The Days Grimm Podcast
The Days Grimm, "arguably Indiana's most comical, thrilling, and controversial podcast", This three-pronged mandate acts as a primary filter for their guest selection. The "comical" aspect is reflected in its official genre of "COMEDY INTERVIEWS" and its history of hosting local stand-up comedians. The "thrilling" component is evident in interviews with individuals who have extraordinary life stories, such as people who survived shootings, rare medical conditions, and combat. Finally, the "controversial" element is demonstrated by Brian & Thomas’ willingness to engage in difficult or unfiltered conversations, touching on topics like homelessness, artificial intelligence, and religious hypotheticals.
A crucial element of the show's tone is its tagline, "Brought to you by Sadness & ADHD (non-medicated)". This self-aware and raw positioning signals a modern comedic sensibility that embraces vulnerability and finds humor in personal struggle. The podcast's brand is not built on polished narratives but on the authentic, often messy, intersection of hardship and humor. The most compelling guests are those who have navigated a "Grimm" reality and emerged with a story to tell, and ideally, a sense of humor about it. This dynamic is the core of the show's appeal and the primary filter for identifying a story worth telling.
The Days Grimm Podcast
Ep.241 NAVY PILOT to COMMERCIAL 737: Alex Trujillo on Naval Academy, Cuban Roots, & Latin Mass
In this high-flying episode of The Day's Grimm, Brian Michael Day and Thomas Grimm welcome Navy veteran and commercial airline pilot Alex Trujillo (Senior Alex Trujillo)!
Alex, who currently pilots the Boeing 737 (the "scary one" ), takes us on a deep dive through his unique life journey, from growing up on the East Coast to earning his wings in the military.
The conversation covers massive topics, including:
- From Helicopter to Commercial Jet: Alex breaks down his transition from flying helicopters in the Navy to becoming a commercial airline pilot and the intense training (including flying in simulators and recurrent training) required to maintain his expertise.
- The Naval Academy & Military Life: He recounts how a summer seminar led him to apply to the Naval Academy and discusses the benefits of using the military to get flight ratings, hours, and the GI Bill , as well as using the Skillbridge program for a civilian transition.
- Cuban Roots & East Coast Elite: Alex shares his background as a first-generation American born to Cuban parents in Fairfax, Virginia (an "East Coast elite" area outside DC).
- Faith and Football: The guys revisit how they met at a Ruck'n'Rosary event and discuss the profound impact of Alex's small private Catholic school education. They also dive into the simplicity and quiet nature of a Latin Mass.
- Soccer State Champ: Hear about his serious competitive soccer career, playing travel ball and winning state championships three years in a row!
Whether you're interested in the life of a pilot, military service, or the impact of faith and culture, this episode is packed with fascinating stories!
TIMESTAMPS
00:49 - Intro & Welcoming Alex Trujillo
02:43 - Alex Trujillo: Navy Veteran & Commercial Pilot Elevator Pitch
03:11 - Flying the Boeing 737 (The "Scary One")
05:55 - Cuban Descent & First Generation American
06:21 - Growing up in Fairfax, Virginia
08:35 - Catholic School Foundation & Faith Journey
10:27 - Explaining the Quiet Simplicity of Latin Mass
13:34 - High School Soccer (Travel Ball & State Championships)
16:44 - The Path to the Naval Academy
18:15 - Flying Helicopters in the Navy
01:26:15 - Military to Civilian Transition (Skillbridge Program)
01:40:37 - 737 Recurrent Training in the Simulator
01:50:08 - Advice for Aspiring Pilots
[The Days Grimm Podcast Links]
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheDaysGrimm
- Our link tree: linktr.ee/Thedaysgrimm
- GoFundMe account for The Days Grimm: https://gofund.me/02527e7c
[The Days Grimm is brought to you by]
Sadness & ADHD (non-medicated)
Hello, hello, hello, everyone, and welcome to another thrilling episode of the Days Grimm. My name is Brian Michael Day. My name is Thomas Grimm. How are you, dude? Hired. Who's producing the show today? Producing the show is our good buddy Jake Newton. Hell yeah, brother. Hiding out in the corner. And he's gonna he's gonna make magic happen. He's gonna make a beautiful thing happen today. Love you, big daddy. Um, help me welcome Tom and Jake to the studio. Uh armchair drum roll. Uh Senior Alex. Through heel. What's going on, guys?
SPEAKER_05:My name is Tom Stas. Estoy bien, gracias.
SPEAKER_08:Hell yeah, brother. Doing good? Yeah. Beautiful Sunday.
SPEAKER_05:It is a beautiful Sunday. A little colder than yesterday. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A little chilly. Well, I don't hate it. I don't hate it. Yeah, it's about that time of the year, dude. Honestly. Ryan went hunting for the first time yesterday. Yeah, yesterday was the first first day of rifle.
SPEAKER_08:Uh yes. And it was 130 degrees. So all the deer were actually busy having strokes. Uh so I didn't shoot shit. Uh I didn't shoot shit. Um, but I'm really excited about it. Almost wore my camo hoodie, but I knew one of these turds would have made fun of me.
SPEAKER_07:Uh and the cool part is is he went with our good buddy Paul from Mission First, which is Paul Limberg. Paul Limberg.
SPEAKER_08:The Paul Limberg. It's a good call back there, too.
SPEAKER_07:And that's actually how we met you, was at Paul's Rucking Rosary. Very true.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, so I was gonna get into that, but I'm glad you guys brought it up.
SPEAKER_07:Shout out to the Catholics.
SPEAKER_08:Love them. Uh and the Ruck and Rosary is just a hell of a good time. If you want more information, DM myself, DM Tom, DM the show, DM somebody at the freaking. Is there a Facebook group? Yeah, but I think it's a private group. I'm not sure.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I'd say DM me, but I don't want that much. Somebody knows it's just too much publicity.
SPEAKER_08:If you're interested, the ruck'n'rosaries are dope. Uh you don't have to be Catholic, you can be uh Islamic. It doesn't matter, just hop on in. But if you want more information, just DM us and we'll hook you up. Um, but anyways, yeah, that's how we met, man. Yeah. And we just kind of like sat and chewed the fat after the ruck over by Van Avenue.
SPEAKER_07:A slight elevator pitch. And if you'd be so kind to share an elevator pitch to our listeners. For sure. It is Alex Truhillo.
SPEAKER_05:So quick uh Navy veteran. I flew helicopters in the Navy, and right now I am a commercial airline pilot for I'm not gonna say for who. But I fly uh 737, the Boeing 737. You know, the scary one that everyone, the doors fall off, they crash. That's the one. The one also that like crash, the Air Asia crash, whatever. Yeah, that one.
SPEAKER_08:I love that you're just like openly affiliated. He's like, yeah, you know the one that falls apart in the sky? Yeah, that's the one I'm flying. That's that's how badass I am. I only need half a plane to land it. It's fine. I learned how to fly. Uh what if I can only imagine somebody like fucking landing a plane with one wing. It's like, yeah, that's standard protocol for these 737s.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, it's easy, dude. It's just no big deal. One wheel. It's a 7.3 now. It's not a 737 anymore. Oh, yeah, we lost the seven. We lost the we lost the other seven.
SPEAKER_07:It's gone. Why why is it called like a 732? Dude, I don't know. It's a good question.
SPEAKER_05:Oh something I should know. But Boeing, they're all seven something something. Gotcha. Right? So you have, I mean, way back 707s, they had a 7, maybe a 717, 737, 47, 57, 67, 87.
SPEAKER_08:What's the one that looks like a beluga whale? Like in the military, they call it a C17. Like it kind of has like that weird nose front end. Yeah. It's like the biggest one they make. Is it that's not the only one ever, is it? Airbus does have a beluga whale.
SPEAKER_05:That's a fat-looking plant. Yeah, it's a fat. That's a Airbus 380.
SPEAKER_08:Five head, you mean? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07:That's an Airbus 380. Um But there's like a lot of people on those. Like did you never flew 180 people in the military, did you?
SPEAKER_05:Hell no. The most we ever flew in the military was like three other people in the back. So me and a co-pilot, what was that? Uh uh crewman, so two officers, an enlisted guy who did all the our all the hard work. Hell yeah. And then like maybe we had a couple passengers. So sick, dude.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah. We're gonna get more into that. But off while we were talking about the beluga whales, what is the do you know by chance the biggest plane that Boeing makes? Is it the Beluga Wales?
SPEAKER_05:No, it would probably be the the triple seven, so the 777. 777. 747 is like Air Force One, where it has like the little bump up in the front mini beluga. Yeah, a little mini blue, not full um. Like a baby beluga. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Baby, never mind.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, baby beluga. Um, but the triple seven, dude. Yeah, okay.
SPEAKER_05:That's the biggest one we make. Now you could uh make an argument for the Dreamliner, is the 787.
SPEAKER_07:Do you ever like a pilot from back in the day where they actually had like bars and could smoke on board? Sort of.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, I just watched Catch Me If You Can. I'm I mean, maybe that's why I'm a pilot now. But you know, Leah, when he's walking with the ladies, I'm like, yeah. Oh yeah, dude. Now it's like not as cool as that. Not nearly as cool as it's not. Especially if my wife is listening. It's not nearly as cool as that. It's just very boring, very boring.
SPEAKER_08:I actually don't even like this film. This is such a poor portrayal of the stuff.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, this is so inaccurate.
SPEAKER_08:Uh but yeah, dude, let's let's uh let's dig into it. So so Alex, where where are you from? Where do you hail from? I hail. Yeah, from you have cubano uh descent. Yes. Yes.
SPEAKER_05:So both my parents are born in Cuba. I am first generation American, proudly.
SPEAKER_08:I'm very stupid. Does that mean that your parents moved here or you moved here from Cuba?
SPEAKER_05:They moved here. I am born here. You know, so since they were not born here, I was all their offspring, I guess, immediate offspring are first generation. First gen, okay. I am very stupid. I'd like to open up with that. I'm pretty sure that's true. That's what I've always told people. Okay. That I'm first generation. I think it's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sounds right.
SPEAKER_08:I buy it. So so where were you born at?
SPEAKER_05:Uh Fairfax, Virginia. So where the hell is that? Right? East Coast. Uh yeah. So there's something you guys gotta know about me. I'm an East Coast elite. Okay, I don't know what that means. I barely even know what uh uh Indiana is on the map. It's one of those like somewhere over there in the middle. It's a flyover state. Exactly. It's a flyover state. You're not like you're not one of the first 13, and you're not California, Oregon, or Washington, right? I have no idea what the hell you are.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, we'll take uh we'll happily take like 17th place. It's fine. Whatever that winds up being. Um, I get it.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it's uh so Fairfax is right outside DC.
