I was an Air Force brat.  When I was a kid my dad would take us near the runway at the base and we'd watch the F106's take off.

I've loved that sound ever since.

My grandparents lived at the north end of Tinker. Grandfather workeda t Tinker.  All day long when I was growing up. F-4 Phantoms would do touch and go's.  That is how I fell in love with F-4's & A-7 Corsair II's(Remember those??). Black smoke belching engines roar.  T-38's F-106's sometimes. But this was in the mid to late 70's right before the F-16 and along time before the 507th got them.  Sometimes if they saw you on their approach they would wave their wings.

Fishing in lake Chickasha must be a dead on run to the Lawton Bombing Range.  Because those F-16's Hall some ass across that lake about 200 feet above it.  It goes something like this.
You hear the F-16 splitting the wind SSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHhh then complete silence for several seconds then BBBBBBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMM ENGINE ROAR THAT MAKES YOU SMILE FROM EAR TO EAR. GREAT STUFF. LIBERTY TALKIN.

MAKES YOU GIDDY INSIDE.  

WHAT A LIFE THOSE GUYS HAVE.
Ben

The title of this thread reminds me of my time at MCAS Yuma. Harriers are some of the loudest birds out there, and we had five squadrons of them, on what has been an active military airfield since 1921.

We frequently got calls complaining about the jet noise, and forwarded them to public affairs. Just once I wanted to say, "That's the sound of freedom, baby!"

When I was in the military I was a jet enging machanic on the F-15's and F-16's.  We use to do night afterburner take offs.  You could not see anything but this 8 foot flame rocketing into the sky until you could not longer see it. Or when we would test the engine in the shop and shoot that same Flame through the shop.  Yeah good times :)

I used to like to hear the jets too.  When I was growing up in the Mojave Desert of So. Calif. I would hear the roars and sonic booms of jet planes all the time.  Then one day I saw a fire ball and a plume of black smoke, one of them crashed.

When we still were doing AeroSpace America here at Will Rogers, every monday after the Airshow you could watch the fighter jocks take off back for home.  The Ego drivers(F-15s) would always do viking departures.  Where they take off and climb vertically to altitude. KICK FRICKIN ASSSS.  ITs like 150knots , Plane rotation, wheels leave ground... Wheels up....Stage 5 afterburner...... PITCHING UP........ C YA.... Climbing to angels 10 accelerating to 450 knots in the vertical.  JESUS.

Benjamin

My last tour in the "Corps" was spent at MCAS Cherry Point, N.C.,  To the left of our main gate  reads, "Pardon our noise, it's the sound of freedom."  Guess we kind of said it all.