Pretty good, 463x0

Negative, the Big SAC would be designed and built by Apple.

MM III Nuclear Weapons Specialist 3 1/2 years at GFAFB. It never seemed to be overwhelming or particularly difficult. Mostly worked about 8 hours, M-F. Lived off base and supported all local bars in town. It wasn’t a bad life. Also consider it was a college town, UND.

There for if the MAF got snowed in and food topside dwindled. Or, if DEFCON changes happened (and a NUDET became a real possibility) you’d get them moved into the capsule. The capsule itself is very cramped and doesn’t have room for them day to day.

They play that for every new Airman that shows up at Minot AFB, takes the sting out of the -30 degree weather for about a week

This one?

My neighbor was on some Airforce team that transported nukes, he was stationed in Minot. All he talks about was how horrible Minot was...although he did tell me they took their job VERY serious..only smoked weed during his off time serious...!!! (1980s)

Minot is a sportsman’s paradise if you like pheasant/duck/deer hunting. Phenomenal ice fishing as well.

Missile operations is usually a brand-new LT out of college job, so, 22-23.  

In the Soviet Union/Russia, the same position is filled by Maj/Lt Cols.  

We (usually  ) trust our people a lot more than other cultures.

I can neither confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons aboard the USS  

The storage bunkers were always nice and warm inside during the winter, due to the shitload of 'joes stored in them.

I handled and loaded B61s and B57s on F16s.  

It was a sobering task every time I put one on a jet. Knowing they weren't going to be used gave some solace but you still think about the device you are working with and the ramifications if it needed to be used.

I did it proudly, with utter perfection.  It was my code on the lead seal that went on the consent switch and I put it there.

I worked as a security team leader on a nuke site in Germany for 4 and a half years. It was....interesting.

My older brother was munitions maintenance at Seymour Johnson
and Anderson AFB in the ‘70s. He said you just got used to handling the nukes after you had done it for a while.

What? You didnt like the NSI/LSI's? haha

While you were outside the HAS I was inside dealing with:

Warning: Screwdrivers can be sharp -Warned-Warned-Warned-Warned-Warned

Loosen left front bolster nut-Check-Check-Check-Check-

Question Life Choices-Check-Check-Check-Check


I will say the Convoys over seas were fun though

I worked security for tacticals (B-61 series) in the 90s in Europe for six years. No aircraft to deliver, just storage. Did everything from regular shift security to alarm operator, close in sentry/shelter entry controller of some NSI. Ended up as Sensor NCO, and did lead vehicle driver for convoys for three of the years there.  When driving lead was one of two cops on the convoy with a CDS card with the codes to command disable the resource if needed. Since we were basically a depot, we did a lot of convoys to stage and move resources from statements side to the other bases in theater. Those were long weeks. Besides that, with the number of shelters we had and the weapon and shelter PMI schedule, along with any mods, stockpile verifications and other stuff, we had ops going on 1/3 of the year. the rest of the time was NSI preparation and inspections.  In six years I was part of 4 NSI along with a DTRA and Air Force.Safety Center oversight inspection.

It was business. Lots of checklists, lots of redundancy. But the system is designed that way for a reason. As other posters have noted, it's regular people doing some pretty cool things.

I was also in SAC -------------- 100TH SRW  1972 - 1976

We provided maintenance for the 390SMW.

They had 18 Titan 2 ICBM sites around Tucson --------------- I went into four of them to fix/remove boo-boo's as a machinist.


I was 19 when I went into the first one ---------------- I felt like I was touching the face of God when I touched that monster...!


9 MT's of good time...!

I wonder what changed from your time to my time (Early 2000's) as our cops rarely saw a 61 much less new how to to check and disable.

Yep! That one right there, and thanks to me having to stop for that very temp repair, I didn't get to stop at Cabela's.

Oh yeah. Most pilots simply aren't suited to be indoors, especially in a place without windows. Locked in. 24 hours at a time. With nobody to admire their perfectly tailored flight suit. <---Well, these days being what they are, maybe? IDK LOL

Probably like being married.
Don't push the wrong buttons.

