Stealth Bomber over the house

[bubba]

I was over at my in-laws looking at my MIL's car and I heard this jet flying overhead, but it didn't sound quite right.. It lasted a few seconds, and I decided to have a look outside.. We are on the outskirts to Newark airport, so I hear jets once in awhile.. It was a Stealth bomber all by itself, just kinda floating through the sky at a fairly low altitude.. it looked like a UFO.. It was such an awesome sight to see... I wish I could have reacted quickly to get a picture...

I would still like to know what he was doing in my neighborhood.. We don't have an airport for that within 250 miles at least, especially down that low..

[scalebowler]

That is really cool! There is an airforce base near me and they have a flight path that goes pretty close to my house and we see all kinds of different planes flying by. Even saw the space shuttle atlantis on the back of a 747 flying by. That was really strange to see. Were there any airshows going on near you? The stealth comes around here sometimes to do a fly by at the airshow.

[collecture]

I would still like to know what he was doing in my neighborhood...

I think Uncle Sam is keeping tabs on your MIL!   

I live about a mile from a regional airport and we occasionally F-14's or F-15's flying over the house, which is always cool.

[Creighton]

Stealth planes are fine. Practice run most likely.
When the black helicopters show up overhead time to worry :-)
Creighton

[bubba]

The closest military base is about 150 miles away, but I don't think he would land there... We rarely get military planes overhead unless its an old warbird.. there are a few of those local to me.. I've had the space shuttle land in my backyard, but that was the hot air balloon version.. I'd love to see it piggbacked in the air..

[stuntpilot]

Bubba,
     The stealth was most likely doing a flyover for a football game or an airshow. With 9-11 last weekend they were probably at alot of games.

     We had one last year flyover at a Nebraska football game, it flew directly over my house at about a 60 degree bank, Impressive to say the least.

     All of the stealth bombers are located at Whiteman AFB in southern Missouri, they launch all there missions from that location.

[mznb1u]

My son is an aviation nut so we check out aircraft both old and new every chance we get.  There is a large air show in Ypsilanti, MI at Willow Run Airport, home of the Yankee Air Museum http://yankeeairmuseum.org/  A few years ago they had a Stealth Bomber at the show and it flew over our house a number of times.  Very cool plane.  My boys took several pictures and a video even though it was at a very high altitude.

The Willow Run Airport is near the GM Willow Run plant.  This plant and airfield were constructed during WWII by Ford Motor Company for the mass production of the B-24 Liberator.  They produced up to 650 planes per month at the peak and they had barracks area where pilots and crew waited for the planes to roll off the line.  My friend's father worked at the plant and his job was to train the gunners on how to operate the turret gun.

The Yankee Air Museum has a fully restored B-17G Flying Fortress "The Yankee Lady" in their collection.  It flies over my house regularly and it is amazing to see that plane go over with the highly polished aluminum exterior.  When it is anywhere in the area, the roar of the 4 WWII era engines is unmistakeable.  I always step outside to see it fly by.  You can actually pay for a ride on the plane.  Something that I have to do someday.  From what I understand, this plane appeared in the movie, "Tora! Tora! Tora!"

During practice for this year's air show, I was in my office when I heard it approaching but it sounded much louder.  When I stepped outside, there were four B-17's flying in formation and they were accompanied by a couple of WWII vintage fighter planes.  They circled the area at least a half a dozen times at between 1000 and 2000 feet.  Very cool to see.  Grabbed the camera but could not get any real good pictures.

At the rededication of the University of Michigan Football Stadium, they had "The Yankee Lady" fly over during the ribbon cutting ceremony.  I swear that guy was less than 100 feet above the top of the stadium.  It was awesome.  That was followed up by a fly-over during the National Anthem of a couple A-10 Wart Hogs!

If you like vintage aircraft, I highly recommend the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, OH and the Naval Aviation Museum at the NAval Air Station in Pensacola, FL.  The aircraft that they have at these two museums are incredible.  As a bonus, the Blue Angels winter at Pensacola so if you are there in the winter you will likely get to see them practicing.

