Dear diary,

Today I logged my first 1.4 hours of Viper time. Lt. Col. Kevin "Coconut" Grove was the pilot on my first F-16 flight. We started off by doing a full afterburner vertical ascent to 10,000 feet. This pulled about 3.2Gs. The strangest thing about sitting in the cockpit of this aircraft while it is flying is the lack of engine noise. The vertical takeoff was completely silent.

After we got to altitude we meandered up past Sedona to Meteor Crater. I'm going to have to plan a trip (road) there. It looked really neat from the air. We then headed west past Flagstaff and got a short view of the Grand Canyon. We were running into some wind so I opted to cut the Grand Canyon tour short in favor of more time in our airspace.

Once we saw the Grand Canyon to our right he gave me the jet. I banked to point to our airspace and did some S-turns to get used to the controls. Upon arriving in our airspace I did a quick left aileron roll. The stick took some getting used to as it only has about a quarter of an inch of play. Slight movements of the stick translate to huge movements of the jet. After the left roll I did another one to the right. My second was a lot faster than my first. I did some vertical movements and experienced some negative Gs.

As I was in the back seat I didn't have a traditional HUD. I had an MFD with a HUD display overlayed onto a camera view of straight forward from the aircraft. This was below horizontal from my head position so the majority of my stick time was spent looking at this screen and not out the window.

After my maneuvers he took the jet back and proceeded to do some G checks. He accelerated to about 450 knots and did a 4.5G turn to the left and I practiced my breathing. He again accelerated to about 450 knots and then did a 6.5G turn and I again practiced my breathing. I started to get tunnel vision and he mentioned that I was breathing too quickly. I corrected this and he let off on the stick. After a quick check to make sure that I was fine he accelerated to about 500 knots and threw us into our 9G turn. This was excruciatingly awesome. I did not start to black out or get tunnel vision. I was under intense pressure and acutely aware of the sweat running out from under my helmet and down my forehead. I noticed that my mask must not have been seated right as it started warbling when I was breathing in the 100% oxygen that I turned on to help avoid passing out.

My mind was relieved when he said "There's 7, 8 and there's 9". But it wasn't over. We still had to come back down from 9Gs. After he leveled us out and I told him that I was fine, great, even, he asked if I wanted to go supersonic.

Supersonic was nothing. An absence of anything unusual. I wasn't expecting much to happen and I wasn't disappointed. I watched the Mach speed indicator go up from 0.5 to 1.0 and then back down. I'm sure the people below us noticed, though!

We were running low on fuel so we proceeded to head back home. He let me fly it back into the Luke area and I descended from 12,000 to 3,600 feet at which point he took over and brought us in for a landing. We dearmed our AIM 9M-9 Sidewinder and taxied back in. I disembarked and felt a bit wobbly and very tired.

I changed out of the flight suit, G-suit and harness and drove home where I promptly went to bed.

This was one of the best days of my life.

Some pics here.

That sounds seriously cool, how long will it take to be fully qualified?

They let you fly a plane?

I know our military is understaffed, but this is the last thing they should have done.

Sweet. Congratulations! Sounds like you had an amazing time!

I won't be qualified by the USAF to fly one. I'm color blind and, as such, am disqualified from most flying duties.

This was an incentive ride awarded to me for various reasons. It probably won't occur again.

Heh, they sure did. Not only that, but I had the stick for 37 of the 84 minutes we were in the air.

So you must have some flying experience then? I wouldn't have thought they let just anyone 'fly' an F-16!

I'd never flown in my entire life. I have lots of video games experience!

He was impressed by my skills and kept suggesting that I should pursue a private license.

Hey, flying's easy, it's LANDING that's the trick!

-Zeke

Awesome!

I'm jealous. The closest I've gotten (besides our sims here, but those aren't fixed wing) was playing in a B-52 sim at Minot.

I thought the Air Force met their recruitment goals, was this a re-enlistment incentive?

It was an incentive flight awarded to me for securing numerous unit and higher command awards. I guess they all added up.

Also, I forgot to mention this above. I had the stick for 37 of the 84 minutes we were in the air.

Very nice, congratulations!

Well, I played *GOLF* at Luke last year! Top that!!!

OK, OK, I'm jealous. Or maybe I'd be jealous if it was 30 years ago. Now I'd probably just pass out. The closest I have ever come is a couple of sideways rides in the gunner's seat of a Huey Cobra. Also eerie -- couldn't see who was driving -- and quiet. As I recall the seat doubled as the vent for the air conditioning unit. Refreshing.

I did *not* get any stick time. No stick!

Very cool. Jealous

[edit: I have good color vision, but was informed mid-way through my draft physical that I didn't have any stereoscopic depth perception. This came as a complete surprise to me. I hadn't noticed. I mean I could drive a car and everything, but I wondered if it explained why I sucked at tennis. Anyhow, tennis balls and automobiles are roughly consistent in size (so the brain makes up the difference). Hills and mountains not so. The examiner told me I wouldn't have to worry about getting sent to Huey school. At the time I was a little bummed. Not very bummed now. Rotary-wing aircraft. Can't trust 'em.]

That would be pretty sweet as well!

I've never played golf, but I have eaten at the golf course.

Awesome story. What in the world is a G-Suit?!

You can do a roll with no experience? See, video games are educational. Maybe I'm qualified as a plumber.

Video is up

It's long and mostly boring. I annotated the not-so-boring parts.

I also recently went on a tandem jump with the USAF Academy competition jump team instructors.

Video here

We just got a new guy in my group here (about a month ago now), who is a former F-16 pilot... scary thing is we are the same age. Now our war stories consist of a bunch of Army guys talking about flying attack, one scout guy, and an F-16 guy.

This story reminds me of Ken Thompson's classic Mig-29 trip report.