Sitt'n around working on all the damned intricated parts of a rocket engine all night long you're bound to be tried and tested on the familiarities and dangers of such things that can result in anything from minor repairs to catastrophic types of bullshit...
What I'm talking about is a familiar acronym among acronyms in this ol' salts book of nautical phrases and terms...
Dunt, Dunt, Dunt, Duuuh.....
The infamous FOD walkdown!!!
On a bird farm, 'FOD' for all you out there who know no better is Foreign Object Damage... or in simpler terms, the kinda shit that gets caught in the engine of an aircraft and can end up crushing skulls and causing millions of dineros in damage!!! And in my days in the Navy, a FOD walkdown was a good ol' fashion nutt to butt single file line of walking up and down the flight deck and hangar bay looking for anything that can be sucked up a gaudamned jet engine so it was our job to make sure nothing was over looked!!!
At 0800 hours in the morning there is nothing more beautiful than one of them tropical sunrise with a waft of jet fuel in the air... but don't be caught gazing out yonder when the Captain of the flight line draws you into his ranks to be a part of his gaudamn crew.
"OK, let me put you stupid son-of-a-bitches in tune with your present relationship with the rest of the universe. You dumb bastards have volunteered for FOD walkdown rather you like it or not. You have, of your own stupidity, signed up by being in the wrong place at the right time."
I was usually one of those son-of-a-bitch bastards with about two or three hundred other idiots just like me who got sucked up in vacuum of the FOD walkdown... In my book, FOD walkdown was a polite inoffensive way of calling it an anal sphincter detail.
There was a reason they didn't call away FOD walkdown over the 1MC!!! I could only imagine it would be like turning the kitchen light on at the dead of night and watching a thousand gaudamned cockroaches scurry'n away in every nook and cranny they could find to get outta the detail...
That's why half way through a lotta fellas would devolunteer themselves as soon as no one was looking. It was a mundane task, but some Chief would always try to make it interesting,
"Hey shipmate, you got any change so we can get a cold drink when we're done... this job makes a man thirsty!"
God forbid the jackass who said yes... you see, on the flight deck no one was allowed to have anything loose in their pockets. Pens, papers, tools, green memo pads, you name it!!!!
"Now get your gaudamned dickskinners outta your pockets and let's go!"
Yep, we were walking in full force, searching every crevice and every corner, with no stone left unturned.... or should I say no stone left unpicked up! We walked the good walk in the the hottest sunshine, snow, rain, or monsoon... didn't matter if it was 110 degrees outside or if we were grow'n ice cycles from our noses... just another FOD walkdown which no foreign objects would interrupt!! Had to keep the FOD Gods happy or some plane might come crashing down... so they say!!!
But Gaudamned the poor son-of-a-bitch who got caught up in this debacle. Usually your divisional Chief didn't give two shits why you weren't on time to his working party. Being caught up in a FOD walkdown was no gaudamned excuse!! Hell.. they usually didn't believe you when you told them.
"Hey kid, never bullshit a Chief. You pull my leg and I'll bounce you off the side of the ship like nobodies business."
Yeah, I loved that ol' school wall to wall counseling... don't allow that stuff no more.
But I never could understand... with today's technology, why don't them sorry sons-a-bitches just get some damn street sweepers to do the job! Well I guess without stupid activity, life would become unacceptably boring underway!!!
So my hats off to all those crusty bastards out there keep'n the airplanes safe in the air and the ships safely underway...
If one gaudamned thing is learned here it's this....
"You can take yourself outta the Navy after Twenty-three years... but you'll never take the Navy outta me!!!
Well said
ReplyDeletezlposeidon0623@gmail.com
Ahhhhh...the "Good Ole Days"
ReplyDeleteA tropical sunset at 0800?? Must have been on the way to Australia.
ReplyDeleteI thought the same!
DeleteOkay Shipmates... I've been had by the Grammar Nazis... I changed it from Sunset to Sunrise... Better?!?
DeleteWe had sunset quite early up in the Bering Sea Jan 87, but it was never that early, and it was far from tropical.
Deleteever walk with two bags?one for plane parts and one for body parts.
ReplyDeleteYep
DeleteProbably just an old sea tale, and I've never actually met anyone that this happened to, but I did hear about sometimes they painted a paperclip and put it somewhere on the flight deck, and who ever found it during FOD walkdown won a prize (like a liberty day or something else valuable like that).
ReplyDeleteNever had FOD walk walkdowns in the Tin Can Navy. BUT, in my next life I intend to come back as a flight deck crewmember on a flat top. Maybe Air Boss....Whatever that is.
ReplyDeleteI've participated in enumerable FOD searches but the absolute worst in my experience was the flight ramp along the St Johns' River of NAS Jacksonville. That nasty sea chicken loved to roost there in the thousands.
ReplyDeleteMy father was a career USAF Officer. FOD is indeed dangerous. After he became to old to fly, he went into maintenance. On the back wall of his office, he had a turbine blade , from a C5-A Engine, with a soft drink tab embedded into it (this was in the days before tab was designed to stay on the can.) The cost of that one soft drink tab was approximately 1.3 million dollars (this included repair costs, removal, replacement, etc) I admit this made an impression on me - and when I supervised FOD walkdowns as a JO - I always remembered that turbine blade.
ReplyDeleteBeen to many, many lifetimes of FOD walkdowns. Usually, it's enough to say, anything not tied down when a jet spins and powers up, is going to be one a missle. It'll put a bent piece of safety wire into a goggle lens that could be some sadsacks eye because he thought he didn't need to wear safety goggles. If you want to scoff at that, just think of the last time a moment of your indescretion somethig happened y
ReplyDeleteI worked nights but I had the unfortunate experience of "A" FOD
ReplyDeletewalk down. 8 years in, 3 years, 11 months and 19 days aboard. AMS A/F And A/F trouble shooter (final checker for you young pups)
Not sure if I was lucky or just that good at skating off the flight deck before hand.