Re: AN-124 Enroute to LAS


Message posted by Mark Dahn on July 27, 2005 at 21:39:21 PST:

lone wolf & all
I was stationed at Travis for eons, and back in zee olt days, when the evil empire was still THE EVIL EMPIRE, (late 80's or so)the base was the entry point for the Soviet INF Treaty inspectors. I can vividly remember how utterly surreal and truly unsettling it was to see their Aeroflot jets, sporting the Evil Empire Flag on their tails, parked on OUR transient ramp! Being a child of The Cold War, I never quite got used to that sight. But, to put this a bit more on topic, one time they brought a Condor in hauling some outsized equipment, which was then transferred to a C-5. They parked them nose to nose on an out of the way ramp, and many of us ramp rats had the opportunity to do an up close & personal comparison of the two. Thing is built like a bloody tractor! We joked that it appeared that the Soviets were only able to steal the prints of the forward 3/4 of the C-5, and then had to rely on pics of maybe a 747 to complete the rear. I also remember hearing someone mention what a bugger the 124 was to up/off load, since the cargo floor wasn't designed to use rollerized pallets. Seems to me there was some sort of overhead bridge crane on rails, and everything had to be loaded piece by piece.
The crews were kept on a VERY short tether, so we never had the chance to meet any of them. Pity.


In Reply to: Re: AN-124 Enroute to LAS posted by lone wolf on July 27, 2005 at 12:55:55 PST:

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