Whoo, that was a heck of a flight.
I'm Matthew Burchette, and this is Behind the Wings. Matthew, what are you doing my helmet?
Give it back to me. Oh, sorry sir. That was the boss. Ah, you're playing around like I do. Hey, John. Hey, Matthew. How are you? It's good to see you.
Thanks for being on our show This is General John Barry. He's actually the CEO now of Wings Over the Rockies. He's also a
former F-4 driver, so we're going to use him as our resident expert for this
episode. John, give me a little bit of information on this plane. Well, you know
the F-4 was operational in 1961 for the first time with the Navy. But the Navy, the
Air Force and the Marine Corps all flew it. And, actually, the F-4 was flown by 11
different countries around the world. Wow! Yeah, so this is a great airplane. It's a
Vietnam-era kind of jet. The fascinating thing about it, you know besides being
Mach 2 airplane, but it could carry almost anything. We had a 20 millimeter
you know gun in the front. Right. That carried about 600 rounds.
That's about 6 seconds of rounds. You got to be pretty accurate. You got to be quick about it, too. Then we had AIM-7
Sparrows, which are radar guided missiles. We had 4, and then 4 AIM-9 heat-seeking Sidewinders. Right. You know exactly. But then you can carry a
whole bunch of different kinds of assortment of bombs: 500-pound bombs,
1,000-pound bombs, 2,000 pound bombs, laser-guided bombs
and also nuclear weapons. Man, this thing was really kind of a dump truck, a do-it-all, kind of a plane, wasn't it? Well, it could. It was a master that. I mean, when it first came
out, it was a air-to-air aircraft, it was an air-to-ground airplane. Reality is
that we were sitting Zulu alert, which means that you were sitting air defense
alert, and if the horn went off, and you're in a dead sleep, you'd be airborne in
less than five minutes, supersonic in probably less than seven minutes,
from a dead sleep. That's nuts. Now, I remember you and I
talking one time about when you guys were carrying B-61 nukes, which we
actually have one here, and you had to wear an eye patch? Yeah, it's kind of strange
to think that you're flying a combat airplane, and you're flying carrying an eye
patch. But the risk was, if a nuclear detonation went off somewhere in front
of you, you'd be blinded. So the first thing you do is you put the eye patch on,
when you got into the target area, and, hopefully, if nothing went wrong, you'd be
alright. But, if it didn't, you pick up the eye patch, and you have one good eye.
That's how crazy it was. That's crazy. John, thank you so much for all your knowledge today, and thank you for the leadership of the museum. We really enjoy
having you here. Well, this is my favorite airplane we've got in here, obviously, with 2,000 hours of flying it, and it's been a great opportunity. So thank you. We'll make sure we
keep it nice and clean for you. You better. By the way, there's a little spot over here. Yes, sir. We'll take care of that. Alright. Okay, so earlier, we had a boarding ladder
attached to the aircraft, which is great if you're at an airfield that has, you
know, infrastructure. But what if you land some place that have kind of a forward
operating base, it really doesn't have anything like that? Check this out. BAM!
Your own boarding ladder stowed right in the aircraft. How cool is that! All you
got to do is just climb on up. But enough of that. Let's go check out some of the weaponry. So one of the things that General Barry talked about was the ordinance that the F-4 can carry. I'm actually at the tail of a 2,000
pound, general-purpose bomb. Now the cool thing about the 2000-pounder was that
you could actually add a different tail and a different nose, and, all of a sudden,
this dumb bomb becomes smart. And the F-4 could carry these guys and then, through
GPS and laser tracking, could actually semi-aim where the bomb would land. How cool is that? Now, that is a smart bomb. But have we got a surprise for you. We have
even got something that's even cooler than this, and you're not going to want
to miss it. We're going to have to go into some of
the bowels of the museum to see it. So follow me. So everybody that knows jet aircraft
know that they are equipped with ejection seats. It's really the only way
you're going to get out of a fast mover. Now, the F-4 is no different. It actually
had two Martin-Baker seats. But check this Martin-Baker seat out. Blamo! How cool is this! Look at this thing. It is beat-up. You
want to know why? Because it was actually used in a real-life ejection in Vietnam.
The pilot Ed Payne is actually from Colorado, and he loaned us this seat, and
it's not on display yet, so you guys are the first ones to get a gander at this
thing. Now, I know there's some history geeks out there, and, if you really want
to do some Googling, check out 66-8774. That's the serial number of the
airplane that Ed was flying when he punched out. Now you want to know another
secret? It was his second punch out of an F-4 in Vietnam. That's nuts!
This guy is amazing, and we are so thankful to him to loan us this seat, and
I'm really glad you guys are getting to take a look at it, because it is really cool. So the General didn't want me wearing
his flight helmet, but he can't keep me from wearing this one. In your face,
General! Don't fire me! Okay, so that was our episode on the F-4 Phantom. Thank you
all for tuning in so much, we really enjoy bringing it to you. If you've got
questions or comments, make sure you post them up, and, if you got any buddies that
you think might like this episode or the the entire series, for that matter, make
sure to share. We've got to get that word out there! So next month, we are doing an
episode on the Titan missile program. Now, that's going to be cool, and we're going
to take a field trip to someplace really cool. Trust me. You're not going to want
to miss that part. Alright, we'll see you next month. Ciao.
A-6 intruder crews did this as well...truly different times
The F4 Phantom is my absolute favorite plane.
I went to RIAT and Italy still Flys F4s for its demo team.
Guy wanted to trade patchs for my extra F35 patch and litterally rips it off his flight suit to give to me.
He thought he got the better deal, but he doesn't know how much I really, really, like F4s
"Do not look at explosion with remaining good eye."
TIL the F4 flew with nuclear payloads!
This is shown in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. Which is a surprisingly accurate movie in most regards.
That's why pirates had eye patches too! When they attacked a ship and went below deck, they had to be able to adjust to the darkness quickly, in case there was someone hiding there. So cool that the technology changed so much but methods like that didn't.
Jenkins why are you wearing a fake beard and going Yar?
Oh I thought it was a costume party or something...