeping the doors closed.

We don't like it but we are driven by AFI.  Some of them have some cool stuff on the circuit breaker doors.
Most of our nose art is driven by a/c history.  Only one (that I know of) was because the crew chief wanted to change it.

True, but the airport was supposedly secure..

So?  I have a very good idea how easy it is (I work at Ellsworth with B-1 maintenance)

I have a for sale sign from my 1972 CH-53D Sea Stallion.  The other guys in the shop hung it in the window during the time when the tail pylons were cracking and we were short on pylons.  They took my baby's pylon and canni raped her for almost 9 months before I could get her put back together. Cock smokers would sneak in and steal shit left and right.

Again someone got to the plane had time to put a sign on it was observing the AF when they arrived, big problems up the chain of command. If this was the 1990's though not much would have been said.

Ever been part of a Mexican standoff between AF SecFor and USMC HMX-1 Security Guards over the ROD/Yankee White Material transport?  That was the one time I thought I was going to end up in the middle of a E-4 gun battle.  

Simulated terrorist demoralization attack.

I have FSBO'd an L1011 before:



Had a few calls.

It's been going on a while..here are some Herk guys:

I never really enjoyed being the red line nazi, especially with the other services. I only enjoyed fucking with my fellow airmen.

Most of my conversations with the Army and Marines were,
"(Rank), I apologize for the Air Force being retarded. Here are the rules and guidelines I have to enforce."
"Well that is complete expletive,expletive, expletive."
"I agree, (Rank). Here is how you get around this bullshit. I will need the following."
"I'll make it happen."
"Here is the number to my OPs O, CO and the Base CO."
"Thank you. Carry on."

Navy was rather simple.
"(Rank), here are the restrictions for this area. Please make sure everyone knows them."
"Sounds good."
In my experience the Navy was always more security conscious and understood the reasons behind the protocols, then the avg AF idiot. Never had a problem working with Navy personnel.

Special breed right there.