  Tim

[loman4ec]

Yep I am 20 minutes from the Wright Patterson AFB museum. I had an aviation History minor in school so if you ever want a guided tour let me know. I am a regular there.

[bubba]

The Monday night football game was in Jersey and I'm probably a 15 min fly from there.. The game was already in progress when it was heading in that direction though... I know they had some fighters at Newark airport for the Sept 11th ceremonies in NYC, but that was 2 days prior. I wish he'd come back as it was a cool sight.

I'm not a warbird buff by any means, but I do appreciate the old planes.. We have 2 at a local airport in town that routinely roar across my yard and I love the sound. I've been to 1 warbird museum outside of a major airport, but can't remember where. It was a pretty cool museum somewhere in the midwest. If I get out that way Josh, I'll take you up on that. I had an older gentlemen, I think he was a vet, walk me through the museum and it was great to hear the stories of how some of the planes got there and what they were used for.

[SIGNGUY]

The only time we get to see planes flying overhead is when I go to a Packer Game, our seats are up near the top of the stadium (which is only 60 rows or so) but when they do flyovers timed with the end of the national anthem..I get chills every time,, they have flown F16's , Blackhawk Helicopters and more... coolest was during a tribute to a former packer player who passed away, 4 jets came over, and one broke off in the Missing Man formation.. VERY COOL!!!

[Cokemachinesandmore]

we are lucky enough to have the air and water show here, we get to see the planes flying over the whole city.

[sodaworks]

I live about 30 miles from Edwards air force base so we get to see some pretty cool aircraft quite often flying over head. It's not uncommon here to see B2 stealth bomber's. They are pretty cool looking aircraft and neat to see unles you live in Iraq. When they fly the new Raptor's they always have a couple of F16's and a B2 for "support" if you know what I mean. The B2's were made at skunkworks about 45 miles from us in Palmdale, Ca.  Years ago one of the three prototypes crashed late at night behind our rock quarry and was actually in flames as it flew over our plant. One of my coworkers witnessed it and called the Sherriff's office to report it. Bad idea, the men in black showed up within minutes and interigated him for 16 hours. In the end they told him that he didn't "see anything" and that he was the only person that reported seeing "nothing". The next morning the highway was closed down and locked down by guy's with big gun's. No one was allowed in or out with orders to shoot to kill! The news was there and inquired about what was going on and it was reported it was just a special training ops. When a couple of 18 wheelers were spotted coming out with something trapped down they were asked what was under the traps? Their reply was there was nothing under the traps! To this day my buddy says that AF1 crashes in his backyard he isn't calling anyone!

[loman4ec]

Terry that would suck to be your friend. That sounds like something our government would do.

At wright Pat in Dayton Ohio where the Museum is located is still an active air force base. It is also the home to the largest fleet of B1B's in the USA. They are also cool to see. At the museum they have the only B2 on permeant display. In the newer aircraft hangar they also have a B1B, B52, SR71, F22 and they also have the apollo 13 capsule on display. But I think the coolest plane they have is the Bockscar B-29 that dropped the "Fatman" atomic bomb on Nagasaki on Aug 9th 1945. They also have one of the original wright fliers and all of the air force 1's that have been used prior the current 747's.

The Wright Patterson museum is the largest Air Force museum in the USA. They have an amazing collection of aircraft and it takes several hours to go through. One of the best things is its free admission. My offer stands that anyone that wants to come to the museum let me know and I will be happy to meet you there. I don't know everything but it is a great museum and one of my favorite places to spend a day. I know it is not soda machine related but it would make a cool SMC midwest meeting place! I attached a few pictures. They were taken with my phone and may be too small to see well.

[BronzeGiant]

The only problem I have with the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson is the fact that once they get ahold of an airplane, it never flies again. I know they are in the business of preservation but just like cars were built to be driven, airplanes were built to fly and should be able to do so even if owned by a museum.

Another off topic side note EVERY B-17 that went to war went with 4 Wright Cyclone radial engines built under contract by the Studebaker Corporation of South Bend, Indiana.

