Saturday, February 22, 2014

Boeing

A few years ago an important plant closed.

This history is passed along by Peter Bysura who worked on Boeing 737 then and still does. The presumption is worked on the plane in this Boeing plant but he does not say that. He might be flight attendant. No! I'm kidding. Peter relates in 2010 people gathered at Boeing's Plant II to observe the last of three historic planes moved that were in a state of museum repair in the assembly bays. The buildings are cleared.

It is 3:00 in the morning as people gathered. It had been a long run, they are thinking, it had been seventy-five years and thousands of airplanes.


As the last three airplanes rolled out representing all the planes that rolled out of the historic building, the ritual of rolling a plane out of the hangar, the light reflecting off the wet floors, the giant doors opening, tow bars hooked up, tugs attached, the planes moving onto the ramp, the realization then these are the very last planes to roll out, to ever roll out of there, the history of the place, the weight of the understanding the depth of the history of the place suddenly washed over the assembled reverent crowd all at once and made everyone cry.

An era closed. As if closing a book. Did you notice that?


April, 1944, sixteen flying fortresses rolled out of the plant every single day.


B-52. This is my favorite photograph. One of my favorite planes, on account of Barksdale AFB. Nana couldn't take it but the roar of the engines and incredibly long takeoffs were as soothing nocturnes, comforting familiar lullabies.  


B-29, the last of the last of the last terminal final omega zed fini end of the line done Mohican B-29. (Take heart, you see the new stuff they're doing.)


Boeing B-47, a radical design at the time, six-jet bomber prototype. Peter writes this plane is the direct lineal matriarch of all Boeing jet planes produced since. I did not know that.


The entire plant camouflaged as residential.


1966 First prototype Boeing twin jet 737, Paul writes, the first one from this building, through these doors, onto this ramp.


First Boeing XC-97, also C-97 transport, KC-97 tanker, and B-377 for commercial Stratocruiser.

That was serious and somewhat emotional. But I am not so saddened by unhappy eras ending as I am saddened by unhappy eras starting.

I cannot stay that way for long. My mind tends to wander, and I allow it.

Because I always did wonder and still do wonder why does the Air Force put their lowest ranks on airplanes? It's like saying we're proud of these little dummkopfs. 



Two stripes is airman first class. You would think it would be one stripe. One of those planes is two stripes, I noticed, another plane one stripe, as if the planes have ranks and the ranks are lowest of all. Maybe it is a bomber v transport thing. I do not know.

Do you know what it takes to be a two-stripe airman?

* must comply with A.F. standards (high) and be a role model for subordinates (one stripers)
* expected to show effort in mastering necessary skills in new career field.  (try)
* ... oh, that's it.

To be a wearer of one-stripe chevron with a silver star pay grade E-2

* expected to understand and conform to military standards.

That is the symbol the Air Force puts on airplanes. Or perhaps it is a variant symbol with variant meanings. These chevron rank patches differ from regular straight horizontal parallel bars.

The symbols must remind you of winged solar disc. That is the original idea.

[winged solar disc] tons of those in stone
[winged solar disc tattoo] tons of those too.

The tattoos are all too small. Timid. Uncertain.

They don't get it at all.

They need me.

All of them do. They all need me there in the tattoo parlor with them to help them make the right tattoo-related decisions.  Every single one of them is too small. Too hesitant. The whole point is to go BLAM don't TOUCH this. It is protected. The design is more than a stamp of protection, it is complete enwrapping, enveloping, protection of wings, as a fierce bird of prey, or most birds actually, protect their offspring, their treasure, in the nest by spreading its feathers and concealing the whole lot, so the tattoo must protect the whole body by wrapping it. Completely around the shoulders around the arms, feather tips all the way to the front.

Or the other way around with feather tips reaching to the back including arms. Each feather tediously drawn. A real project. Not a little decal on the body.


Stud, if it must be that small and that stylized then raise it up where it belongs (over the door) at the clavicle. And put columns of meaningful hieroglyphics under it. It is a full frontal project. The hieroglyphics a definitive statement. The winged disc design accompanies and protects declaratives and imperatives. Not a hesitant little patch of uncertainty.

