This year's excursion to Tikaboo Peak may not have included the same level of activity over Groom Lake as last year but was memorable in that it was the first (and perhaps last) time that I was able to log a serial using the naked eye from Tikaboo. Most of the time one is fiddling with high-powered telescopes, cameras and the like carried up the 7900ft mountain and seeing aircraft at all due to the 26 miles distance from the base is all one expects.
Below is HH-60G 91-26352 snooping around us during a security patrol; nice to meet you guys! Next time perhaps you could pick us up and take us for a ramp tour....or at least offer us a ride back to the 'parking lot' at the base of the mountain.
If you have any photos of me waving I'd be most interested!
To be honest I was a little surprised to be standing on top of a mountain in one of the remotest parts of the world being looked at very closely by the security people from the base. It didn't seem like a good idea to wave camcorders etc at them so I used my hand. Perhaps this was the time to wave my LAAS 'I am a genuine plane spotter' ID card?! (For those not in the know there is an anti-terrorist initiative that recognises that plane spotters are a good defence against terrorist threats around airports...)
To start with I thought that the TWR were talking to a 'Skitty 34'; it was only when the thud thud thud turned into a black speck on the valley floor later turning into a very large HH-60G that I realised that its callsign was probably Security 34. Having checked us out at close quarters the chopper descended into the valley and from the rotor pitch was hovering for a couple of minutes. I assume that they were doing a recce of our 4x4 parked in the hugely undersubscribed Tikaboo Peak parking lot; they don't appear to have landed as all was intact when we eventually returned.
Here's some garbled audio security34.wav Having headed out directly from the Groom Lake Road Guard Shack direction to Tikaboo, they returned from their licence-plate collecting task to then fly past us at a much more sensible distance i.e. greater than the 500ft minimum from a person, vehicle, vessel or structure as mandated by law and returned via the same route. They appeared to resume a more routine tour of the perimeter as they didn't land until 25 mins later on spot DD at the base.
There was nothing too exciting on the movements front today at Groom Lake though, just the usual Janet 737s, Beech 200s and the one remaining Beech 1900. A change from previous visits was the use of (shorter) runway 30 which terminates at the Hangar 18 area (the HUGE one) and is used as the taxiway from the Janet terminal to the holding point for runway 32 (the long one). It appears that whatever contractor personnel the small Beechs ferry around, they work in the area south of Hangar 18 and they seem to park in the area which is allegedly the stores for Hangars 20-23 (close to the old A-12 hangars which is where Have Blue was too).
Much more fun is the nonsense of changing callsign when contacting Groom approach or tower. Janet 288 becomes 'Buddy' 12 for example. The Tower controller helpfully - in banter with one of the crews - told us that the next month's callsign would be 'Mother'. Anyhow, the R/T discipline isn't great and I'll spare the blushes of those involved in christian name exchanges but here is N654BA forgetting that he is supposed to be Buddy 4. buddy_4arr.wav And thus Buddy 0 we heard presumably is N20RA. I haven't worked out the Janet 737 callsigns yet but in addition to the one above Buddy 93 became Janet 278.
Others heard were 09 and 69. It will be interesting to tie these up with a Janet flight number or aircraft serial. Last year the MiG-29 was 18. And N105TB was 03 (it was also GATOR 03 at Pt Mugu but one assumes this is coincidence). A F-16 was 61.
Below is HH-60G 91-26352 snooping around us during a security patrol; nice to meet you guys! Next time perhaps you could pick us up and take us for a ramp tour....or at least offer us a ride back to the 'parking lot' at the base of the mountain.
If you have any photos of me waving I'd be most interested!
To be honest I was a little surprised to be standing on top of a mountain in one of the remotest parts of the world being looked at very closely by the security people from the base. It didn't seem like a good idea to wave camcorders etc at them so I used my hand. Perhaps this was the time to wave my LAAS 'I am a genuine plane spotter' ID card?! (For those not in the know there is an anti-terrorist initiative that recognises that plane spotters are a good defence against terrorist threats around airports...)
To start with I thought that the TWR were talking to a 'Skitty 34'; it was only when the thud thud thud turned into a black speck on the valley floor later turning into a very large HH-60G that I realised that its callsign was probably Security 34. Having checked us out at close quarters the chopper descended into the valley and from the rotor pitch was hovering for a couple of minutes. I assume that they were doing a recce of our 4x4 parked in the hugely undersubscribed Tikaboo Peak parking lot; they don't appear to have landed as all was intact when we eventually returned.
Here's some garbled audio security34.wav Having headed out directly from the Groom Lake Road Guard Shack direction to Tikaboo, they returned from their licence-plate collecting task to then fly past us at a much more sensible distance i.e. greater than the 500ft minimum from a person, vehicle, vessel or structure as mandated by law and returned via the same route. They appeared to resume a more routine tour of the perimeter as they didn't land until 25 mins later on spot DD at the base.
There was nothing too exciting on the movements front today at Groom Lake though, just the usual Janet 737s, Beech 200s and the one remaining Beech 1900. A change from previous visits was the use of (shorter) runway 30 which terminates at the Hangar 18 area (the HUGE one) and is used as the taxiway from the Janet terminal to the holding point for runway 32 (the long one). It appears that whatever contractor personnel the small Beechs ferry around, they work in the area south of Hangar 18 and they seem to park in the area which is allegedly the stores for Hangars 20-23 (close to the old A-12 hangars which is where Have Blue was too).
Much more fun is the nonsense of changing callsign when contacting Groom approach or tower. Janet 288 becomes 'Buddy' 12 for example. The Tower controller helpfully - in banter with one of the crews - told us that the next month's callsign would be 'Mother'. Anyhow, the R/T discipline isn't great and I'll spare the blushes of those involved in christian name exchanges but here is N654BA forgetting that he is supposed to be Buddy 4. buddy_4arr.wav And thus Buddy 0 we heard presumably is N20RA. I haven't worked out the Janet 737 callsigns yet but in addition to the one above Buddy 93 became Janet 278.
Others heard were 09 and 69. It will be interesting to tie these up with a Janet flight number or aircraft serial. Last year the MiG-29 was 18. And N105TB was 03 (it was also GATOR 03 at Pt Mugu but one assumes this is coincidence). A F-16 was 61.