SPEAKER_08:Oh sick, dude.
SPEAKER_05:Probably like half hour to the Capitol. Okay.
SPEAKER_08:Did your did why did they land there? Did dad or mom work for government?
SPEAKER_05:No, dude. Um kind of ran out. My dad grew up in Miami, typical Cuban, right? Yeah. So once once they left uh Cuba, his family went to Miami pretty typical. Oh yeah. My mom's family though, I think they knew some people who already lived up there because my grandfather had come to medical or dental school. Okay. Uh up in Boston. So they kind of knew the states a little bit before, you know, then they went back to Cuba, had kids, and then Castro had to leave. Oh yeah. Uh so they knew people in the area and there was already like a Cuban community up there. So, like, hey, we'll go up there. Okay. And then my dad went to get his master's at like George Washington, I think. Which is also in DC. Oh, that's a school.
SPEAKER_08:Yes, that's a school just ran around. I thought we were talking about dentures again.
SPEAKER_07:I was like, grandpa was a dentist, not a George Washington. And then George Washington, yeah.
SPEAKER_08:I was very confused. You said George Washington, and I was about I was like, Abe Lincoln. I don't know. We're just throwing that presidents, Lyndon Johnson. He sucks that guy assholes. Yeah. Uh uh, no, that's sick. So he went up there at Washington University.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, to get his master's, and then you know, Cubans kind of hanging out together. He met my grandfather from like a it was like a kind of like a rucking rosary, but it was like a men's fraternity for Catholics, cu Cuban Catholics mostly. Okay. So my grandfather met my dad. He's like, Oh, hey, I'm like building a patio in my backyard, come help me out. He's like, Alright, fine. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:And then he met my mom, and then sick, dude. Here I am. Nice, man.
SPEAKER_05:So, and you said uh Cuban Catholic.
SPEAKER_08:I don't know what that means.
SPEAKER_05:Uh basically it was like a Catholic fraternity group, right? Of a bunch of Cubans, and they would meet weekly to kind of pray or have a discussion. Oh, it's not like a designation.
SPEAKER_08:No, no, no, Catholicism. No, no, sorry.
SPEAKER_05:It's not like Roman Catholic where that's a full-on. Were they Roman Catholic or was it grew up Roman Catholic Catholic masses? No, grew up Roman Catholic. Roman Catholic, okay.
SPEAKER_07:Did you go to Catholic school growing up?
SPEAKER_05:I did. Yeah, dude. Very much so. Very much a Catholic school.
SPEAKER_08:Hell yeah, dude. Did you uh like most kids like take it for granted when you were younger, or did you kind of like believe in it and stay devout like all through your youth? Good question. Typically, like I feel like with Catholics, they kind of kids take it for granted. Yeah, they wind up walking away from it and they either come back or continue walking away. Live under a bridge. I don't know what to tell you.
SPEAKER_07:Uh those are the two options. Right. Yeah, that's it. You will not be happy.
SPEAKER_05:Um yeah, I don't know what to tell you. No, so my my grade school was like really private, small Catholic. It's not like a diocesan school, which was in like run by the kind of by the church states. Right. Yeah, the diocese. The diocese, the the church government, I guess, in the in the area. So Evansville has a diocese that has their mayors, the bishop, or if you were the governor or whatever, and then the schools, they have schools. So it wasn't like a public kind of school, or it wasn't um a big, bigger diocesan school was really small. It was like these this couple, they started a school small, small. We had like 20 kids per class. But we had to wear a blazer, a tie, we had masks like every day, we said a rosary every day. So it was really just kind of part of the life. Um and I always look back on that, it built a really good foundation. Uh I guess where I kind of faltered later on in my later teens, early twenties. I I didn't fall away from the faith, but I took it less seriously, maybe. Okay. But I always had that foundation of like, hey, no, this is I know is right because I grew up with it so much, right? This is what I believe. Right. Yeah. Even if I'm not like living it so well right now, I know this is the right thing.
SPEAKER_08:Have you ever we were talking a little bit earlier and then Tom just took off racing with the questions, but gosh damn it. We we were talking a little bit about like the difference between Roman Catholic and Latin Catholic or Latin, like the different masses. I don't know if Latin Catholic is a thing.
SPEAKER_05:It's still Roman Catholic. It is still Roman Catholic. Yeah, it's just two different masses, yeah. Two different liturgies if you want to get to it.
SPEAKER_08:So I was talking to Paul a little bit about like Latin mass, and he was like, dude, it's sick. And I was like, Okay, do tell, dad. Yeah, get on with it. And he like starts explaining it to me. He was like, Yeah, you walk in, nobody's talking. Nobody's talking. I was like, well, when does Padre get up there? And he was like, nope.
SPEAKER_05:I mean, he does, yeah, he does. It's just you don't you don't know it because he just kind of quietly goes up there, like, oh, where'd he come from?
SPEAKER_08:And I was like, dude, that's like low-key, the kind of because I'm a very minimalist. That's why I kind of I hover towards Catholicism because it's very like dry, brash, blah blah blah blah blah. This is actually turning into a religious episode, everybody at home. Buckle up. No, but I thought it was cool. Do you go to many Latin masses? I have. I mean we spoke about it after the Ruck and Rosary. I didn't know if that was like your norm or not.
SPEAKER_05:It's uh I wouldn't say it's my norm. Um I've been a number of times. I do have a strong love for it. Because like you're saying, it's it's simple. Yeah, it's just the way I look at it is uh it's just an opportunity to be quiet and pray, and you know something more powerful is happening up front. Yeah, right? The priest, and I love the premise. Like the priest is taking everyone's prayers and offerings and like hey, desires, and he's just presenting them to God. He doesn't even look at you, he's just straight up praying to God the entire time.
SPEAKER_08:Don't look at me.
SPEAKER_05:Don't look I agree. Like, dude, this isn't a show. You don't need to be like, hey, everybody, I'm Father Blah. I'm like, no, dude. This is between this is between you and God, and you are a priest, and like even in like old religions, the priest, his job was to take the sacrifices of the people, right? Jewish religion. Yeah, take the sacrifice of the people and offer them to God. Yeah, that's the priest, literally, I think, if you looked up the definition. Yeah, because I'm not super smart. No, no, no, you're correct.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, and then back then it was the bishops that actually like ran the actual um service or whatever. Like back when Catholicism started, it was the bishops that ran the service, and even then it was like minimalist.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:They didn't do like they did the baptisms and they ran the service, and then the priest handled like like you were saying, the rest, yeah. Yeah, all the sacraments and etc. etc.
SPEAKER_05:So yeah, anyways, I do I do like the quietness, I like the simplicity of the biggest.
SPEAKER_08:I just wanted to stop there because I don't know how many people know about Latin Mass. I didn't know about it. I didn't well, I knew about it, but I didn't know what the heck it was.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, and like it was. They have one here every Sunday. I think it's only a Sunday Mass. Oh sick, dude. Um nice, yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Hell yeah. Um, but anyway, so so going back, so you're you're a kid in West Virginia, Virginia, in a customer.
SPEAKER_05:Not West Virginia, just for yeah, those are hill people.
SPEAKER_08:Fighting words here. Those are hill people, my bad. Uh but you're in Virginia, you're going to school with like 20 people in a class. What the heck is that like? You you just know everybody.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it I mean the whole school was K through 12, and it was a total of 300 people, probably.
SPEAKER_07:That's how Holy Spirit is here in town.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, that's how most Catholic schools are. I mean, we we have two Catholic high schools, but for the most part, it's tit it's not I feel like it's normally K through graduation.
SPEAKER_05:I figured it would be more like K to eight, and then you go to the high school.
SPEAKER_08:That's how it is here, but we still only have two Catholic high schools, I think. Two or three?
SPEAKER_05:Was it a memorial on rates, rights?
SPEAKER_08:No, memorial in the modern day. Modern day. Yeah, I don't think we have a third one. If we do, I don't know about it. But um, but yeah, I just that's wild to me.
SPEAKER_05:So did you play sports growing up? I did. Yeah, what was that like soccer was my thing? Soccer. Baseball. You say that because I was Cuban? Yeah. Okay. Hey, settled down, bro. Soccer was my next guest. I actually broke my nose playing baseball. Really? Yeah, I sucked at it. That's so bad.
SPEAKER_08:Paul lost an eye. Um I did hear about that. I was like, damn, I'm not playing baseball. Jeez, dude. Uh, how many gold chains do you have? I'm just joking. Um, okay. So uh so you liked soccer a lot. What was your position? You look like a striker, like an offensive kind of started that way. Started a striker.
SPEAKER_05:Um, I was like when I uh played like House League Everyone does, and I got called to an all-star game and then travel ball after that. And I was always you were good. I was pretty good. Yeah, for your I started playing, I think when I was eight, I got into a travel ball team.
SPEAKER_08:Nice, dude.
SPEAKER_05:And I played like right wing, usually right right midfield. And then I as I got older, my on-the-ball skills got worse, but I was getting faster and I don't know, maybe a little more physical, so I played right back. Okay, a little more defense, yeah. A lot more and I loved that because I was faster than their wingers or just as fast. I keep up with them. Play a little bit of center back, sweeper. I love playing sweeper because you didn't have to mark anyone, and I'm sure I'm five eight on a good one. I get it.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, I love playing like the mid D. Like, that's my favorite player.
SPEAKER_05:So if I had a guy in front of me who could win all the headers, and then I would just read. I'm like, all right, the balls, he's gonna kick the ball there, and I would start running there, intercept the pass, and like nailed it, you're right.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, and you just have to kick it in a fucking direction. Right. Yeah, the right way. Yeah, and you're good. Um yeah, I love that stuff. That's why yeah, playing soccer, that was my thing. I only got into soccer like in intramurals when I was in college. Like I wasn't, I was like 25 when I first started.
SPEAKER_07:We did go to a local semi-pro soccer practice.
SPEAKER_08:I don't know if you know who there's a local semi-pro team here. Semi-pro team. I think they're triple A. I don't know. They're the second from the bottom league. Okay. Um kind of like the uh they're kind of like the Thunderbolts. Okay. Yeah, yeah. They're like second from the bottom. So they're not like the lowest tier league where you can just like walk on. But like, I mean, they had like international players that come from reputable schools. We met up all of them. I think we met everybody but like one or two on the team. That's it. Crazy, crazy.
SPEAKER_07:They had Brian and I both in the goal trying to stop shots. He was playing goalie in fucking socks. I can see that. Hey, but I did kick a few balls defensively away from him, and they were like the whole team was like, whoa, yeah, it was cool.
