I caught this video over at Kenny’s.
That is the inside of Lockheed AC-130 gunship.
Wikipedia will give you a big spiel about the history of the AC-130. It maybe technically correct, but that’s not how it happened.
I work as an engineer in the defense industry. I know engineers in the defense industry. We are not like other engineers. We are… different.
The setting: a large conference room in Calabasas, California.
Doug: “We need to come up with another good idea to sell to the military. Anybody have any good ideas.”
Bob: “Lets put a cannon in a plane.”
Doug: “We already have a good heavy lift aircraft capable of hauling several artillery pieces.”
Bob: “No, I was thinking that we’d put a cannon in a plane so we can shoot at people on the ground. High altitude bombing is great and all, but you can’t really see what your’re hitting from 40,000 feet. You might as well be flying a passenger plane. Now a plane with a cannon in it…”
Doug: “You’re serious?”
Bob: “Yes Doug. I want to fire a cannon out of an airplane.”
Doug: “Bob, we made the F-104 and the SR-71, we run god damn Skunk Works. We are the world’s leader in high performance, supersonic aircraft, and you want to fire a cannon out of a plane? No. Next.”
Steve: “I’m with Bob. I want to shoot a cannon out of a fucking airplane.”
Doug: “We made a plane that can go more than Mach 3. Steve, you were on project OXCART. We’re not dicking around with a cannon.”
Mike: “Shut the fuck up Doug. That cannon thing sounds fucking AWESOME!”
Doug: “That sounds fucking stupid.”
Mark: “Stop being such a ‘Doug’ Doug. Haven’t you ever looked out of the window of a plane to see the people below and though to yourself ‘fuck that guy right there… with a cannon.”
Roger: “Yeah, at 2,500 feet, people look like ants.”
Mark: “They ARE ants. Fuck ’em… with a cannon.”
Doug: “Jesus Mark.”
Everybody but Doug: (chanting) “Cannon, cannon, cannon, cannon…”
Bob: “I got a frat brother over at Rock Island, maybe he can lend us a howitzer.”
Everybody but Doug: (still chanting) “Cannon, cannon, cannon, cannon…”
Doug: “Fuck it. I’m going to Boeing. I hear they want to make an upgrade to the 707.”
Mark: “And when they do, we’ll stick a cannon in that thing too.”
Doug: “Jesus Mark…”
End Scene.
That’s how it really happened.
I am too young to have actually been at that meeting, and I’m trained as a civil so I would have been down the hall at the “better more bulletproof runways meeting” but I am convinced that what you recount is the way it really happened.
A great chuckle-thanks for sharing
Sorry that’s not how it happened. Some weapons officer and an Ordnance sergeant in Australia 1942:
WO: sarge the front of these B-25s are so big and that bombardier’s position is kind of useless since we can’t carry to many bombs. What do you think we can do?
Sergeant: Draws on his cigar and blows a smoke rings; Well sir I’ve been measuring and I figure we can take the plexiglass out, salvage some scrap wing panels, shape it to fit the nose and then mount 8 50 cals and a 75 pack howitzer. And we have all these incendiary bombs so say we put parachutes on them to slow the descent so that the bombs go off after the plane has cleared the area on a low level pass.
WO: Damn sarge that sounds good. Build one up and we’ll show it to General Kenney by the end of the week.
Later, in Vietnam, you probably had a bored C-47 pilot and crew chief wondering how they could have some fun.
“I know, let’s mount some of those old .30 Brownings on the side, fly in a circle, and shoot VC”
They try it, and it works… but needs some more overkill, so they get a few of the new fangled 7.62 miniguns- and Spooky was born.
Then the areo engineers got involved, and upped the aircraft and the size of the guns.
Martin Caidin (inventor of the six million dollar man) wrote a novel about it,
https://www.amazon.com/Whip-Martin-Caidin/dp/039520707X/ref=la_B001HO4VYO_1_10?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1529187889&sr=1-10&refinements=p_82%3AB001HO4VYO
I always wondered what went on in those closed door meeting…..thats really funny, mainly cause you Sir are right….heh heh heh
Was in a similar meeting regarding terrorist intrusion into Nuke Power plants via HVAC ducts (I was the HVAC guy). As all of our large ducts from the outside had turning vanes after about a 15-20 foot drop, I suggest we replace the turning vanes with stainless steel ones reinforced and sharpened to a razor’s edge, think vegimatic on steroids. Somehow, that didn’t get approved. Remember, that the term “engineer” originated with folks devising “infernal engines” to take down fortifications.
The word “engineer” means “one who operates engines” and the word engine came from “siege engine.” So yes, the origin of the word engineer is someone who destroys fortifications.
It really started in sales.
“I just got back from Da Nang doing a follow up on that new C-130 we’re supporting. Some crew chiefs got together with a some saws and a welder and bolted about ten guns firing out the side of an old-ass C-47.”
“I shit you not!”
“I’m looking at this abomination on the flight line and I’m thinking to myself, why are we letting the Air Force make these things? We should be SELLING these things!”
“Trish, get Bob in engineering on the line for me, will you?”
Do you really think there would have been a Doug in that meeting, trying to shut down such a great idea?
There is always a Doug,