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A flock of Ospreys over the freeway.


Bob Hudson
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Driving on Interstate 15 through San Diego, you will cross the flight path for Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, and often have low fliying aircraft not too far overhead, including FA-18s and the tilt rotor Ospreys.

 

Bordering the western edge of MCAS Miramar is Interstate 805 and usually the aircraft at the west end are much higher than those landing to the east near I-15. But the other day there were three Osprey in formation, something I hadn't seen before. Earlier that same day I was at my sister's not too far north of the border, and 6 Marine Cobras in straight line formation came flying over. My guess is they were heading back from the desert.

 

Hard to shoot an Osprey from a moving vehicle, so this is the best I got:

 

osprey1.jpg

 

osprey2.jpg

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439th Signal Battalion

Neat. Thanks for posting.

 

A couple of years ago, I was coming home from work and if memory serves me, it was sometime in January. Since I live in the mountains of western North Carolina, it was a cold, dreary day with a mix of light snow and freezing rain. The clouds, which were as thick as cotton, were hanging extrememly low with the barometric pressure hanging even lower.

 

Anyway, as I got out of my truck, I heard a tremendous roar and since there is an active railroad track in the valley below me by less than a mile, I thought nothing of it (as trains go back and forth routinely) until an Osprey comes bursting out of the low-hanging clouds right above my house and right above me standing there in the driveway with my mouth open. My first thougt was, "Wow, I wasn't expecting that." My next thought was, "Holy crap, its going to crash!"

 

I remember my knees getting momentarily weak as the Osprey banked hard to the left and then leveled out, looking like it was clipping the top of the trees in the valley below my house. I was actually expecting to see a fireball erupt at any moment.

 

In actuality, it was just my point of view on top of the hill as he was actually getting out of the thick cloud bank above to begin snaking up the French Broad River valley setting up a flight path towards the Asheville Airport...

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I work near JBLM, and I've seen Ospreys flying around every now and then.

Last year I was at Ellis Island and Liberty Island, and I saw a flight of several V-22s buzzing the statue of liberty. We were under and enclosure at the ferry dock at the time and I couldn't get decent shots. I assume they were there for a photo shoot from the air, but I've never found any photos online of them doing so.

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They do like to play here at MCAS Yuma. We(Air traffic control)hear all the reports from the snowbirds who came down to vacation but I guess they didn't know that their trailer park is in the Approach to our main runways.. They can get a little loud when the are transitioning from vertical to level flight and visa versa. A little window rattling just make the experience more enjoyable!!!

 

Semper Fi

Phil

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Last time I flew in one of those, it was over state lines, ridiculous winds, and we fishtailed the entire hour+ flight. Those things, by all reason, should not be capable of flight, yet somehow they are

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Last time I flew in one of those, it was over state lines, ridiculous winds, and we fishtailed the entire hour+ flight. Those things, by all reason, should not be capable of flight, yet somehow they are

 

I've also heard that from a few Marines over the years. I never flew in one, but helicopters were unkind enough to me as it was, so it doesn't appear I was missing much.

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Living in the area of a Bell helicopter plant, we frequently see V-22s, Cobras, etc. But one of the test flight paths that they use always seem to run right over my house, and they're usually flying by at about five to eight thousand feet tops. Needless to say it can be window shaking loud. In addition there are the C-130s, C-17s, E-3s, and numerous types of fighter jets from the New Mexico bases conducting exercises in my area probably because Amarillo used to have an Air Force base and they choose to keep it part of the flight paths.

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  • 1 month later...

Last time I flew in one of those, it was over state lines, ridiculous winds, and we fishtailed the entire hour+ flight. Those things, by all reason, should not be capable of flight, yet somehow they are

 

Technically, they don't actually fly. They beat the air into submission.

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