SPEAKER_08:You've always been big on ball play. So the uh so how long do you play soccer for?
SPEAKER_05:Um like eight to eighteen. I mean, for my whole like all the way through school. Yeah, I played the whole time, travel ball the whole time. Um, you know, you kind of hit a point mid like teens, sixteen, where you're like, I don't think I'm quite good enough to go to college. Like I might have gotten like a D three, maybe, but I just really enjoyed it. I played high school. Um get any awards? Like when central.
SPEAKER_08:We did we won states three three years in a row. Three in a row?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, for division two. We were like division two for it was like the conference was private schools in the Virginia area. In Virginia.
SPEAKER_08:Just a bunch of Catholics beating the shit out of each other.
SPEAKER_04:There's a couple proddies in there, you know, like Baptists, oh shit.
SPEAKER_08:Get a couple holy rollers out there, dude.
SPEAKER_07:So in high school, did you know that you wanted to be like a pilot or was that transition like that?
SPEAKER_05:Dude, so that was kind of funny. My brother closest to me is six years older than me. Um and he applied, so the Naval Academy and West Point and Air Force, who cares? And Coast Guard. Annapolis, Maryland.
SPEAKER_08:Annapolis, Maryland.
SPEAKER_05:It's a really beautiful area. It's like an hour east of Washington, D.C., almost like straight shot east. Um so he applied to their summer programs, like summer camp for a week, and you kind of see, hey, this is the Naval Academy, and you get to do this and this and that. So he went like six years before, you know, I'm like 11 or 10 when he goes to this thing. Um and I remember picking him up from there. I was like, it's kind of cool, right? Um, but I'm still young. And then I remember I was junior year in high school and my like high school what do they call it? Uh student, when they're like, hey, this is what you're supposed to do in life kind of thing.
SPEAKER_08:Oh yeah, like your uh your guidance counselor.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, kind of like guidance counselor part of the newsletter was like, hey, Naval Academy Summer Seminar. I was like, oh shit, that's what John, my brother, that's what he did. I should I should apply to that. That's cool. I didn't know thoughts of the military at this point.
SPEAKER_10:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Um so I applied, went to that summer seminar. I was like, this is legit. That's kind of cool. Like there's you know, this idea that there's just gonna be some structure here. I I don't really know what I want to do with my life, so I at least, you know, when I get out of college, if I go to the naval academy, I'll have a job when I get out. Um so yeah, I after that summer seminar, I applied and and by the grace of God, I guess, got into the Naval Academy.
SPEAKER_08:So you wind up going to the Naval Academy because I thought I thought you were Air Force originally. Because I fly.
unknown:Probably.
SPEAKER_08:Very confused. So you were in the Navy, right? Yeah, yeah. Did you say that in the opening? In the opening, I said you said. I said it in the opening.
SPEAKER_05:Jake, did I say in the opening? Jake's been recording everything. Yeah, I said I said it.
SPEAKER_08:It's on record. Okay, I am just in fact that student.
SPEAKER_07:Have you seen, you know, aircraft carriers? Aren't don't most of those pilots fly for the Navy?
SPEAKER_08:Every single one of them. Uh maybe a marine couple Marines here and there. I never I've never been like a huge fan of the Navy, but I always give them credit where credit is due. And the best thing about the Navy is that um you chose the right branch in that you will always be safe because every country on earth knows not to fuck with our boats. True. And if they do, why don't you shoot Japan attacks and just see how that worked out for me what I mean? See what happened there. You know what I mean? So fucking nice.
SPEAKER_05:Good on you. Good decision. I think the better reason to go in the Navy is because all our bases are on the coast for the most part.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, that's also used.
SPEAKER_05:As opposed to like super sick based on Fort I don't know, in the middle of I don't know. Um flyover state, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_08:So I was stationed at Fort Bliss, which is a super sick base. It's in the middle of uh like a drug uh drug running route, which is really, really sick. Where's Fort Bliss? By uh Texas. Uh uh El Paso, Texas, but what's the name of the Chihuahua? Uh Juarez. Yeah, Juarez. Juarez.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, you know.
SPEAKER_08:Have you seen Sicario? Yeah, I was gonna say, you know where they filmed Sicario?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. That scene when they're crossing the border, I'm like, I can't breathe. I can't breathe. The drug tunnels, yeah, that's where I lived for three fucking.
SPEAKER_07:You're like, hey, hey Jorge. Yeah. Getting your drugs again. Okay, cool, man. We're gonna train you for the tunnels of Afghanistan. By doing the tunnels of Mehra. You know, yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Some of you will not make it out alive. Uh the cartel are fucking disgusting people, dude. I was talking to Paul about that the other day, too. Fuck. I bet he knows a little bit. Gross. Uh, but anyway, so so you wind up. Well, I want to know, so like get into the naval academy, right? Do you test in?
SPEAKER_07:Like when you get how to get into the naval academy?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Okay. Uh basic application to like any school. You know, here's a we need a letter of recommendation from your teacher, blah, blah, blah. Uh, maybe like an essay personal statement thing. The intricate parts are you need a letter of recommendation from a congressman or a senator. Ooh. There's some other ones that are a little more complicated, but we'll just stick with those two. Okay. So then you have to interview again with a congressman or a senator. Uh so I interviewed with the local congressman.
SPEAKER_08:What is that like?
SPEAKER_05:Well, how stressful is that interview? Or do they just sit you down and they're like, hey, what's up, champ? Kind of like that. It was kind of like it was for the most part that. This guy's like, oh yeah, cool. I went to this, I went to the Merchant Marine Academy, so I kind of, you know, I get it, and I'm one of the congressman staff. It wasn't the congressman, it was his staff. Typical. Right? Do they actually do anything? I don't think they actually do anything. It's just all their staff.
SPEAKER_08:The staff. All the assistance. Uh, but so they sit you down, it's very informal, God bless you. Um, it's very informal.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it was it wasn't. I mean, it was formal. I like wore a suit and whatnot, but it wasn't like intense grilling, like, why do you want to go to the naval academy? I mean, they did ask that question, I think.
SPEAKER_08:But but it wasn't like what they didn't have like a gun on the table and they were like, Why do you want to go to the naval academy? Right. It wasn't Russian roulette either.
SPEAKER_07:So you didn't have to like take uh you had to take a test to get in, and then like from there they gave you like your job offers of like Oh, he would have taken yeah, you would have taken an ASFAB, right? Eventually at some point.
SPEAKER_05:I took it in high school, but it wasn't I don't think it was a requirement for getting to the Naval Academy.
SPEAKER_08:Really? Yeah. So I wonder if you have if if you had already taken it in high school, I wonder if like your other Naval Academy cadets had to like take an ASFAB before they graduated college?
SPEAKER_04:No. No?
SPEAKER_05:Um so I'll get into that. Okay. So um when you're at the Naval Academy, you're just through normal school, it's college with like a lot of peppering of military, like you're wearing a uniform. If you're a freshman, you gotta like they call it chopping. You have to like run in the hallways, you can't walk.
SPEAKER_08:I like that.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, you literally have to run in the middle of the hallway and when you square a corner, you have to square a corner, so like you know, for the hallway like bang bang. Yeah. When you do that, you gotta go, go navy, sir, beat army, sir. Like literally, say that as you're running. That's hot. It was this funny. Uh you'd have to memorize the menu of the day, and they called them chow calls. So before every meal, you'd have these like 40 plebes freshmen yelling in the hallways, sir, the menu for morning meal is blah blah blah blah blah blah. You're like rattling up the meal, and like usually you just start making it up until a upperclassman comes up, he's like, What are we having for lunch? You're like uh roast beef. Like, all right, cool. You're like, oh shit, I hope it's roast beef.
SPEAKER_07:So, like, you didn't have any flying experience before zero. Because we got a buddy that is he's Oh yeah, our guy that crashed the plane that one time. Yeah, but he works on planes, but he flies planes recreationally.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, he has like his recreational FFA license. Okay, yeah, yeah. He got that. He's been flying since high school. He wrecked the plane in high school. He was flying before he could drive, I believe. Yeah, yeah. If I remember he got his pilot's license when he was like 14 or 15. Okay. He was like logging hours when he was fucking 13, which is insane to me. That is wild, yeah. But he had it before he turned 16, which is fucking bonkers.
SPEAKER_05:Um like just normal, normal college and then they're like so right before you graduate, your senior year, you know, you got they get your whole package, your grades, and it's not just grades there, it's like how'd you do in PE? And what were your PE scores too? What was your PRG? You have to take every uh every um half year? Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:What were your years of I guess 2008-2012. 2008-2012 was these were the college years. Yeah. Right. So I graduated high school 08. Okay. Sick. So did I. We're oh, I think we talked about this. We're the almost the same age. I think you're older than me by like a few months. I'm 35.
SPEAKER_05:Same. What month?
SPEAKER_08:March. You're older than me. Uh okay, August 21st. Nice, dude. Yeah. Sick. Um I'm older than a lot of people. Uh me too. It's the fuck. It's the worst, dude. It's the worst. Uh I just wanted to have a frame of reference. So you were saying like before you graduate. Sorry to make sure you're going to be able to do that. Yeah, no, you're good.
SPEAKER_05:So right before beginning of your senior year, like fall of a senior year, they kind of take your whole package and you say, These are my order of preferences of what I want to do in the Navy. Yeah, absolutely. And you can also go to the Marine Corps out of the Naval Academy because it's uh, you know, subset of what do they call it? The male department of the Navy is the Marine Corps. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you guys own them. Right. Yeah. They're part of the Department of the Navy, so I'm like, okay, cool guys. Yeah, okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Uh you're welcome for your paycheck.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, you're welcome for the boat you get to go on because you're a Marine. How else would you go on there? Good luck getting to Afghanistan on an osprey. Yeah. Those ospreys are dope though. They are cool. Uh so they get your whole package, all your grades, everything. The kind of messed up part of that naval academy is you get peer ranked. Who was that like so of your classmates, they can rank you. And so if like you fall off with some guys, they'll be like this guy fucking sucks, and they'll give him give you a 40 out of 40. And that affects your like standing in school, too.
SPEAKER_08:So like if you're like a shitty, like if you're the last one to get picked for a dodgeball, you're probably sticks with you the whole entire fucking life, right?
SPEAKER_05:Dude, I was talking to someone, quick side note, I was talking to someone about this about the naval academy the other day. It's a great school, but man, is it like a confidence? Like it it pushes you to the limit because you you graduate high school and you're like, dude, I'm hot shit. Yeah. I was captain of the soccer team, blah, blah, blah, national society. Stud. Stud, right? You go to the you go to the naval academy, you're like, yeah, I was president of my high school. I was the captain of five different teams. Yeah. I had an 8.10 GPA. You're like, what the fuck?
