Nicknames for planes

fencersmother

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Nicknames for planes...

I was recently told by my son, now in training to fly the C5M Galaxy, that his plane is lovingly referred to as FRED: Flippin' Ridiculous Economic Disaster. Some have said it stands for Fred Flintstone and that's why the C17 is called "Barney." Some have insinuated that FRED stands for freakin' ridiculous Engineering design.

B52: BUFF: Big Ugly Fat Fellow (it's a family show, here, folks.:cool:)

B51: HAWK: Holiday and Weekend Killer

B1: B-one: BONE

Got any others? I'm sure the Navy has some cutesy names for its planes.
 
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E-2 Hawkeye: Hummer
S-3 Viking (out of commission): Hoover
F-18 E/F Super Hornet: Rhino
 
If I recall the old F-111 was the "Ramp Vac" and/or "Switchblade Edsel"

C-5s are the spawn of the devil.

On the R/W side...

CH-46: often called a "Phrog" or some variant thereof, though it is technically a Sea Knight

CH-47: Chinook became "sh**-hook" and thus they're often called Hooks and the pilots are referred to as Hookers

UH-60: older folks will call them "Lawn Darts" because early models suffered stabilator fails which caused them to nose into the ground like...well, you get the picture.

UH-1: a lot of folks don't know that it was actually the Iroquois. The first designation was HU-1, and hence "Huey."

Trivia: the AH-1 Cobra is the only Army helicopter not to bear an Indian tribe name.
 
More...

On the subject of the Huey, the first helicopter gunships were the UH-1C models, which became known as Huey Hogs.

The OH-6: Techinically designated the Cayuse, it filled the role of the Light Observation Helicopter. Hence, it became known as the Loach (from L-O-H).

AH-1: An obvious one, but even now it's known as the Snake and its pilots are "Snake Drivers."

P-47: For some reason, the name Thunderbolt doesn't sit well with people. As mentioned, the A-10 Thunderbolt II is known to most everyone as the Warthog. The original Thunderbolt, the P-47, was known as the Jug.

F-105: You USAFA football fan parents should know that the venerable Thunderchief is better known as the Thud.

F-4: A more obscure one, but I grew up down the street from an old aerospace engineer who worked on the F-4 in its development. He often referred to it as the Lead Sled, because it was quite heavy for its size and apparently didn't glide all that well.
 
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Ahh, Scout...

When speaking of the venerable F-4...many names...in the AF we heard it called "rhino" long before the '18 came online. But the most common among F-15 drivers was "double ugly."

Let's see...

KC-135 Stratobladder...er...Stratotanker
KC-10 Officially "Extender" but known universally as "Gucci"
C-5 "Fred" for XXXXXX Ridiculous Economic Disaster (but a great jet in truth)
C-17 "Slow"
U-2 "Dragonlady"
F-16 "Lawn Dart"
F-111 "Vark" (as in Aardvark)
EF-111 "Spark Vark"
RC-135S "The Ball"
T-37 "Converter: converts fuel to noise", "Tweet", "2000lb dog whistle"
T-38 "PURE FUN!"
SR-71 "The Sled"
C-21 "Corporate Lead-in"

Just some I remember...

Steve
USAFA ALO
USAFA '83
 
C-5 "Fred" for XXXXXX Ridiculous Economic Disaster (but a great jet in truth)

Unless you're trying to get somewhere in a timely fashion, and then that 60% OR rate they had was a real pain in the you-know-what. At least they usually had the decency to break in Rota.
 
We were doing some fun stuff in Europe (OK, riding around) and the Army flew us in to Grafenwoehr. We had been "touring" EUCOM in a C-17, but had to fly in with two Army C-130s.

"Folks, we're going to show you what it's like to do a combat landing."

The night before in Rota had been a little "bumpy" for a few people there, one or two of which revisited their breakfast.

Well, the landing was hard. I remember thinking, "Well, that was slightly more violent than I expected."

The pilot hadn't intended on such a hard landing either, left cherry juice on the runway. Down to one C-130, the process of flying to Stuttgart was a little longer.
 
We were doing some fun stuff in Europe (OK, riding around) and the Army flew us in to Grafenwoehr. We had been "touring" EUCOM in a C-17, but had to fly in with two Army C-130s.