The spread wings protect the whole body. As etched on the outsides and insides of coffins and sarcopha Gusses. 


Come on. This is the idea, not the final product. The final design is 100 x more tedious.

But if you sleep on your back then you will want your protection symbol on front to warn off demons and lower-level spirit pervs, vibratory-wise, messing with your unprotected body while you're out of it and off having your out-of-body experiences, lucid dreams and the like. They do that. Ugly incomplete spirit pervs do. They roam around looking for trouble, taking advantage of unprotected live bodies. They're curious. So just for protection, for your own reassurance, this symbol will glow like a neon light and keep at a distance those scavenging creatures.

Here, lemme draw it on you.



Know what, Hotshot? Come to think of it... 

44 comments:

Trooper York said...

Now this post is not weird at all....err...really...not strange in the least...err...really.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

ChipA writing style differs from yours Troop, that's all.

Trooper York said...

Oh you can say that again.

Hey I like it. It is very different and interesting.

Michael Haz said...

Chip, I really enjoy your stories about the USAF, about living on bases, and so forth.

If I may ask, was your father a pilot?

deborah said...

NOT a tatt person, but I kinda like the third one. Done by a kick-ass tattoo artist it could be really cool.

That show where they fix horribly stupid tattoos by drawing over them is pretty interesting.

Aridog said...

Chip ... thanks for the history lesson and particularly for the explanations of how "airmen" ranks are defined...it was always v-e-r-y confusing (amusing?) to us old Army NCO's. USAF ranks seemed to have endless stripes.... :-)

Chip Ahoy said...

Pilots, dad and brother were but not current. Friends were but not current. (friends like to drink too much and keeping hours is too much problem, but man, that was fun) Two friends are commercial pilots. Other brother and I went through a hang gliding phase, but separately.

Tats. I saw a new guy on the restoration show. He does not fit in. Nice guy but different from the rest. From N.J. The guys hazed him. The camera would not linger on his tats but he has the most amazing tat-faces coming out of his arms. Faces all over. I wish they would show them better but that is not the feature of the show.

I objected to the all the solar disc tats being so small.

What artist wants that? Artists want the whole wall. BLAM-O The whole skin. Not some stupid little bumble bee.

The tat I flat do not get is the lark. Where did that come from? Why that bird? Of all birds why that one?

And I would appreciate it if someone would explain why the air force puts its lowest ranks on its airplanes. Modesty? What?

The Dude said...

I blame Ralph Vaughan Williams for the lark.

MamaM said...

ChipA writing style differs from yours Troop, that's all

If there's going to be a threadwinner for understatement and hitting the nail on the head, with a levity bonus, this comment qualifies, for complying and making me laugh!

By the time I reached the part where the ugly incomplete spirit pervs were entering the picture, my need to fit the entire post into an understandable box had lifted enough to allow me attain levity and follow the vapor trails to their inconclusive ending.

Great post. As always, a journey, similar to zooming, sailing, tumbling, spinning, flapping and soaring through blog space to conscious awareness on the wings of a bird.

MrM was a three striper.

With regard to the plane stripes, have you checked this site on insignia? It looks as if a red bar was added in 1947 which gives the appearance of two stripes.

chickelit said...

That was a beautiful tribute to an era, Chip. Well done!

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

The air force tattoo the planes... Ricardo Gonzalo Pedro Montalbán y Merino

deborah said...

Chip, here's the show I meant, it takes place in Vegas:

Bad Ink

I was watching under protest with my daughter, but it's pretty good for a reality show, because they fix bad tattoos, and the two men have pretty good chemistry. The non-artist sidekick has a great laugh that reminds me of my cousin's.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

In Cordova I have what I need.

XRay said...

That was a good post ChipA. The US has a lot of history that is going by the wayside as time moves on, a natural thing.

The item that caught my eye, 16 B-17's a day from that plant. That's roughly one aircraft every one and a half hours. Simply amazing.