Steve

[Cokemachinesandmore]

one of the best signs I ever saw on a military installation was at NAS Whidbey Island in Oak Harbor Washington. I was in the Marines and went there for school. The people in the area were always bitching about the noise from the jets.  The Commander had a huge sign posted  near the front of  the base, and I mean huge  billboard big.  It said, PLEASE PARDON OUR NOISE IT'S THE SOUND OF FREEDOM !

[tkaz]

Out here in DC, we have the new Air and Space museum, the Udvar-Hazy center, which is a lot like Wright-Patterson.  They have a ton of planes there, the SR71, the Enola Gay (the other atomic bomb dropper), a space shuttle, an F35, and a ton of others.  Its about a 20m drive for me, and well worth bringing people out there when they come to visit.  If you ever have a layover at Dulles airport, take a cab out there for a couple hours.

There is also an IMAX theater that they put in there, which is where I go to watch all movies now.  Cant' go wrong watching movies on a screen that size.

[johnieG]

They had a fly-by over the local airport open house here in Oakland county Michigan last month & me & my son thought it was awesome!  It was a great show including four WW2 naval fighter/bombers & even a WW1 Biplane, a B29 & an F16... Two years ago they even had rides on a 1930's Ford tri-wing! 

[johnieG]

One of the fighters mentioned above

[johnieG]

and a bomber

[BrianB]

COKEMACHINES,

When I was stationed out in San Diego, the Marine Corps transferred a helo squadron from another base to MCAS Miramar. Some of the people in the surrounding community started to whine and moan about the noise.

Funny thing, 95% of these people had recently moved to the area and had the audacity to complain about the noise that is a by product of an Marine Corps AIR STATION!!!

The local news channel interviewed a bunch of residents of the area and the resounding statement was the same as the banner you mentioned, "That's the sound of freedom!" I love it!!!

As a side note, I grew up right next to NAS Moffet Field in Sunnyvale, CA. We lived about 4 miles from base and right in the normal landing pattern for the multiple P-3C III squadrons that were based there. The sound that those turbo props make is so distinct. Every year since I can remember we would go to Moffet to watch the annual air show. The Blue Angels were always a hit as well as the old warbirds. Seeing as how it was a P-3 base, everybody LOVED to see the show that they put on during their flight demonstration. When they would simulate dropping a weapon on a soviet sub, they would light-off some pyrotechnics on the north side of the main runway and would always end up lighting the scrub brush on fire which meant that the Federal Fire Dept. would have to roar out onto the tarmac and runway to fight the accidentally set blaze. The stands would go crazy!!! They loved to see the trucks put out the fire. They got as many cheers as a street sweeper picking up horse dookie after a Fourth of July Parade!!

Right next door to Moffet Field is the NASA Ames Reasearch Center. They do all sorts of cool funky stuif there. They have the largest wind tunnel facility in the world, they have a variety of really neat experimental aircraft and at one point back in the 80's they were the control center for the Voyager series space probes.

During the Cold War, the P-3 Anti-Submarine Warfare aircraft was the most hated thing that ever took to the skies, according to Soviet submarine commanders! The P-3 has a 12 hour on-station or "loiter" capability which means it can circle and stay in the area for half of a day without refueling. If they needed to, they could shut down 1 to 2 engines to increase that loiter time.

As a shipboard Sonar Technician, I had a love/hate relationship with the P-3. I was a sensor operator on a peice of equipment that received data from sonobuoys that were launched by either a helicopter or fixed wing aircraft. When operating the system, I was directly in charge of communicating with the aircraft controller on my ship, the sensor operators onboard the aircraft and my direct supervisor in Sonar Control. At the same time all that was going on I was busy "tuning" sonobuoys and analyzing the data on my screen to see if there was anything of interest in or under the water. Normally we worked with an SH-60B Helo that was capable of carrying 25 sonobuoys, not to difficult to keep up with. They'd "spit" a line of buoys and I would tune them and analyze the data to see if there was a possible submarine threat creeping around.

Every once in a great while we would get notification that we would be working with a P-3. They carry HUNDREDS of sonobuoys and they aren't afraid to use them!!! Instead of spitting 10 here or 7 here they would VOMIT 40 or 50 in one drop!!! My screen would light up and go crazy!! Fun, fun, fun!