"Folks, we're going to show you what it's like to do a combat landing."

The night before in Rota had been a little "bumpy" for a few people there, one or two of which revisited their breakfast.

Well, the landing was hard. I remember thinking, "Well, that was slightly more violent than I expected."

The pilot hadn't intended on such a hard landing either, left cherry juice on the runway. Down to one C-130, the process of flying to Stuttgart was a little longer.

No such thing as an Army C-130. The Army is the only service that doesn't operate them.
 
No such thing as an Army C-130. The Army is the only service that doesn't operate them.

Are there not National Guard ones? Well, ok, then Air Force C-130.

I actually wasn't aware the Marine Corps and Navy DID operate C-130s. I assumed the Army did (did they use to?) and I know the Coast Guard has them.
 
Are there not National Guard ones? Well, ok, then Air Force C-130.

I actually wasn't aware the Marine Corps and Navy DID operate C-130s. I assumed the Army did (did they use to?) and I know the Coast Guard has them.

Nope, not even the Guard. The Army lost medium and heavy fixed-wing transport long ago. The last "big" Army fixed wing transport platform was in the 60s. The DHC-7, aka the "Four Fans of Freedom" is used still, but only for intel work. The Army did recently acquire a few C-27J Spartans.

As for the Guard, they tend to fly the C-23 primarily, or C-12 Pax transports.

The Navy may not have any active C-130s now. The Marines primarily fly the KC-130 tanker variant. If you look closely at the Blue Angels, their support C-130 "Fat Albert" is marked as a USMC aircraft.
 
Nope, not even the Guard. The Army lost medium and heavy fixed-wing transport long ago. The last "big" Army fixed wing transport platform was in the 60s. The DHC-7, aka the "Four Fans of Freedom" is used still, but only for intel work. The Army did recently acquire a few C-27J Spartans.

As for the Guard, they tend to fly the C-23 primarily, or C-12 Pax transports.

The Navy may not have any active C-130s now. The Marines primarily fly the KC-130 tanker variant. If you look closely at the Blue Angels, their support C-130 "Fat Albert" is marked as a USMC aircraft.

Those were taken back by the Air Force (very political) and then the program was canceled. Brand new aircraft were mothballed at Davis-Monthan before Congress got involved and gave them to the Coast Guard.
 
This thread got me thinking about names and planes from my favorite era in aviation, the 1950’s. There was a willingness to try just about anything.

The Convair B-36… a huge intercontinental bomber powered by 6 radial pushers and 4 jet engines. The B-36 was never given an official name. The winner of a contest for Convair employees was “Peacemaker”, but religious groups objected. “Peacemaker” stuck anyway. It never flew a combat mission… but flew 21 missions with a critical nuclear reactor on board, as part of a nuclear powered flight program.

Here are some others from that era that probably didn’t fly enough for pilot nicknames, other than maybe “Widow Maker”.

The McDonnell XP-85 “Goblin”… a tiny, parasite jet fighter escort for the B-36.
(For some outside-the-box thinking on jet fighter parasites, google B-36 project tom-tom.)

The Convair XFY-1 “Pogo”… a VTOL with an Allison turbine and counter-rotating props. The VTO worked but not the L. It reminds me of the Walt Kelly cartoon quote, “We have met the enemy and he is us”.

Convair F2Y-1 “Sea Dart”… Take the Convair F-102 jet interceptor (the one that Bush II flew), and put it on a water ski.
 
Grumman WF-2 - "Willy Fudd" or "Elmer's Cousin"

These Navy AEWs with the big radar dome's became known as Willy Fudds from their "WF" designation. The ridiculous look tied perfectly to the famous cartoon character Elmer J Fudd. The names stuck so well amongst many sailors that even years later more modern versions of domed aircrafrt were sometimes still referred to this way.
 
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Those were taken back by the Air Force (very political) and then the program was canceled. Brand new aircraft were mothballed at Davis-Monthan before Congress got involved and gave them to the Coast Guard.

Not all of them. Four still belong to the Army.
 
Unless you're trying to get somewhere in a timely fashion, and then that 60% OR rate they had was a real pain in the you-know-what. At least they usually had the decency to break in Rota.

VERY true re: Rota.

Steve
USAFA ALO
USAFA '83
 
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