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, I'm just like, and that was a random person you just like ran into. Like, well, I learned how to split an atom in the third grade. Right. You're like, oh, everyone here is a fucking stud. Yeah, you're like talking to an astrophysicist. Right. You're like, dang, I just thought the Navy was a good idea. Right. You're fucking fuck up, Einstein. What are you doing here? Uh we're here for boats, right?
SPEAKER_05:Not fucking Neptune. Uh boat. I think the Navy has the most astronauts. Hell yeah. Quick side thing.
SPEAKER_08:What about uh what wait, they have astronauts?
SPEAKER_05:Like, because a naval pilot can go become an astronaut. Like I think Buzz, I think Buzz and Armstrong were both Navy pilots.
SPEAKER_08:Hell yeah, dude. That's sick.
SPEAKER_05:I think. Fact check me on that, Jake.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, you might look up if Buzz Aldra.
SPEAKER_05:Or just look up how many Navy pilots were astronauts. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:My first premise. I'm very curious about that. But I think that's how they when they started the Space Force, um, they to recruit astronauts. I think now that you're saying that, it does ring a bell because they went straight to the Air Force and they were like, hey, volunteer program, who's open to this? Right, right. And they like went to their highest scoring pilots or whatever. And they were like, who wants to I would not have started with my highest scoring. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We can't afford to lose them. Yeah. Hey, man, there's a 36, 30-70 chance you make it out of this. Uh uh over 83 Navy pilots have become astronauts, making the Navy the leading military branch for astronauts with the most former naval aviators in NASA. Um, yeah. What's the uh Neil Armstrong? Okay, not Buzz.
SPEAKER_05:Oh yeah. I was close. Halfway.
SPEAKER_08:Close enough, dude.
SPEAKER_07:Alan Shepherd. Out of it says like below 360 astronaut candidates over the years, and 212 of them were military. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah. That's hot. Uh so was Matthew McConaughey in the film Interstellar. He was also a pilot in the Air Force.
SPEAKER_04:Well, you know, love is really the reason why we have anything here. We're just looking for a place in the dirt. He went back. Smurf Smurf.
SPEAKER_08:Wild guy. Yeah. Hook him. Because he's a Longhorns fan. Uh hook'em. That's what he says at the end. You don't see it. At the end of every take. Right. Hook him. Uh so okay, so where do you get where do you get placed? They lost? I didn't say that. Oh, damn, that sucks.
SPEAKER_05:34, whatever. Sorry, we're diverging. No, we're good.
SPEAKER_08:Um where'd you wind up placing?
SPEAKER_05:Like my ranking in the school?
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, like how how with that whole packet and everything. I was like almost exact middle. Exact middle. That's actually a good place to go.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it wasn't bad. I I wasn't like I I was a history major. Okay. Really not good at like uh the sciences and stuff, but you have to you get a bachelor of science from the Naval Academy. Always? Yeah, no matter what. Because your pre-re your core classes, if you will, the classes you have to take is like two semesters of chemistry, two semesters of electrical engineering, three semesters of calculus, depends. I'm like, what the f uh and then uh what was the last semester? Like one was aerodynamics, the other one was thermodynamics.
SPEAKER_08:I'm like, what the f I don't know that I'm a history major, damn it. I thought I was signing up for the Navy, not making a lot of things.
SPEAKER_07:They're like if you're if you're if your plane or helicopter crashes in the desert, like we would like you to do that. Yeah, we would have to rebuild it, please. Like, I'm not Iron Man, all right?
SPEAKER_08:I'm not Tony Stark. We lost a wing circle. You're lucky I landed it.
SPEAKER_05:Like, good thing you're took some engineering classes back then, right? Like, no, not good thing. Oh, physics, two semesters of physics. So I had to take all these like extra science classes. So I finished with like a two, nine, four GPA overall. But my major GPA, like history was like three, seven, five or something like that. I was like, Oh yeah, yeah, because that was what I wanted to study. Hell yeah. Um so I finished like almost exact middle of our graduating class. Oh yeah. Um if I remember correctly.
SPEAKER_07:So did they approach you with options?
SPEAKER_05:So they say these are your options. And you're not really like um kicked off of any before you put your selection. So the whole three years prior to that, you go on different every summer you go on a cruise. They call it like a summer cruise. Um and it's like, hey, you're gonna go to the case.
SPEAKER_08:Is this like like a cruise? No, it's not like that. Oh, not like a cruise.
SPEAKER_05:They call it summer training or summer cruise. So you go like my first year where we went to a boat. We went to a boat in Norfolk. What was it? The USS San Jacinto. Wow, I pulled that up. I don't know. So you go, hey, you're gonna like be with these guys on the boat, they're gonna show you about everything. They call them a running mate, so it was like an enlisted, you know, E5 or something. He's like, Who the f these 18 year old idiots? You know, they're like mini officers. Exactly. Exactly. And like we're like these, but we're like kind of officers, but we're not. We're like, we're not.
SPEAKER_08:Do you just have the little dot on your uniform on the? It was like a cadet. It was like a cadet instead of the case. It was like a slash chevron. Almost like a Eve one or Eve Two. But with an eagle on top. Pretty much.
SPEAKER_07:Do they have like a thing in the military? Like prisons hold my pocket? Like is the military like hold my uh I don't know this phrase.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, in the in the prison system? Yeah, I don't I never I ain't never been. No, neither have I, but I've um I'm a big fan of The Rock, which is an excellent film with Nicholas Cage's. Welcome to the Rock. Yeah, Welcome to the Rock. Uh Sean Connery. Um, but yeah, so basically when you make somebody your bitch in the in prison, then you make them hold your pocket. And then you're like the protector, okay, but they're also like you're you get it. I got you. We we can yeah, you got it? Yeah. Uh so, anyways, that's hold your pocket. I don't know that the military has something like that. But I assume it's a little bit of a thing similar.
SPEAKER_05:Well, similarly, you're like dragging along the guy. Right, right. You're like, all right, show me where to go. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Where's the nuclear reactor?
SPEAKER_05:So I feel for these guys because they're like, I got work to do and I gotta carry this kid with me the whole time. And also this ship was in a certain inspection period, it wasn't going out to sea at all.
SPEAKER_09:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So it was also like, why the fuck are these guys here? So they kind of let us go early. So that was like not, anyways, long story short, every summer you had to do a different cruise. Um, the summer after your sophomore year, you do see a thing called Pro Trimid, and it's four weeks, and each week you do a different thing. So first week was like surface warfare, you go back to a ship for a little bit. Second week you go to the with the Marines and you're like, you're LARPing a little bit. You know, you get you're you're rucking on, like, oh, we're gonna bivwack out there, and we're gonna hop on an osprey or a 40. Like, and they make it's like a sales pitch.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah. Right. You go to eight.
SPEAKER_05:Exactly.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, they're like, hey, put this kit on, dude. You're like, oh, shoot this M6.
SPEAKER_05:Dude, I shot uh what is it, a Mark 29? The big like grenade launcher? Mark 19.
SPEAKER_08:I was like, hell yeah, but shoot fucking monster cans out.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, so it took us to the range one day. We're shooting M16s, we're shooting M M204, is that right? The 204? Yeah, we got to shoot that. They're like, all right, pull it. Yeah. Um the noob tube, as they call it, in Call of Duty, from what I remember.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, yeah. Um our unit in Afghanistan, well, we burned through so many 204. Uh yeah, 208. Just noob and it. What was it called? 203. I'm fucking stupid. Uh too many numbers and letters. We literally our guys would go on mission with belts of these of the 203s around their chests, and every mission we'd come back completely empty.
SPEAKER_05:Just why not? If someone shooted from me a window, thunk.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, got them. 150 meters away. 300 meters away. I wonder how much per round that was. Probably$200 around. Yeah, it's not too bad. But yeah, maybe maybe 100 around. I don't know. But they're dope though. Uh but yeah, so we can warp a little bit.
SPEAKER_05:Got a little ARP, and then there was an aviation week. It was submarine week, which was actually cool. I never wanted to be a submariner at all. But it was cool, like going underwater, and then actually the best part of nuke sitting there living that next bay running the whole thing. You we actually went to the like right outside the reactor, like looking through this glass. There's the reactor like that.
SPEAKER_07:Oh, that's cheap.$10 per cartridge.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, that's cheap as hell.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, that's probably what Uncle Sam is paying for the launcher. Oh, that's just for the launcher, though. Oh, but the 40 millimeter training ammunition.
SPEAKER_08:Training ammunition. It's just a chalk round. Right, that's nothing. Once you put the the HME in the round or the H E, whatever the high, the high explosive. Once you put that$587 around. Yeah, that sounds more realistic. I would probably say somewhere closer. They're probably paying like$100 around. Like the government is. Yeah, on company.
SPEAKER_05:That 587 looks like it's for the launcher in 10 rounds. The Predator Bundle. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Dude, that sounds creepy as fuck. Hey, come check our predator bundle.
SPEAKER_07:So, like uh like um, are you so like you're basically just testing out roles?
SPEAKER_05:And that that that was for that summer. Um, so Sun Mariner was quite year is that? After my sophomore year.
SPEAKER_08:Okay, so they're giving you a taste, a different idea of kind of where you could land.
SPEAKER_07:There's like, here's the boats, here's the options. Exactly.
SPEAKER_05:And so we also had an aviation week, and they take you up in a trainer aircraft. It was at that point, it was a T-34. Um and you also, and I don't know what else we did, but that was the only flight you get. So you get to fly in the backseat, and the guy's like, all right, we'll do a loop pow. And I was like, this is sick. But I was so scared of passing out. So they train you. Have you seen like Top Gun, right? When he's like, Yeah, yeah, pulling five G. Right. But these guys, so they train you like squeeze your legs, yeah. Like starting with your calves and then your thighs and squeeze your your your sounds.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, you're in a you're in an aircraft that can pull that many legs.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I mean, not a ton, like a couple, two or three. It would like do loops and flips and stuff like that. But I was just so specific. Can you look terrified of a what was it a T34?
SPEAKER_08:Can you look up a picture of a T34?
SPEAKER_05:It's gonna look janky. You're not gonna be impressed.
SPEAKER_08:I was picturing like a plane like that. Like a civilians jump out of for parachutes. I don't know. You'll see skydiving. T thirty four. Uh not quite that one type. T thirty four plane, maybe.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, definitely not the tank. That thing does not do rolls very well.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, if it does, you're in uh drive. Deep doo-doo. Is this it? Yeah, that's my oh, I could see it now. Yeah, you could do some barrel rolls in that real short setup.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, the mentor, right? So I'm in the back, the guy's flying, and he's but I was just so scared of passing out, so I'm like squeezing everything. It wasn't that bad of G's. Dude, the next day I couldn't walk, I was like, oh, oh, because I squeezed my calves and everything.
