Tyndall Damage

[Seth]

Our friends at Tyndall got slammed by Hurricane Michael.  Every structure received significant damage.

Here are some pics of the contorl Tower:

 

[mike_elliott]

Ron is there right now, and Mars is returning today to see what is left of the medical facilities at Tyndal. Jim has checked in and is ok, but noted the devastation to the east of Panama City. Fortunately, Panama City Beach, home of the Summit, is in decent shape considering. Sharkeys' shark is gone, but I am sure Neel Bennett will be serving fish tacos soon if not today.

 

[Seth]

3 hours ago, mike_elliott said:

Sharkeys' shark is gone, but I am sure Neel Bennett will be serving fish tacos soon if not today.

 

Wow.  Curious if he’ll replace it.

[mike_elliott]

1 hour ago, Seth said:

Wow.  Curious if he’ll replace it.

You can watch the Shark fly from the Origin

[rbridges]

Wow.  It's crazy how fast Michael developed from Class I to almost a V in such a short period of time.  

[Seth]

 

[rocketman]

Just returned from PCB and PC. PCB got spared. Origin condo showed absolutely no signs of damage. Some insulation from the roof top blown over. I never lost any power, and water was off for about 24 hours. All my four homes including the one on Spyglass and Gulf Drive which are used during the Mooney Summit was virtually  untouched. Some minor shingles need replaced, a fence on Spyglass was broken but can be easily spared. I was indeed fortunate especially after watching the video below from Accuweather showing my home on Spyglass with the coral fencing during the storm. 

Panama City which we went to to assist in Search and Rescue is a completely different story. That city was devastated for as wide and far as we could see. It extended from the east end of PCB eastward for about 50 miles or so taking everything in its path. 

Those homeless people, thousands of them, no where to go, no food, water, electricity, no internet and no Verizon phone service. No shelter, no bathing, no showers, no nothing!. Food lines were long while they were sweltering in the hot 90+ degree weather.  And there was practically nothing I could do. This was an awakening moment for me.

The good news - there will be a Mooney Summit VII next year. September 27-29. Unfortunately, I think the PROATE chamber which was going to be at the MS next year was housed at Tyndall and probably met its fate there - time will tell on this.

Ron Dubin

[carusoam]

Thanks for reporting in, Ron.

Glad to hear of some rays of good news amongst the mess.

Verizon has been running TV ads this week regarding all their truck mounted portable cell towers and a remote plane that is supposed to be helping in times like these...

They don’t give a hint of how capable these systems are...

Best regards,

-a-

[Rick Junkin]

10 hours ago, rocketman said:

Those homeless people, thousands of them, no where to go, no food, water, electricity,

Ron, can you tell us where the best place is to send contributions for the relief effort? A local organization?

Cheers,
Rick

[mike_elliott]

15 hours ago, rocketman said:

, I think the PROATE chamber which was going to be at the MS next year was housed at Tyndall and probably met its fate there - time will tell on thi

Ron, the PROTE chamber is coming from Oklahoma City. Tyndall has a Hypobaric chamber that we were unable to get a LOA with the Airforce and the FAA in place to use like they used to have before it expired. The PROTE chamber is a much safer device to do the hypoxia training in.  We should be good to go still on it for the MOoney Summit VII, unless we are removed from the budget as we were this year. Many of you know this has been a 6 year project to get this training for us. It will take more than a hurricane to shut us down this time.

 

[flyboy0681]

Latest story on the damage to Tyndall. Pay no attention to the Times use of the word "global warming".

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/17/us/tyndall-afb-damage-hurricane-michael.html

 

[Guest]

When I see the kind of damage done, it makes me think that shoveling snow a few months of the year isn’t too bad after all.

Clarence

[Hank]

14 minutes ago, M20Doc said:

When I see the kind of damage done, it makes me think that shoveling snow a few months of the year isn’t too bad after all.

Clarence

You can have it! I moved back right after the Super Bowl in 2014. It snowed twice this last winter; the second time the plant closed for three days. If those are the last snowflakes I ever see, it will still be 3" too many . . . .