Funny story: underway hit my head on a cable hangar, went to the corpsman’s office to get a couple of stitches. I’m laying there and the Doc grabs Petty Officer Fuckstick(PRP) who happens to be walking by gets him to hold a light so he can sew me up. Doc starts his thing I see the light get all wonky hear a thump and the Doc say a couple of expletives and jumps away real quick. So while I’m still laying there I say, “hey Doc, that dude just pass out”? Doc says, “nope, fell down, helped him up”, gets someone else to hold light.

Included a pic of home base:
Attached File

I liked Minot.  The people there were great.  I worked ECM on the flightline so I was all over the B-52.  Nose to the rear and most areas in-between.

It was cold but you got used to it.  The winters had short days but the summer the sun didn't set until late. I was out fishing with a buddy, I think it was 10 pm and there was still light.

Flight line operations were supposed to stop when the temp hit -70.  The thermomter always stopped and held at -69 for some reason.  It didn't make a difference anyway, if a plane on the alert pad went down you were out there regardless of weather.

If you wanted a shit base go to Carswell.  That place was a hell hole, the people and the base. The first time I had the commander who wore a uniform right out of the duffle bag and shined his shoes with a candy bar.  He was a roady and was riding out his time to retirement.

I've got several old friends from college who went to work for Sandia Labs. There are/were a lot of OSU Engineering grads went to work there

One friend in particular told me once "all I can say is I work all day every day on a safety catch for a trigger device"

He said it when he was talking about his divorce from a girl who was also an engineer.  He said he got up one morning and said fuck it all, blew off work and went back to sleep... and at noon woke up with 2 FBI agents "just checking in to make sure you're ok"

The implied threat of being sent to the 59th ORD BDE would eventually lead to my reclassification as an 18Bravo in the Army of the 80's.

Hopefully really, really boring.

Did my time in it at RAF Upper Heyford in the 80s. Ghost base now, but back in those days, Victor Alert pad would call red balls and we'd have  to respond. Two man concept around combat loaded jets.

Base itself was ok, but the thing of it was that only the flight line was secured. Barracks side was wide open. We were very vulnerable and they knew it. Queen's highway ran right through the center of the base. To this day I have no idea why we weren't attacked. We got really scary bad.

There's not really much of a story there for us. We were ground crew, and we attrited at somewhere around 50%. Most guys in the 111 programs were stuck there for career. A lot of guys during my time were all about counting the days until separation. They reall didn't care about much of anything.

We were on Alert about every other week for three years. Wore lots of chem gear and steel pots and canteens. Plus lugged a tool box around. Spent hours in a mask.

Did a lot of physical fitness stuff. Had dreams of maybe one day going out for PJ. Out of all of us, one guy tried out and made it, but decided against doing it for career. I decided to get out instead.

6 months at Pease in NH and then home to Miami. Never saw anything at Pease except Weirs Beach. Nothing going on there for us.

Cannot confirm nor deny the presence of nuclear weapons.

That sounds absolutely miserable, and beyond stressful ...and for all the wrong reasons.

Actually working with bombers, B61s and SRAMs during the cold war was wasn’t difficult.   Everything was deadly serious, no joking around, everyone was expected to know their job, and everyone was watching everyone else for improper actions that required an  immediate response.  You had to be damn good at your job and learn the politics of SAC, or SAC would crush you in a heartbeat.

An area of conflict I and my security troops experienced was convincing other military members of just how serious we took our jobs.   TAC, MAC, ATC and other service’s weenies found out the hard way about violating the red line on a SAC base.  My guys even proned-out alert pilots and jacked up a few wing kings, which was an absolute career killer for a Security Police Lt.