SPEAKER_07:I wonder how well I would do in one of those. We need to try it out. Not great.
SPEAKER_08:You know, don't get a plane. I say you know like I know, but let me ask before I just profess that I'm a fucking idiot. Um the pilots, right? Do they not wear some sort of suit that compresses?
SPEAKER_05:They probably don't in this plane. And it helps. Yeah, so called G suit.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, okay.
SPEAKER_05:So we can get to that later as I progress in naval career here.
SPEAKER_08:But this is sick though. So like you got to do this as a sophomore in college. You're fucking 20 years old doing barrel rolls and two, three.
SPEAKER_05:I wasn't doing it, but I was just like in the backfield ride. Yeah. So that was my first exposure. I was like, this is kind of cool. I'm enjoying it. And I was just kind of like debating what I want to do with my life. What about the fear? Did you have any fear at all? Well, I told you I almost like broke my legs trying to squeeze so I wouldn't pass out. Um, because I was scared of passing out, scared of puking or whatever. And like the embarrassment factor, but you weren't like afraid being in the plane. Not so much.
SPEAKER_08:And I okay, that's a good song. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's interesting.
SPEAKER_05:Not so much. It was more of like, oh shit, I don't know what's gonna be like and see what goes and just get rolling from that kind of thing. Um hell yeah. So that was like sophomore year, junior year. I got lucky and I got to go another aviation tour. So instead of like some guys had to go to a boat for a month, I got to go to an aviation squadron for a month, which was sick. It was a uh kind of transport category, C-130. It was a C130 squadron.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, I love a good C-130, dude.
SPEAKER_05:Uh, we got to go to Hawaii with them. They're like, hey, we're going to Hawaii, you want to come? I'm like, yeah, that sounds like a good time. It was a long time to get there because we stopped in San Diego and went to Hawaii. Got to go to Hawaii. Did you go to Hawaii on a boat? No.
SPEAKER_07:Well I don't know. You know what I mean? Being in the Navy, they'd be like, oh, we got some extra boat. No, no, no.
SPEAKER_05:So it was all flying stuff. I got to fly in a helicopter on that tour, also, because they like said, hey, there's a helicopter squadron down the street. Go to them. Maybe they'll get you a ride. So I got to ride, fly a helicopter a little bit. Um, and that's when I was like, all right.
SPEAKER_07:Is there a big difference from airplane to helicopter? It's like joystick versus like all the above.
SPEAKER_05:It's not even like it's more than that.
SPEAKER_07:Different. Well, because they take off differently.
SPEAKER_05:Air pushing down versus helicopter, also, like you touch one control thing, whether it's rotor or your pedals or your stick, right? It changes something else. You gotta add something else. It's a balancing act completely. Plane, you put power, you move forward, you go up, down, left, right. Sounds like making a good soup.
SPEAKER_08:You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, you gotta beat a little bit of salt, ocean, and a little more pepper. Too much.
SPEAKER_05:And you ratio it out, a little papriki, a little cayenne pepper, a little bit cumin if you want, for the chili. Right?
SPEAKER_07:So did they let you fly the helicopter once it was taken off?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, so we went to a spot, he's like, all right, hover. I'm like, what the fuck? I don't know how to do this. It was going up and down, you know. Now I'm like 20 years old, just doing this thing. I'm like, what do you mean? Just hover. Like, just hover. I'm like, what 21-year-old kid having a panic shaking? Yeah.
SPEAKER_07:I imagine it like driver's ed, do they have like a extra break?
SPEAKER_05:Exact same, like he has exact same controls on the other side. So he could just be like, all right, stop. And just take it and like Alex. It's pretty safe. You're trying to do that. That's cute. That's cute. Yeah. And he just pulls it. He's like, let go. And as long as you're not a dipshit and you're like, I have the controls. Like, no. As long as you just let go when he says let go, you're like, all right, we're good. Oh, that's so funny, dude. So that's when I was like, I want to do aviation. So I put that as my top choice. At senior year, after your senior year gets all compiled.
SPEAKER_08:Right, and they rank you, and then it's these some of your other choices.
SPEAKER_05:Marine Marine Corps, Marine Aviation, uh, naval flight officer, which is in like a jet, goose. Goose is an NFO in Top Gun, right? He's the guy in the back. Yeah. Or yes, I would have been a jet or a bigger plane that like a bomber or something. We don't have bombers, but yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've got like uh it's called a P eight. It's maritime cha plane. Oh, okay, okay. You just do more of like the sensors and the mission and not so much of the flag. Zero of the flag.
SPEAKER_10:Ah, damn. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So I was like, I don't know if I want to do that, but we'll see. Uh so the Marine Corps, submarines, and surface warfare. Surface warfare being you're on a boat.
SPEAKER_08:Okay, okay. But also very safe, as we spoke before. Uh no one messes with our boats. We gonna get to that.
SPEAKER_07:So actually, actually, we seriously. So when you when you so basically you get done with that and you go to flight school, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, yeah. So you go to flight school, that's in Pensacle, Florida for the Navy. Um, the first thing they have you do is like a kind of rigorous ground school of like just you're just learning stuff. And like, all right, we're gonna do aerodynamics one and two, uh, systems one and two, weather. And it's kind of a weed up process, right? Like you have to score a 90 or above on the test, and it's a week long of like four days of classes, test, four days of classes, test. Um, a good weed up process, and once that's done, like all right, you've you get your flight suit, you finish that last test, you get a flight suit. They have a flight suit Friday, which is like a big drinking fest.
SPEAKER_08:Hell yeah. Yeah, it's a good time.
SPEAKER_05:All these like, I just got my flight suit, and now I'm out of the Navy because I fucked it, did something stupid and I drank too much.
SPEAKER_04:Dude, Jerry's out, he bought a freaking institute. Yeah, dude, and it wasn't a brother, it was actually the skipper's wife, dude. We had to cut him, you know what I'm saying? Seriously.
SPEAKER_07:No, did they have like flight sims or anything like that?
SPEAKER_05:This was all just strictly academic. I think it's strictly paper. Yeah, strictly it was all academic at first, and then you go to something called primary. Well, they put you in a Cessna for like 15 hours just to be like, can you actually do this shit? How comfortable are you? Right. And some guys actually would get to that and be like, I actually hate this shit. I don't like being a plane, I don't like flying, I don't like this at all. And they would it would peace out.
SPEAKER_08:Uh well before we take off too far, the classes.
SPEAKER_05:Pun intended, pun intended. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:I did well. I did well. So you did well above nine.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, and uh, and then it was one of those things where you're just like those are hard classes.
SPEAKER_07:They can be aerodynamics and it wasn't like learning different terms for like the weather, like it's blowing this.
SPEAKER_05:Right, or the pressure systems and the you know, pressure systems, all that jazz. Uh they kind of had like had you had a good group of guys if you were studying with them, and it was just if that's your life, which it is at this point, right? You're a 21-year-old, just graduated college, you have nothing else to do, just freaking focus. Lock in. Which is distracting too, because you're also making a lot more money. You're an ensign in the Navy, you're making, I don't know, sixty, seventy thousand dollars.
SPEAKER_08:And every a lot of people are like, ooh, sixty thousand. Your entire life is paid for though. Yeah, I have no debt. Room and board, no debt, no debt, bills are paid for, everything is free. Exactly.
SPEAKER_05:And then we're in Pensacola, Florida, beach town, right? Yeah. I literally there's a bar called on the border of Florida and Alabama called Florabama. Okay. Maybe you've heard of it. You can look it up, it's kind of a fun time. It was like, I don't know, ten minutes down the road. So you have all these like young college graduates, all like 21, we're all studs, right? Yeah. We're in flight school. And we're just going to the bars, boozing, and you're like, all right, well, I should probably focus actually a little bit. So that's actually the trip. Like, as long as you focus, just take take it seriously, which you know, I did my best to like this is my life, you know, I gotta take it seriously. Um still had a good time, but yeah. You gotta focus, right? I think that's the key. You read your stories in school, like, hey, there's some Naval Academy students, you know, went to flight school and then black. They blew it. And which is common for us naval academy guys, because we uh the school was so like we couldn't leave. We had to live on live in dorms the moment you get freedom, you're just like, woo, party. Like, no, dude. Chill. Fucking relax.
SPEAKER_03:Hump the brakes, daddy.
SPEAKER_08:So it was it was a good like maturity check, right? So so you get out of there and now you've got your flight suit.
SPEAKER_05:Right. What's what's happening? Next is primary. So flying that, but actually a newer improved model called the Beechcraft T6 Texan.
SPEAKER_07:Was this fuel injected or carbureted?
SPEAKER_05:That was probably turbine. Okay. So uh look if you look up the T6 Texan 2, Jake, whenever you have a chance, you take your time.
SPEAKER_07:Um the only the only reason I ask is because like some planes like our buddy that was flying the uh the plane model.
SPEAKER_05:T6 Texan 2.
SPEAKER_08:T6 Texan.
SPEAKER_07:But our buddy that was flying in the plane that crashed, it was a carburetor, so he was going too much of a fuel. Lost all the fuel. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So these are all this is a turbine aircraft. So you hop in this thing, dude. I've flown, I don't know, 15 hours in a Cessna. You hop in this thing, it's like 1,100 horsepower, turbine engine, ejection seats, you're wearing oxygen because you're going up, right? Above 30. You're going above, I mean, we went into 30, but you're usually going above at least 10. 10 is usually when you start needing oxygen.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, oh, okay, okay, okay. Interesting.
SPEAKER_05:Um, but ejection seat, this thing's a freaking like hot rod. I still remember my first flight. I'm like, brom, this thing's going nuts. And the cow's like, hey, don't fly in the clouds. I'm like, what? Why don't we I don't know what I'm doing? Don't fly in the clouds. Seriously, I was like, ah he's like, we're we're VFR. I'm like, what the fuck is VFR? Which is visual flight rules, which means you have to be able to see where you're going, as opposed to instrument flight rules, which is you don't need to see. But it's different rules, different like things you gotta do. He said, We're VFR. I'm like, what? Exactly. I'm like, I don't and you're strapping this thing on, dude, and it's ejection seat. You're like, what the fuck? Like you're getting in your seat, like, don't know sudden movements. Please don't eject right now.
SPEAKER_07:Um I've seen like pictures of like the battle scars. Did they make you inject at all in school?
