Warbird Information Exchange

I'm sure at some point in our lives most of you have wished you could go back and do something differently.

I'm no different in this respect. I have alot of these wishes actually, but this a Warbird forum and not a psycho-therapy discussion board. So I'll spare you all.

One that is Warbird related took place back around sometime in 2000. While I was active duty Navy stationed at NAS Norfolk. I was assigned to Ground Electronics Maintenance Division (GEMD). We worked on everything Air Field related from Radar and Communications systems, navigational aids, Microwave repeaters etc. ect. so on and so forth.

One system we worked on was called Weather Vision. Basically a locally generated and updated weather system that was broadcasted to all squadron ready rooms for the aircrews to reference. The broadcast was shot via a microwave transmitter located on the control tower building LP-1 to recievers mounted within line-of-sight on all the hangar buildings. Sometimes these recievers or associated cable runs would muck up and we'd ge a phone call from the squadrons to come and fix it.

Now the thing about NAS Norfolk at the time was that all of these building were pre- or World War 2 structures. Most likely Pre- and extremely old and dirty.

Getting to my point. One day we went out to one of the LP-# Hangar buildings to fix the weather vision (it was fuzzy on the screen). The reciever was mounted on the upper right side of the Hangar, right where all the where hangar doors collected when openned. We had to climb up a ladder on the side of the building and enter above the hangar doors through a small access door. And guees what we found???

And BUTT TON of BIRD SHIT. What did we find beside bird shit? Aircraft ammo cans about a dozen of the. Besides the crap they were nice looking stainless steel containers. Looked alot like the ones used on P-38 Lightnings. I thought that the over the top of the Hangar doors was a funny place to stow ammo can. My theory is that some Cheif or 1st class had an inspection going on and told E-3 so and so to make these obselete ammo cans disappear. And so he did without having to worry about DRMO or paperwork. But that's just my unsupported theory

Now here is my question. The last time I checked the NAVY never used the P-38 Lightnings so what aircraft did the NAVY use that did use similar ammo cases?

I surmise that these cases were used in a aircraft with armourment carried in the nose and that, with exception of the Tigercat, were mostly likely early Naval Jets.

But I haven't been able to find out what if any early naval jet squadron were based at NAS Norfolk in the late 40s 50s eras. I know when I was there and presently today the fighters pretty much hang out at NAS Oceana. But maybe back then whi knows. I wish i had grabbed one or thought to write down the info that was on the placard on them.

Any gueses?

Here you can see pictures of NAS Norfolk from the 1960s. My old control tower is center with the Hangars to the right of it. They are almost identical to the hangar in the fore ground.



ANd here is what Chambers field looks like today. The black square is where my tower used to stand and the light colored squares are where the some of the old hanagrs stood. They are preserving one of them. If memory serves I think the Hanagr I was in is the one that is still standing. Would be wild if they were still there. Oh well




Shay
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Semper Fortis

PB-4Y's used something similiar to the stainless magazines that you are referring to. Was there a -4Y squadron based there by chance?

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If God had wanted man to fly behind a flat motor, Pratt Whitney would've built one.

In the last picture (current view)
what is that white aircraft in the top left hand corner of the picture, the one infront of the S-3 Vikings and beside the HAwkeye?

Todd

Yeah, you say that now, but I recently read about a Navy guy who got 1 year in the brig for taking disposed computer parts... which had been sitting outside in the weather for a week. He figured he could use some of the disposed stuff, and apparently the USN thought differently. Sucks, but I'd say you did the right thing.

My dad and I race sailboats out on Willoughby Bay and I drive past it every day on my way to work and back... that pic of the Marlins is absolute gold, I haven't seen that one before. Great, great find! One of my "long term" modeling projects is to do a collection of NAS Norfolk and Oceana aircraft, with an eye towards a display in the Hampton Roads Naval Museum. I've got some shots of the two-tone VP-44 birds, but this is the first time I've seen the overall dark grey P5M-2s at Chambers Field.

If you've got any other shots of stuff at Chambers Field, I'd be thrilled to see'em!

Cheers,

Lynn