One event that was a train wreck was running a Strategic Aircraft Reconstitution Team.   In the event of war, I was to lead a huge convoy of vehicles containing men, materials, and nukes to alternate civilian airports to avoid the incoming Russian nuke missiles and allow us to launch a second bomber strike.   I had a few hours to coordinate with 6-8 different civilian police and other state/fed govt agencies and keep a 75+ vehicle convoy moving non-stop through cities, through narrow roads, in all kinds of bad weather, and was expected to let my cops die from radiation exposure to protect the convoy.   We were briefed about sleeper agents in the area, and expected an attack.  I was confident we could get most of the convoy through, but not all.   Plus, the civilian cowboy cops knew what we were transporting and they were going to shoot up anything they thought was a threat.  It had all the ingredients of a major disaster.   I ran two of these as HHQ exercises, with everything but real nukes and herding cats would have been easier.
SAC held people to an often impossibly high standard of performance.   Even if my troops killed every attacker, if some vehicles or personnel had suffered damage, that is the only thing the wing kings would have  focused on. I’m certain I’d have be Courts-Martialled and spent a decade in prison.   There were several times I was congratulated for my handling of an unusual event, and weeks or months later get chewed out for that specific performance because of politics.

My main job was making constant decisions about sometimes bizarre incidents.  I was the OIC, and my career NCOs weren’t about to risk their retirement checks by making the important decisions.  Even though nuke regulations were very specific, sometimes there would be an unusual incident that wasn’t covered, like running a PNAF nuke convoy and the aircraft commander refused to accept the nukes because he had exceeded his duty time.   Or the MMS tech rep that didn’t strap a B61 to the trailer  and the truck spun on ice resulting in a nuke lying in a ditch and everyone walking around bug-eyed expecting to be vaporized any second.  Yeah,  guaran-damn-teed THAT incident was never up-channeled to SAC HQ.   Or the aircraft control tower tried to stop my nuke convoy from crossing a runway, so a transient F-16 could shoot touch-and-goes to meet his monthly flight hours requirement.   I’m sure that controller was hung by his thumbs.  The convoy has priority, even over aircraft with emergencies.   They can go crash and burn elsewhere.

I hated having Central Security Control or the Law Enforcement Desk contact me via radio and ask for a phone call, because it was usually some kind of crazy incident I had to handle.   I perfected my face-palm in mere days.   Each week could have a half dozen incidents, like a brawl at the NCO club (release the dog!), drunk and crazy colonel at the main gate,  flasher in the base housing area, civilian L.E. with a satan-worshipping deserter from the Korean War,  VERY classified documents ditched during a failed smuggling attempt, etc.

Every incident was a chance the wing kings might decide later they didn’t like my response and try to hang me for it.  Career-wise, it was like playing russian roulette with three bullets in the gun, numerous times a week.  And my superiors bluntly told me I was their scapegoat.   They wouldn’t defend me in a wing king witch hunt, and if they screwed up, I was going to be blamed for their actions.  I received NO training on how to handle these incidents.  My NCOs would offer advice, but sometimes their advice was bad.

I was required to know my job, and all the jobs of the 90 troops working for me.  My annual evaluation lasted three days and covered 1500 pages of regulations.  Several hundred written questions, a few hundred oral questions and a practical exercise, with several evaluators.   I recall an oral question that was “ state all of the duress codes and the appropriate response for each patrol involved”   I had to get 50-something parts of the question correct to earn ONE point.  And if you scored less than 90% you were in deeeeep shit.  If you did anything questionable on a practice eval, you were temp disqualified from your job immediately.   Things got really tense when the Sqdn CC appoint a fuck-up MSgt as quality control (stan/eval) chief.  My troops had busted this guy three times previously for botched exercises that had him proned out with a loaded M-16 pointed at his head.   This Msgt once used the state police to try screwing with a nuke convoy I was running.   Pretty damn funny to see the troopers run like hell when a dozen M-16s pointed in their direction, but would have been tragic if anyone had fired a shot.

During my time, the U.S.S. Vincennes shot down an Iranian airliner full of civilians, which brought out all kinds of terrorists and caused most military bases to greatly increase security, without getting any additional personnel to cover the new requirements.  For two years my troops worked 12-14 hour days, often losing their days off.   I averaged around 90 hours per 7-day week for two years, and had my leave requests denied for 2.5 years.   I would sometimes start a shift and not leave until 24-36 hours later.

No one that knew what SAC was really like would have ever volunteered, and once you were SAC-umcised, it was damn near impossible to move to a different major command.

SAC sucked donkey balls.

12E10 back in the day.  SADM's and MADM's

The layman can't tell a nuke just by looking at it.  We knew "those planes" have nukes and "these planes" don't.