SPEAKER_05:No, they they do like some training on it. Like, hey, this is what a little simulation might feel like. Uh they get a they don't actually have you parachute. Like they used to do, they'd tire you up on a parachute, tie you up to a truck, and the truck would start polling ass. So you're like, you're like, ooh, I'm flying, right?
SPEAKER_08:Buy an F-150. Exactly. You're like, dude, this is the white trashiest thing.
SPEAKER_07:We got a Ford Raptor out here. Now we're going, boy.
SPEAKER_08:United States Navy.
SPEAKER_05:Oh my god. But they didn't do that for us. All they did, and that was like to practice like parachute fall landing, they call it, where you don't break your knees when you fall. Yeah. Um, and then there's another part where they would train, they would literally drag you and you had to unclip. Just so you're like, if you're landed, yeah, you're shooting and you're still being pulled, you gotta learn how to unclip, or else you're like off, you know. Who knows?
SPEAKER_08:So I wonder the VFR, right? Yeah. VFR is what it was. Visually what?
SPEAKER_07:Visual flight rules? Visual flight rules. It's kind of like a drone pilot on the ground. You gotta have eyesight on the drone.
SPEAKER_08:Is that the same reason? Like, I went skydiving. They won't let you skydive through clouds.
SPEAKER_05:Probably.
SPEAKER_08:That's a good that's probably a good reason. That's like an introduction. Because like we jumped at like 14,000 feet. VFR, here's the the Webster's dictionary. Are regulations that permit pilots to fly using visual navigation and good weather controls. So the see and avoid part I like.
SPEAKER_05:So as a parachute, as a you know, jumping out of a plane, if you can't see and avoid, there could be a plane under you, you have no idea. All of a sudden you flap, right? So same thing premise with a plane. If I'm in the clouds, but I'm not when you're in instrument flight rules, you're talking to ATC. They know where you are. You don't need that, but they ATC knows where you are. You're on a strict, like, hey, I'm going from this point to that point to this point. Azimuth and yeah. Or point to point. They know exactly where you are, theoretically, right? Yeah. Um, and they know where other aircraft are, and they separate everybody. So this is how it is in commercial aviation. You're thousand feet separated, you know, X amount of miles away separated. Yeah. Um, so that's when it's an IFR conditions. And even though it's like broad daylight outside for commercial aviation, like when I go in the 737, I can see freaking from here to you know, Texas. Yeah. But um, it's still IFR, so because they make sure everything's controlled. Hey, this guy's at this altitude, this guy's at this altitude, this guy's over here, this guy's over there.
SPEAKER_07:And all the drones are at 400 feet. Right. Hey, we're coming in. Oh shit, we're coming to land. There's a drone. What the as a pilot, can you see like a drone? Because they're emitting uh like a radio frequency or whatever, so can you tell that like there's something in the airspace?
SPEAKER_05:I haven't seen that, and a lot of times with airports, I know I I only know a little bit my brother-in-law had the DJ DJI. Um, I think like when you try to take it off at my in-law's house, they're not too far from Evansville's airport.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, it won't let you. It won't let you like, hey, you're in class C airspace, you're not allowed. Exactly. And then like I had one of the older drones before the flight rules, and I went to like Wright's Hill, and like I flew it for the Wrights bowl to get the whole thing up and it got to a certain altitude. It was like, hey, you're breaking the law if you went to the city. You're getting into airspace here. Yeah. You just hit accept and then you can go higher. But that was that was back in the day.
SPEAKER_04:F-16s are scrambled. Just kidding. I don't care that much here.
SPEAKER_07:But like uh, we had a guy on Evansville Aerial, uh, shout out to him, who like uh like uh the what's the festival I'm blinking? The West Street Ball Festival. Yeah, Fall Fest. West when they do that, it's they they close the airspace and you have to get permission to take off. Oh yeah, yeah. And so he was talking about like there was like two or three people arrested this year. Is there a fall festival? Because they're flying drones without permission.
SPEAKER_08:They're able now the the EPD. God bless you. Thank you. The EPD is able for whatever reason they've got the communication. It's a radio frequency. Yeah, they can now triangulate the remote. So yeah. So they find the they find the drone and then try and transmit the person.
SPEAKER_05:We have the same thing in planes. It's called a transponder. I don't know what the radio I don't drone savvy.
SPEAKER_08:All right. That's the same thing as a flight box or the black box.
SPEAKER_05:Uh the black box is a recorder.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, fuck me. Yeah, no, you're good.
SPEAKER_05:Transponder is uh it's it's a certain code assigned to your plane, and it shoots out to ATC, so they know exactly, hey, your transponder code is 3232. Yeah and they say, Oh, that's uh airline two two one two flight going from Dallas or uh Houston to Pittsburgh. Gotcha. Right? So they know what your flight plan is. They they click your button, they click your your on the screen, they click a you know, but you pilot can turn that on or off, right?
SPEAKER_07:Didn't that happen during 9-11 where like they turned on responder? Exactly.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, you can turn it off. They went off, they went dark. Yeah. So they didn't have them on.
SPEAKER_05:I imagine if you go dark. Now they still have radar so they can actually see like your blip, right? Yeah, you could absolutely I imagine if you turned it off, there'd be some questions asked. And if you continued not to respond, more questions are asked.
SPEAKER_08:That's actually, I'm so glad you said that, because one of the most recent documentaries they cut loose. The Tucker Carlson one? No, it was no, it was like 2020, 2021. But they took they were talking about how the transponders on all three or four planes. They all got turned off. Yeah, they all flipped, it was four planes, and they all flipped off. Hypothetically. They did, though, and then when they found the planes that were like, oh, these are the two that are flipped off, and they one had left New Jersey and was going to fucking Iowa, and the other one had left New York and was going to Texas, and then they found them on the radar, and then they were like opposite direction. They were like, Oh, they're coming back to New York. That is strange. Yeah, yeah. So that's actually what a smart question, Tom.
SPEAKER_07:Anyways, uh, I want to go to like I did I know I'm gonna skip ahead in the time, but did they have you fly like any other planes? Like, did they have you take off from an aircraft carrier?
SPEAKER_05:No, didn't have to do that. So after you do primary that in that jet in that plane, right, with the ejection seat and everything, you get your grades and say, All right, once again, Navy, what do you want to do? And I after flying the helicopter before, I was like, dude, I kind of like the helicopter. You're low to the ground, you see everything. I was still a little skeptical about like if I'm gonna enjoy flying super high. There's a little bit of like a fear factor in there. I'm like, eh. So I'll just do this helicopter thing. I think it'll be enjoyable. So I chose helicopters and then they put you in a little tiny trainer helicopter. It's called a jet bell ranger. Um sorry, a bell jet ranger. A bell is a helicopter company, it's like the most common helicopter you'll see in the in the world almost. Okay. Um, it's using like all bunch of movie sets and whatnot.
SPEAKER_07:Would have seen like Grand Theft Auto, like a two-person helicopter.
SPEAKER_05:A little bigger. That's probably like a Robinson and Grand Theft Auto, which is like a tiny little thing. Yeah. Um looks like a Kiowa. It's it's a longer thing. Just uh Bell Jet Ranger, Jake, when you got a chance. So they they put you in that and then you learn how to fly a helicopter.
SPEAKER_07:Bell jet. Which is different because, like you said, you have foot pedals in a helicopter.
SPEAKER_05:Which you have foot pedals, yeah, Bell 206.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's like the one from Jurassic Park.
SPEAKER_05:Right? It's pretty common helicopter, right? You see it a lot. It's uh in news helicopters.
SPEAKER_07:Um I think the Indiana State Police are now using helicopters to patrol. Hell yeah. That's hot. Maybe I got a new job there. I don't know.
SPEAKER_08:I'm here for it. I'm here for it, dude. Oh yeah. Arevac, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Aerivac, they fly as different ones, but for sure.
SPEAKER_08:Um that's nice though. So so this is this is the company. This is like the this is what you trained on. This is what I trained on. The but it's uh it's a uh you said it wasn't the real helicopter, it's like a um thing. Not a simulator?
SPEAKER_05:Not a simulator. Yeah, it wasn't simple. Oh, it's a good thing. No, this if we actually hop in this.
SPEAKER_07:So after you do all the flying and stuff, yeah, you do some simulator stuff, but it was pretty archaic kind of things. They don't actually like move now. I watched a reel the other day of a guy playing like uh air flight simulator, yeah, like doing barrel rolls and then the things sims thing and everything.
SPEAKER_05:Um some do, some don't. The ones with this weren't, they're kind of old. They're more like procedural trainers, like, all right, where's this switch? Where's that? When if you have to do this, how are you gonna do it? So you fly this, and then once again, the Navy's like, all right, you have three options of what to fly in the Navy. Uh the 60 Romeo, 60 Sierra, or the 53, which is a you might know the 53. C stallion. Is that what you called it? Oh no, you're sorry, you're not Marine Corps.
SPEAKER_08:Army. Yeah, Chinooks and Blackhawks, Daddy. That's all I know.
SPEAKER_05:So the 53 is a big mango thing. The Navy uses it for different reasons. I chose the 60. I think I wanted the 60 Sierra, but I got the 60 Romeo. 60 Romeo.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, let's see both of these. Let's see.
SPEAKER_05:Uh, try um MH60.
SPEAKER_08:MH60. Yeah. MH Mark Hotel. There we go. Yeah, there we go. Oh, that's basically a Blackhawk. Yeah, it's the Navy's version of the Blackhawk, right? Dude, why are you guys copying our shit? I know. Sorry, bruh. We call it the Seahawk. Yeah, dude. Shows how good you guys are.
SPEAKER_07:What would be the difference between this and a Blackhawk other than the color?
SPEAKER_05:Um the capabilities, what it has. So the Sierra, you see that tailwheels all the way at the back? That's closest to um, hit that verse Romeo one. That's closest to the Blackhawk. Right? So the tailwheel on the way at the back. The Romeo, our tailwheel is more in the middle. What is it, the fifth picture, sixth picture over to the right? Oh, I see it. Yeah, yeah. See how that tailwheels in the middle? Um we're more very sensor heavy. So the Sierra was like passenger transport, could carry lots of guns and missiles and stuff. But not a lot of sensors, right? I like that. The Romeo, we had radar, fleer, we had we could shoot Sonobooys. See those little holes on the side there? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Those are all Sonobuoy launchers. Oh, no shit. So you could shoot Sonoboo's.
SPEAKER_07:Is that like a Sonoboo's just like a flare?