[Niko182]

On 10/18/2018 at 8:56 AM, flyboy0681 said:

Latest story on the damage to Tyndall. Pay no attention to the Times use of the word "global warming".

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/17/us/tyndall-afb-damage-hurricane-michael.html

 

my favorite quote from that article.

"The base’s F-22 stealth fighter jets may be unmatched in the skies, but they were all but defenseless on the ground"

when all aircraft on that base were flown out.

[Guest]

9 hours ago, Niko182 said:

my favorite quote from that article.

"The base’s F-22 stealth fighter jets may be unmatched in the skies, but they were all but defenseless on the ground"

when all aircraft on that base were flown out.

A quick internet search shows images of a few F22’s still in hangars that obviously didn’t fly out to other bases.

Clarence

 

[neilpilot]

1 hour ago, M20Doc said:

A quick internet search shows images of a few F22’s still in hangars that obviously didn’t fly out to other bases.

Clarence

 

They were undergoing maintenance and not able to be repositioned.

[kpaul]

16 hours ago, Niko182 said:

my favorite quote from that article.

"The base’s F-22 stealth fighter jets may be unmatched in the skies, but they were all but defenseless on the ground"

when all aircraft on that base were flown out.

Not even close...it numbered in the teens that were not able to fly out.  The hangars they were in was severely damaged. The final bill will be in the billions.  

[flyboy0681]

Perhaps a stupid question, but given each planes massive cost, wouldn't it have been prudent to get them on some kid of transport and flown out? Even damaging them in the haste to get them out surely would have been less costly than replacing them.

[Guest]

Didn’t they used to put aircraft in round roof concrete hangars in the past?  Seems to me that relative to the cost of modern fighter aircraft  a concrete bunker style hangar would be a cheap investment.

Clarence

[Marauder]

Perhaps a stupid question, but given each planes massive cost, wouldn't it have been prudent to get them on some kid of transport and flown out? Even damaging them in the haste to get them out surely would have been less costly than replacing them.

I suspect it was due to the number of qualified pilots available to fly them out.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[kpaul]

2 hours ago, M20Doc said:

Didn’t they used to put aircraft in round roof concrete hangars in the past?  Seems to me that relative to the cost of modern fighter aircraft  a concrete bunker style hangar would be a cheap investment.

Clarence

Those were hardened bunkers that were supposed to protect against bombs during the cold war, mainly at the US bases in Europe.  I don't think there are any at Air Force bases in the states..

[kpaul]

2 hours ago, Marauder said:

 

I suspect it was due to the number of qualified pilots available to fly them out.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

No, there are way more qualified F22 pilots than flyable planes.  A single squadron probably has 4 pilots per aircraft.

[flyboy0681]

2 hours ago, Marauder said:

I suspect it was due to the number of qualified pilots available to fly them out.
 

I didn't mean fly them out but remove the wings, if possible, and load them onto a C5A.

[Marauder]

No, there are way more qualified F22 pilots than flyable planes.  A single squadron probably has 4 pilots per aircraft.

So why did they leave them there? Logistics? Or was it wishful thinking that the storm wasn’t going to hit that hard or miss them entirely?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[kpaul]

9 minutes ago, flyboy0681 said:

I didn't mean fly them out but remove the wings, if possible, and load them onto a C5A.

I never turned wrenches on F-22s but I did on F-16s.  Certain maintenance actions can only be done at the depo and require special tools, gigs and cradles.  Removing wings is generally one of them.  Tyndall is not a F-22 depo.  Additionally, the storm grew and moved faster than a team could have been assembled, traveled to Tyndall and completed the work.  You also risk additional personnel and aircraft being on the ground when the storm hit.

Yes, the commanders are responsible for their equipment (planes), but they have a greater responsibility to their personnel.  The potential is real that 2 Billion dollars in aircraft were lost, but zero lives were lost.  It sucks to be a tax payer, but its better than attending funerals.