The US's ramp up for wwii is also amazing, a great read on same if one is interested is; "Freedoms Forge" by Arthur Herman.

The industrial giants of the age, and giants they were. Great book.

Germany and Japan (except for Yamamoto) were idiots for thinking they had a chance.

The Dude said...

And now GE props up the commie in chief. The Marines are at war and Americans are at the mall.

What a fucking joke this country has become.

XRay said...

Forgot to add. Right now the exact history escapes me, but I'm fairly certain that there is no relation whatsoever between the insignia on the aircraft and stripes, or chevrons, on a sleeve. Separate and distinct are they.

XRay said...

GE makes money, Marines die in vain, America, with one exception, has never been really pushed. Nothing new there.

Though the world would be much different should we be ever so inclined to flex our way.

Take note, China.

The Dude said...

America, as we once knew it, no longer exists. It is now a collection of aggrieved leftist whiners who side with dictators and wish nothing more than to emulate some 8th world shithole or oppress those who disagree with them.

We have no will to fight and will slowly fade away - we had a nice republic, but we couldn't keep it.

C'est la vie.

chickelit said...

That's pretty pessimistic, Sixty.

I'll bet you could bowl us over with talent. We're just just turning it out like we used to.

XRay said...

I don't buy that, just yet, though it may come to pass.

The Dude said...

Yeah, that was dour, I had been reading a Maine blog and watching "The Red Shoes" - not a good combination if you want to be optimistic, which I usually am.

But damn, the institutions, the government, and most of all, the young pukes I encounter here are all communists. Turns out Joseph McCarthy was an optimist too.

Good news is I probably won't live long enough to see it really turn to shit.

Wait, who am I kidding - with NSA spying, TSA and FEMA making sure we stay put, the IRS digging through our finances, the judicial system running show trials - maybe I better stick with my previous comment. It's all ready turned to shit but we never saw it happen.

In any case, it is a sunny morning, I'll walk my dogs and work, maybe I will be left alone.

deborah said...

"Wait, who am I kidding - with NSA spying, TSA and FEMA making sure we stay put, the IRS digging through our finances, the judicial system running show trials..."

Well, when you put it that way. And bread and circuses with television, movies, computer chat boards, and sporting events in the place of gladiators. And shopping as a national pastime. And weddings turned into grand pageants.

virgil xenophon said...

I have to agree with sixty here. Even the upper command structure of the armed services--the flag officers--are now shot thru with all that multi-culti, "diversity" PC shite. It's sickening enough to make even the proverbial Mad Magazine Jackal wretch..

The Dude said...

The other night at drumming a guy stopped by. Drove up from Fayetteville, he did, just to drum.

I could tell by his haircut he was active duty. Talked to him after drumming and found out he had just moved here from Colorado Springs.

I asked him what he does in the Army. He said he was in community outreach. That he wants to help build relationships with other nations.

That's nice, but shouldn't that wait until we have utterly destroyed their ability to wage war on us? Am I so out of touch that I think it's backwards for the Army to sing Kumbayah with the enemy rather than killing the rat bastards that want to kill us?

That was a rhetorical question.

XRay said...

I guess there's been a half-dozen or so times in my twenty (shit-has it really been that long) years on the internet that the conversation has come up as to what would it take to turn this country around. Or, if it is even possible anymore to turn the country around.

Most thoughts have leaned toward some version of apocalyptic distress as the only means to wake us from our slumber. I'm not so sure, today, that even that would suffice.

Paddy O said...

"It is now a collection of aggrieved leftist whiners who side with dictators and wish nothing more than to emulate some 8th world shithole or oppress those who disagree with them."

Well, honestly, it's always been like this. We didn't exactly take up the fight against Napoleon, did we?

But, the great thing about America is that it has never been, nor is it now, just this. There are people with bigger hopes and dreams who help keep us teetering over the edge, who remind us that we're better than that part you mention, even though that's always a temptation.

Trooper York said...

I just think it is amazing the way Chip veers from direction to another and you never know where he is going to end up.