SPEAKER_05:No, Sonoboois uh acoustics to listen to submarines. Oh, okay. Yeah. So they go into the water and they listen. Or they could shoot acoustic noise, right? And then get them back. Only Russians. Yeah. Because they only do one ping. It's weird. Oh yeah. Red Hunford October. Hun for October. So it's easy to find them. Like one ping, we got them. We got the Ruskies. Ruskies. Uh we had, you know, so our mission was very much like everything maritime. So we take off from the ship. Nice. So you go to, after you go to like you finish that little helicopter, you go to this helicopter, another year of training on this thing specifically, how to fly it, not only, but then how to do the tactics. So a lot of tactical different formations. Not so much that. Oh. Using the sensors. So hey, how do you use the radar? Hey, how do you use the sonar? And you have the guy in the back who's like the really the SME or the subject matter expert on it. He's the one who really knows how to use the sensors. You're just there to like, like any good officer, supervise. Right? Like, hey, uh, try this thing. Oh, yeah, sir, it's working really well. Like, yeah, damn right it is.
SPEAKER_07:So you have to have like case struggling with one part, you can do it.
SPEAKER_05:You can take over, right? I could take, he's like, hey, dude, run the radar on the back, I'll take the FLIR. Yeah. He's like, hey, sir, I got some Q's. Hey, Q SO. And then the FLIR snaps to it. Like, oh dude, that looks like a fishing boat. Okay, next thing. Yeah. Q SO. Boom. All right. Oh shit, that's a battleship.
SPEAKER_07:Some Venezuelans bringing in drugs. Get 'em! Get 'em. Sink him.
SPEAKER_05:Uh yes, Mr. Hegset? Yes, yes, sir. All right, yeah, got it.
SPEAKER_08:How long did you do that for?
SPEAKER_05:So after a year of training on that, I was on this for the rest of just about the rest of my Navy career.
SPEAKER_08:Follow-up question. Sure. This is a two-part question. Uh, how long did you do that for? And then so roughly how many years?
SPEAKER_05:I did ten and a half total years in the Navy, two years of early flight school, and then let's say seven years flying that. Follow-up question.
SPEAKER_08:Okay. Aliens? I have no idea. Never saw anything? Never saw anything. Okay. I gotta check. Sorry. So a lot of maritime alien shit happened. I gotta check it out. I've seen those videos, right? You gotta check in, dude, with the little pills fucking flying over the Atlantic.
SPEAKER_07:What uh like your first deployment? Is that on one of these?
SPEAKER_05:Yes. So first deployment, I finished the they call it the FRS Fleet Replacement Squadron, where you train on this thing, right? You learn all your tactics. Oh yeah. Uh I got to my first final C squadron. Like after three years of being in the Navy, they're like, Alright, you're gonna deploy, do some Navy shit here now. Um and so I got there in like January, they were deploying in June. So I had six months to kind of get up to speed with the squadron. We went to Fallon, Nevada, where the new top gun is school is.
SPEAKER_08:Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So it's where we go to like kind of get ready with the carrier squadron with the jets and coordinate, and we can like alright, guys, drop bombs here, go, go, go. Right. We could kind of do that as part of a mission set because we had all these sensors, right? Um and then, yeah, my first deployment was started in June of 2017, 2016. Where'd you go? Middle East. So you just kind of go on a boat, and you go to the Gulf, Transatlantic, Gulf of Arabia.
SPEAKER_07:And they didn't have like any heat-seeking stuff, it was just like RPG. Like, do you get shot at a uh yes and no?
SPEAKER_05:So when I say Middle East, we never went feet dry. We were just over the water, right? So our job was to take off from the boat that we were attached with, do like a 50 mile radius around it, maybe, and then just like, hey, identify every single ship that we see on radar and say, Hey ship, here's this thing. And he puts it into his log. Yeah. Hey ship, our ship, hey ship, here's this guy. All right, cool.
SPEAKER_08:Hey, this you're not communicating with that ship.
SPEAKER_05:No, no, no. We're communicating back with our guys. Yeah, yeah. We mark them and so we have a full picture.
SPEAKER_07:We got some Somalians on a boat coming up close.
SPEAKER_05:Dude, so this deployment was actually kind of awesome because the whole carrier strike group goes, and we go across the Atlantic, we go to the Mediterranean, we've got some port stops. My ship kind of left behind. So the carrier strike group goes to the Gulf Arabia. We stayed like Gulf of Oman near uh Somali. We were in Somalia, and we got some Coast Guard guys on board, and it was kind of like Coast Guard SEAL Team Six. They're called the uh interdiction unit, air interdiction units.
SPEAKER_07:Oh, that's a thing. That's a weird first name.
SPEAKER_05:Was it no, I don't think it was Air. It was AIT Advanced Interdiction Troop or something like that. Okay. Um there's interdiction. There's some there's some interdiction. Type in Coast Guard after that. Uh that's all. AIT. There you go. Advanced interdiction team. Thank you. Yeah, so that was AIT, um, Coast Guards Maritime. So we got them on board our ship, and their job was because of like laws and stuff, they could actually board ships and seize stuff and take care of stuff.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, these are the homies that are like getting the pirate. Yeah. Yeah. Was it them? Okay. Yeah, that's hot. I that's I don't dude. God bless you. Uh, I don't know anything about the Coast Guard. God bless them. This is cool. These dudes are dope.
SPEAKER_05:So these guys were badass. So we'd be on our ship and we'd have the precision marksman in our helicopter, and he was like for sniper overwatch. As they're as his buddies are boarding, he'd be up in our helicopter, we're circling around. So that was one thing we did. And then the big like climax of this deployment was while we're over on the coast of Somalia, this was in 20, yeah, 2016. Um, Houthi Rebels from Yemen. Yeah, they shot a Saudi Arabian ship, like a maritime vessel from Saudi Arabia. So it was like all hands on board, go to the Red Sea. So we went to the Red Sea to kind of like because it's a shipping lane. So if they're just lobbing missiles, we need to freaking be there and make sure we're not bothering the rest of the shipping vessels they're kind of going through. Yeah. Um, and my ship was shot at three separate times on that deployment.
SPEAKER_08:With missiles?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. So you uh look up USS Mason 2016, see what pops up.
SPEAKER_08:Were these air?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Air missile? I think they said they were Charlie 802s, um which was like a surface, surface-to-surface missile. USS Mason. 2016?
SPEAKER_08:2016. Yeah, let's pop this puppy up, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:There you go. Three misses to defend.
SPEAKER_08:So October 11th. Yeah. US Mason.
SPEAKER_05:So this was this was the ship I was on, and uh, I'll still never forget like the first time we were shot at. I was just walking through the halls and we hear vampire, vampire, which is like a brevity word. I wouldn't say it's like a code word. It's just like a instead of saying we're being shot at, they just say vampire, which means missile inbound. Get your garlic, folks. Right. Um and I was like, what the fuck? And uh our the XO of the boat runs out to go to like combat control. I'm like, the fuck? Like this is real shit. So there's not a drill. This was like day one of three separate occasions. Um did they not follow up with vampire? Not a drill. Yeah, they might. I think they did. I think they did.
SPEAKER_07:The wheel is in the middle of the cab way better than this one.
SPEAKER_05:These are actually fifty threes, the big ones. Oh, okay. So these are from the Ponce, which was like a ship that was around there. Um, yeah. These are the big, big ones. I we could have flown. The Marines fly this one mostly. Oh yeah, dude. Um, but yeah, so we were shot at three separate times at deployment. I was this close to launching to go shoot back at one of the guys who shot at us. Oh, how hot. What did that be? Oh, I was so ready.
SPEAKER_08:Oh my god. Your freedom just my freedom boner was fired up, dude. Just fired up.
SPEAKER_07:Um did they typically like as the boat's going through the ocean, are there normally like four helicopters flying? No, this was probably I don't know, April 11, 26.
SPEAKER_05:This was before then. This was just them, I don't know, photo shoot. This is a typical publicity stunt. Go up there and do some cool shit, guys. Exactly. How long does it take to refuel one of these? Uh those, I don't know. For us, it was like I don't know, 10-minute thing. We took about 3,000 packs.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:You'd kind of get on, chain them up. So we'd get chains on when we're on the deck of the ship because the ship's like rocking and rolling. Yeah, yeah. Just make sure we don't. You don't want to go rolling off. Yeah, that would suck.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, not a good thing.
SPEAKER_05:Um and then they fuel up probably 10 minutes or so.
SPEAKER_07:Is there like a like a different takeoff for like the air of the ocean? Because like I know you get by the ocean and the air fluctuates.
SPEAKER_05:So it's like uh so the ship has to kind of ideally they're into the wind. So if the wind's coming, you know, from this direction, turn the ship here so you have more airflow. Um and the ship's moving forward too, so you have even more airflow. It creates like a synthetic airflow. Yeah, I get you. It's kind of like scooting underneath your wing.
SPEAKER_07:How long does it take for a ship to change position? Because I they're massive.
SPEAKER_05:That ours was not as big. Um, I don't know if they show a picture of the Mason. It's a smaller destroyer. Uh if you want to just find it.
SPEAKER_07:Did you see the Chinese came out with magnetic launch instead of what we have that too? Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_05:So one of our carriers has the USS Ford has the magnetic launch where it's magnets pulling the ship plane forward. That's wild. So for us, we just needed enough airflow and then we'd pick up and then the airflow would kind of yeah. Our ship was not big. Okay.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:That's just like a wheel, a lad.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, I got a boat like that that I push off of, dude. Yeah, I put one of those in my bathtub. Hell yeah. Braden's got one of these boats, dude.
SPEAKER_05:Uh no, that's sick, dude. So on the very back, see that's flat in the back? Yeah. That's where the helicopter takes on and off.
SPEAKER_08:How many helicopters are on that boat? Two. Two? Yeah. A max of two. So one in the bow and one in the stern?
SPEAKER_05:No, there's uh you see on that picture, there's like two doors looking up. Sorry, I'm pointing. You guys can't tell. Move a little up and right. The back, see the back of the boat. A little more to the right, a little more to the right, more and more right. There. See, there's like two doors, those are hangers. Uh so the helicopter lands in the middle and then it gets on a track and it goes and it goes in. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, nice, dude.
SPEAKER_05:So we had to when we landed, we had this little probe come out, and we had to land the probe like in a square, and the square claps. Yeah, it's exciting. I'm very I'm very good at this. Very fired. I have four kids.
SPEAKER_08:Uh very fired up right now.
SPEAKER_07:Uh so there's no hair on the probe.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, Jake's not a big fan of neither confirm nor deny. Yeah, Jake's not a big fan of hair on the probe.
SPEAKER_05:Uh so it gets in the trag and you move it and you kind of it wheels on in.
