'THUD' OUT [4 page Thunderchief F-105 PDF]

'THUD' OUT [4 page PDF attached]
Apr 2020 Lindsay Peacock

"Combat Aircraft Journal looks back at the final days of the US Air Force’s F-105 Thunderchief, and one very special farewell event at Hill AFB. REPORT AND PHOTOS Lindsay Peacock..."

Source: Combat Aircraft Journal April 2020 Volume 21 No 4

Salute!

Awww man, you bring back such great memories and times.

I have my litho picture from the Thud Out ceremony and it's a Thud coming off tgt - Doumer Bridge. Bride and I attended the bash in the Reserve's big hangar. My deputy was a Thud jock and we got some great seats. It also helped that I was working with the 466th for their checkout in the Viper and also I had flown combat with some of them in the SLUF. A small world.

I have my departure gifts from the Rattlers, and only regret was not gettin a Thud ride before they had that great launch. I brought my son to the hill by golf course that morning and we watched all the planes take off, and then come back along the Wasatch front range. What a moment.

Gums sends...

Would have been a great event to take video of for us young ones. Only F-105 left when I became an aviation fan was F-105G out of the reserve in Lincoln, NE. They seemed to spend all their time parked or deployed because it was next to impossible for me to catch them flying even on the last days of a month

Full Bomb Load F-105D Thunderchief photo from USAF 70 YEARS of the World's Most Powerful Air Force by David Baker.

Salute!

Ya gotta remember, Rat, that I was in the smaller of the fighter community tribes during the late 60's and the 70's. I was a mudbeater in the Dragonfly and Sluf. THe Viper was my first experience with cosmic ACM/ACT and such. But the community all came together in the eighties.

When I showed up at The Beach, I only knew some folks from the A-37 and A-1 tribes - special ops types. Oh yeah, I had run into a few Hun drivers I had met at Bien Hoa and a few at England AFB when the Huns left 'nam. It was at the Beach I met and learned from miudbeaters - Thud and Hun folks. My infamous C-flt only had one F-4 troop. I was Dragonfly, others from Huns. I looked around and estimated we had about 30-40% Hun drivers, 30-40% Thud drivers and rest a mix of F-4 and folks like me outta special ops.

When I showed up at Hill in that first unit, it was old home. Many Sluf folks plus old Hun and Thud drivers that had to fly Phantoms for a coupla years. Rest were aggressor folks that had flown Phantoms before their tour in the F-5.

So no mystery when I went down the flightline from the 388th to help the Thud unit check out in the VIper, that I knew many. Hell, I flew combat with a few in the Sluf at Korat. So we all wound up in the Viper, and that community is like the F-4 community from the mid 60's to the late 80's.

Gums remembers...

THE EXPENDABLES [8 page PDF attached]
Jan 2021 JOHN LOWERY

"WHEN BOMBS BEGAN EXPLODING PREMATURELY OVER VIETNAM, KILLING AIRCREWS, THE CAUSE WAS TRACED TO FAULTY FUZES, BUT MORE WOULD DIE BEFORE A SOLUTION WAS FOUND....

...THE PROBLEM OF AIRCREWS BEING KILLED BY PREMATURE BOMB DETONATION BEGAN EARLY IN THE VIETNAM WAR....

...THE BOMB RELEASED NORMALLY, BUT JUST A FEW FEET BELOW THE F-105 IT EXPLODED...."

Source: Aviation History Magazine January 2021