Military Memes
- Thread starter Wildman
- Start date
The PLGR is (was) just a GPS receiver, supposed to be another tool for land navigation. Younger troops thought they didn't need to be real proficient in map reading because they had a PLUGGERRRRRRRR. We still trained with compasses (compii?), protractors and maps but more focus was getting put on digital tracking and guidance instead.
Similar to the old CEOI going over to the ANCD - nice but batteries die, electronics fail, software crashes etc.
I was just venting, now back to the regularly scheduled programming.
I had the same argument with my command & the younger guys. Tried to get them to see the light but NOPE.
one of the good things coming out of SERE school was utilizing the emergency radio to get a friendly get to evacuate too.
still needed a map to find a route to that friendly grid while avoiding the enemy combatants that were trying. to scoop you up.
yes topo maps make perfect sense to me. though i can not navigate via stars.
that’s just PFM
I can find the North star pretty easy based on the Big Dipper or the crab (there is probably a real name for this one, but I don't know it). Beyond that I'm useless.
Still amazes me how they were able to cross oceans using stars.
the Candy Bomber of berlin fame COL Hal Halverston spent his time delivering bombers in the pacific theater flying by stars. imagine if you made a single mistake flying at night to deliver a plane to land on a strip of land 1 mile wide by three miles long. just big enough for a runway and a few buildings.
mess that up by 1* over a course of just a half hour. you’d never see it.
Amazing. and i whine if my GPS / satnav doesn’t work these days.
C.J. Roberts
TJ Addict
Back in 1963, Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper had a problem with his Navigation system, and had to fire his retro rockets MANUALLY after plotting his position by the stars.
Here is an excerpt from a story about it:
At length, on his 22nd orbit, Cooper made his way smoothly through the pre-retrofire checklist, steadying Faith 7 with his hand controller and lining up a horizontal mark on his window with Earth’s horizon; this dipped the capsule’s nose to the desired 34-degree angle. Next, he lined up a vertical mark with pre-determined stars to acquire his correct heading and astronaut John Glenn counted him down to retrofire. Cooper hit the button once—receiving no light signals, due to his electrical system problems—and verified that he could feel the punch of the three small engines igniting behind him. During the descent from orbit, he periodically damped out unwanted motions with his hand controller and manually deployed both his drogue and main parachutes. Faith 7 hit the Pacific, about 80 miles (130 km) southeast of Midway Island, within sight of the recovery ship USS Kearsarge.
My version of rear PLF in a nutshell: heels, ass, head…
Similar threads
