(ArtKramr) wrote:

GPS was something we could only dream of.Think of the thousands of lost planes
and lives and ruined missions that could have been saved if we only had GPS.

Arthur Kramer

A lot of guys had the same wistful thought about INS. Simply enter the
coordinates and follow the bearing pointer to the target. I can't
begin to tell you the long series of stories of guys blindly following
the needle while totally ignoring the landmarks, the TACAN, the radar
presentation and good ol' fashioned ded reckoning until they are
totally lost, busted the TAC check and missed the target.

GPS is simply one of a series of tools that must, repeat MUST, be used
in concert and with common sense.

Even the vaunted E-6B (I taught flight planning and navigation in
pilot training academics) was only as good as the common sense of the
user. I would patiently tell the students repeatedly to first estimate
what they think an appropriate answer might be, then do the "whiz
wheel" calculation. For example, my airspeed is 300 knots and I'm
going 120 miles on the leg, how long should it take me? If you guess
24 minutes before you pick up your E-6B, you've got a good chance of
coming up with the right answer.

I recall an ORI out of Torrejon Spain that sent us to a tanker in the
N. Atlantic on a track we seldom used. The "planning cell" in the
command post prepared our flight data cards and transposed two digits
in a Lat/Long for INS coordinates. I was leading with the wing DO on
my wing. When we coasted out from Spain, the bearing point showed 40
degrees left of where the TACAN radial was and where ded reckoning
said we should head. I went to the tanker track while the DO told me I
was wrong and should follow the INS. I told him he was #2 and to
maintain radio silence. We went to the tanker.

Garbage in--garbage out. It never changes.



Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038