Pretty much every cop in the squadron had CDS training once a year. Those of us who would get cards had it twice a year. Assemble at the training PAS, "open" the training code card, open the panel, dial in the code, turn the switch to DI, pull the T handle...see you next time, don't forget the sign in sheet for your training records.

Silent Echo...that's happened.

They tried that once in the 80’s but it failed miserably. It was called the WOPR and we came close to initiating Global Thermonuclear War.

Spent 85-87 in the 59th as part of a special weapons company.  PRP, two man rule, fog guard, alerts, one meter rule, random wiz quiz’s on an old Nazi munitions depot, satellite  schedule where nothing could be moving outside as that was when a satellite was suppose to be overhead and looking for SMLM  (Soviet Military Liaison Mission) vehicles,   Pay guard duty,  etc.  

All in all, there were far better duty stations and far worse.

It was boring as PRP USAFE EOD. At least we got to deploy to escape the paper work shuffling boredom 4-6 months at a time. They stopped deploying 15 month short tour assignments while I was at Incirlik.

Dang. I suspect retention isn't very high among junior enlisted. I can see enlisted getting an intentional NJP to get disqual'd and sent somewhere else.

I spent 3 years on a submarine tender that tended boomers. That duty absolutely sucked balls, but nothing like you're describing. I had to go into the missile trunk on the tender occasionally to do planned maintenance on my gear, and to do break/fix on the copier down there. I absolutely hated having to go in there.

My only missile related story doesn't involve a missile. My shop was a few frames forward of the missile magazine, and on the main deck (1-53-0-Q). When a sub went to sea minus a missile, they had to have ballast added to submerge. There were these things that looked like giant lint rollers that were placed in the sub's missile tube. One day two cranes were operating on the tender, and they collided while one of them was carrying one of those ballasts. It fell, and landed on our missile deck. I was in the shop office when it happened. I think every one of us was expecting to be dust in the wind in the next second. Wide eyes looking at each other followed by nervous laughter.

Nukes are the reason I didnt extend my time overseas and got out of there as soon as possible.

Yes. I didn’t want assignment to another nuke unit after my 15 months of extreme boredom. I went from weapons testing and blowing stuff up a couple times a week to sitting on my hands as a secretary.

We flew Air Missions constantly in the mid 80's all over Germany. Sometimes the containers were empty and sometimes they were live. It was a giant shell game with the Soviets. We'd load them up on CH-47s and sometimes stop and drop and sometimes pick up at multiple nuke sites.

We had a time sheet that was updated daily with what time the their satellites would be flying over. I hope they enjoyed their dick pics and mooning GI shots.

We were cross trained with the Maintenance and Assembly teams and the ordinance teams on how to disable the "items vital to national security" with det cord in case we went down or were ambushed on the ground. Had some interesting times on those trips. Learned more about CH47 ops than I really wanted to such as staying the hell away from the front rotors...they're pretty damned low, and sitting at the very back of the bird for hours is a recipe for migraines between the bouncing motion and the fumes.

Once we had turbulence so bad that we were on the equivalent of a roller coaster for an hour. I was pretty sure we were going down for good. The constant yo-yo-ing eventually took its toll and someone barfed their shitty box lunch in the middle of the bird, ON the warhead containers. Within minutes all 20 of us had purged our innards , coating the inside of that bird with vomit. When we finally made it down, the crew chief was all but kicking people in the ass to get them off the bird. I did NOT relish the job of hosing that mess out. The poor ordinance guys had to deal with our chunks as well. We were persona non grata for a few escorts after that, and they sent other platoons instead.

Four and ahalf years there...the bald head gynecologist unit patch was best patch.

NATO 111 checking in  @HKG3S

@Stretchman

Heyford 88 to 91

So the words "Salty Nation" mean anything to you

"This is the Wing Command Post with A4000 traffic, prepare to copy!"

Also Col Shirley was a dick!

THEE most boring job you've ever had, UNTIL it isn't then it's THEE most terrifyingly stressful experience you dont want.

One of my old Alert Areas.

Sir, that sounds great and all, but my ART team sitting on Hotel 8 just wanna know if you got a good reset on the Outer Zone alarm?