He starts out at "Baa Baa Black Sheep" and ends up in Calvin Klein commercial.

Very entertaining I must say.

chickelit said...

Very entertaining I must say.

As was your fiction contribution earlier this week. I hope it continues one day. We need to leverage levity.

Trooper York said...

I don't know if I will continue the Julia stories. There seemed to be a lack of interest.

chickelit said...

I don't know if I will continue the Julia stories. There seemed to be a lack of interest.

Well, I for one enjoyed them -- that's why I front paged them here.

Lem has an enormous tent -- big enough for Chip Ahoy and Trooper York.

Trooper York said...

I don't want Lem to make a big tent when he is thinking about Trooper York. That's kinda gay.

Only when he is thinking about Ted William's disembodied head.

Just sayn'

Michael Haz said...

Lem's tent has gotten smaller since he began exercising.

I'm not going to continue my novella, either. Too much work, too little time.

chickelit said...

Lem's tent has gotten smaller since he began exercising.

My hope was that it would get bigger after he began exorcising.

Your science friction story was good too, Haz.

Hey, how do you think I feel when I blog about my first love and get little to no response?

The Dude said...

Well, I suppose we could egg you on.

WTF, Troop, that was a good story you started there. And now Haz is going to leave us hanging - we'll never know if dude ate the roach or vice versa.

I can solve both story problems at once - dude sees Julia in the distance, cuts his Enditol in half just in case, once she gets close enough for him to espy her properly and he sees just how skanky she is, administers half to her, then eats the other half. The roach then feasts on their remains, croaks.

Fin. Or Fen. You make the call.

Michael Haz said...

I think blogging is a short-form media. Long and serialized stories just don't fit on blogs, especially for the readers who join part-way through and don't get all the inside baseball comments.

The Dude said...

Post it and they will read it. Those who get it will get it. Those who won't, well, we can't stop liberals from reading it, can we?

Trooper York said...

I generally agree Sixty. That is why I have long strings of stories on my blog. But sometimes it doesn't interest you that much. Not enough to continue it when you have other things that interest you more. Just sayn''

MamaM said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
MamaM said...

Long and serialized stories just don't fit on blogs, especially for the readers who join part-way through and don't get all the inside baseball comments.

Ongoing stories can work as long as there's a portal for entry into them. Which doesn't need to be Amazonian in size, merely an opening which allows others to find the rest of the story or make semi-sense of the content. Particularly so when Blog Contributors are leading the way. Guest Posts might be a different story althogether.

Unknown said...

Who is the guy in the photo?

Aridog said...

virgil xenophon said...

I have to agree with sixty here. Even the upper command structure of the armed services--the flag officers--are now shot thru with all that multi-culti, "diversity" PC shite...

I hate to say it, but on a public level, this recent re-education of the military started with Bush43 & Bill Gates (SecDef) when they refused to renominate USMC General Peter Pace for a 2nd term as CJCS as is customarily done. Reason, it was not PC and would cause a fight in the Senate. Oh, my...chicken shit MF'rs then, and now.

It continues unabated under Obamamessiah as it naturally must progress. Today we have a Chief of the JCS whose major prior command was a training & doctrine command for 5 years (TRADOC)...which explains the rise of McChrystal (thous shalt not eat Burger King) and Petraeus (thou shall fuck you biographer but claim it was later) both with accolades for "teh surge" in Iraq, which rendered Iraq no different today than any other tribal religious civil war shit hole.

None of these great leaders learned a damn thing from Bernard Fall or Jules Roy..if they ever even read them.

BTW...among flag rank military officers (there are even more civilian SES flag rank officers...look it up) we now have more Admirals than ships, of the line or any other kind.

The entire Civil War of the USA was fought with but one, ONE!, three star Lieutenant General...named Grant. Major General Sherman refused award of a 3rd star in specific deference to Grant. Once upon a time there was honor among men of arms.

WTF happened?

The Dude said...

Yeah, sure, on _your_ side...

Aridog said...

60 Grit ... yeah, but we won IIRC. :)

The Dude said...

Round 1, maybe...