SPEAKER_08:Okay. So yanks it in there, and then the second bird can then land, and then the second one.
SPEAKER_05:We never would launch both at the same time. Oh, really? Because let's say we launch both, and there's a lot of like things that have to happen to launch both. You have to have a contingency. Say we launch both. I'm like, hey dude, I'm out of gas. Like, oh, okay, let me come in for gas. Like, hey, you're taking too long. Yeah, we broke. Sorry, bro. And like, uh, I'm out of gas. Right. Where are my girls supposed to go? Like, oh, you gotta go where the fuck over there. Yeah. So we would only just launch one at a time. But it was for efficiency of like maintenance, right? Every 200 hours you gotta do a lot of maintenance on them.
SPEAKER_07:No, that's excellent.
SPEAKER_05:Or one thing's broken on one bird, you can take it to the other, or just take off the other.
SPEAKER_07:Hours of flight in the military do you think you have versus now in computer?
SPEAKER_05:Or do you know that number exactly by two? I probably have like 1,100 total. I had a like 1,150, 1,200 total in the military. A thousand at least in a black hawk, Seahawk. Um, and I'm already at a thousand at my current airline.
SPEAKER_08:Ooh, that's what they called it, the Seahawk? Yeah.
unknown:Nice.
SPEAKER_05:He said this like three times. As opposed to the Blackhawk. Well, first off, you're cut off.
SPEAKER_08:He said two times, so I missed it the first time. I apologize. I also thought he was damn uh Air Force when he opened up the damn. That's true. He was very confused. Yeah, I'm very confused. No, you're good. It's been a long weekend for me, dude. I'm on minimal sleep. So what happens when you go hunting and don't get anything? Yeah, and then I had to go to church this morning, too.
SPEAKER_07:And it's just like I almost got stranded out of my house last night. He's like, Yeah, there's Ubers out here in Boonville. No, there's not. You can get Ubers to Boonville. And then they ain't taking you back. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:God. And the worst part is I had like two beers. I could have drove. I'm like, I was out there all night for like four hours. Like, dude, I'm just gonna go. Just waiting for an Uber? Should have just drove. No, like the whole night I was out there for four hours, had two beers. I had someone drop my wife drop me off. I was like, Oh, god. I should have just drove. Just driven. Yeah. God.
SPEAKER_07:Uh, can we take a pee break real fast?
SPEAKER_05:I don't disagree. Um, so one of the the so right before I was supposed to launch, that night before I thought I thought I was maybe to go kill bad guys who shot at us. Uh, it was another time where we're like a vampire, vampire. So we're like, oh shit. We like gather in the galley, like, all right, what's your job? Like, what's your job? Like, all right, how can I help? Like, dude, you gotta go to bed. You're you're first on the schedule tomorrow. So pilots, you know, will give a shit about this. Like, what do you do to sleep then? Exactly, right? Yeah. So I'm like kind of amped up. Yeah. But like, dude, you're first on the schedule tomorrow. You gotta get your rest because everyone makes fun of pilots. You need your eight hours of rest. I'm like, yeah, dude, I'm flying like in the air. You're just sitting on ground, all right? Leave me alone. Yeah, if you relax. Enjoy your float, Mark. Right, yeah. I'm going to I'm working against gravity right now. I don't know.
SPEAKER_03:You know, ever heard of it?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Um so I just remember, dude, this was kind of a harrowing thing. I remember falling asleep or going to bed, and my bunk was like along the waterline or very close to it. I remember hearing the water line, and then simultaneously. Yeah, as the boat's moving, right? And you just kind of hear like water running off. Dude, I would sleep like a fucking baby. It's actually kind of awesome sleeping because you're in this little like cocoon. Yeah. It's like a little coffin size. You put it, you close your curtain. Yeah, you just hear right. Oh, dude. But the next thing I heard was our defense missiles launching. Problem. Which was like uh both waterline, missile, me, dead, right? I've got a problem. Right. Dude, so I just it was kind of a surreal thing to think about. Like, I'm going to bed. I hear our missiles launching, but I gotta go to bed because I'm work, like, I gotta maybe do something tomorrow. Yeah. Like, I hope I survived the night. Like in kind of the contingency plans. Like, if we get hit, like how do I get up the stairs as fast as I can to get above the water, right? Um, it just something to think back on, which I kind of always like tell them when I talk about this, is like it was you know, it was kind of intense. I'm not saying I'm like a war hero, I was in Fallujah, I was getting shot at with bullets whizzing by my head. No, no, no. It's about as close as I got to it.
SPEAKER_08:This is this is an integral uh a lot of vets can relate to this, what you're explaining though, how you had that contingency plan rolling in your head.
SPEAKER_07:Well, a lot of that I think is like the key point is like the fear of the possibility. Yeah, I mean that alone, like I don't like the word fear. Uh well, based on based on like psychology psychology of being like on high alert or like having that constant need of like preparedness.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, do you keep well what I was gonna say before I was rudely interrupted was do you want me to do it again? Do you keep that with you today?
SPEAKER_05:Do you think about things like that? Probably too much, right? I think I'm too cynical where I'm like waiting for the other shoe to drop. Yeah, where you're like you can ever be kind of comfortable of like, all right, yeah, dude. I was talking to someone the other day about monetary things. He's like, dude, your your money's probably gonna go up. It's gone up every year of your life, pretty much. I'm like, yeah, for the most part.
SPEAKER_07:That's called inflation. Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_05:I'm like, yeah, I've had I've been blessed enough to like in the military, your pay goes up every two years, whatever you get a promotion or whatever, blah blah blah shit like that. He's like, well, it's gone up every time, right? Like, yeah, but what if, what if? Yeah, what if I don't? That what if coming through my head all the time is kind of like it can be debilitating. Because what if is a very dangerous it's like I think I find it to be the root of anxiety. It's like what anxiety feeds off of like, what if?
SPEAKER_04:You know, what if what if you fall and break your leg? What are you gonna do now? I'm like, I don't know.
SPEAKER_05:Why are you telling I what why is this even a fear of mine right now? I'm sitting in my chair. I'm like, why leave me the fuck alone?
SPEAKER_08:What if a femur explodes into a thousand pieces? I'm just sitting having a good day until you're right.
SPEAKER_05:Like, what if you have a stroke right now? I'm like, I don't know. Fuck.
SPEAKER_08:What if I uh damn it? What do we do? Uh but yeah, probably too much. I was curious if you think about that. Like, I think about that shit all the time. Like, what is the quickest way out of here? And if that's blocked, I know where to go elsewhere to get out of this building.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, like no, there's that too for sure. And I'm a little too aware too sometimes where you can't relax a little bit. I swear. I swear I notice too much. My wife's like, calm down.
SPEAKER_07:But look at that person over there. Well, what's the rest of that story? Like, you got the defense missiles going on.
SPEAKER_05:So defense missiles going on, I wake up the next morning, they're like, hey, we have some intel on a ship that shot at us, we know where it is. I'm like, fuck it. Let's go. Let's go. And I'm in the helicopter, we're spinning, and we're about to take off. We're loaded with four hellfire, ready to rock and roll, right? Yeah. And uh they come up like, hey, it looks like that ship that we had eyes on. It's about 200 miles away, which we had SOPs, standard operating procedures out of range. We couldn't get there in back. So 150 ship to ship. Right? It's like, why don't we wait to see if he comes out of his little hiding spot and he comes out and we'll go get him.
SPEAKER_07:What's the range on a Hellfire?
SPEAKER_04:Uh 8,000 meters is probably tops. Wow, how did I remember that?
SPEAKER_08:Uh that's just just south at two miles. Two miles. That's a long, that's a long job. I think that's about right from what I remember correctly. Holy smokes, boy. Uh, we're actually, yeah, I actually I'm curious. Look this up. Look up the go to all. I want to know the range. Uh oh, it's actually four to seven miles. Seven to eleven kilometers. So you weren't wrong. Eight thousand kilometers is You know what? Maybe I was thinking kilometers. Now I don't remember. Oh, yeah, because you said feet, and I was I said meters. Oh, meters, which is basically a kilometer. Yeah. Meter meter thousand.
SPEAKER_07:Uh what'd I say?
SPEAKER_08:Eight kilometers? No, I thought you said feet.
SPEAKER_05:I might have said eight thousand meters, which is eight to kilometers.
SPEAKER_08:Uh, but anyways, I wasn't science. Science says four to seven miles. Uh, thank you, Google AI. Uh, eight.
SPEAKER_05:Eight meet eight thousand meters, eight kilometers is four miles-ish. Yeah, I think. So I wasn't wrong. I think that was like our optimum shooting range was that.
SPEAKER_07:So there wasn't like a real sticky situation that you experienced that time, no.
SPEAKER_05:So we didn't launch. We were shot dude the next day. We're shot at again. This was kind of funny. We're like in a kind of high transit area, and uh as we were chained to the deck, our guy in the tower, he's like, Hey, look out your right window. So we swapped the fleer over there because we're on the deck, and these guys in a boat, like a little like fishing boat, just like fond of circling our boat. We're like, the fuck? What are we doing here? Can we get off the deck or else we get shot at? Yeah, like literally, like it could just be like, Hey, RPG, we can't move. It's like, can we? And we literally told our guy in the back, yo, dude, lock and load, let's get going, let's see what happens. We're not we don't know. It's a very like high pressure situation. This had never really happened in the Navy before then.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, you're secluded to this boat.
SPEAKER_05:Like you have a finite amount of space. And we're literally chained to it in the helicopter. Like, we can't just like oh get out of the way. Like, no, like, can you get the chains off? Can we get going? Um, and it was just kind of wild. It was just high pressure, high tense. Everything was like high alert. Uh, the the guy was flying with that day. I think he's like, dude, I just saw a missile fly by. I was like, there was a missile and not like a bird on the fleet. Because we're just scanning the flee or like skull or something. Exactly. Like how it was just very tense.
SPEAKER_08:Um that's fucking wild, dude.
SPEAKER_05:So that was the highlight of that deployment, minus going to Northern Ireland later that year, which was very fun.
SPEAKER_08:Northern Ireland?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, Derry, like where the Titanic was built.
SPEAKER_08:Oh shit. Okay. I've never been to Ireland. I wanna want to go.
SPEAKER_05:Ireland is a low-key, probably like best deployment spot in the Navy because they all speak your language and they think you're exotic.
SPEAKER_07:Well, they all speak your language until like 5 p.m. their time.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, yeah. When they hit the bars. Yeah. No, but it was great. The girls were like, oh, we love your accent. I'm like, what accent? Yeah. You mean like this one?
SPEAKER_03:What are you talking about?
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:I haven't seen you in dog's age.
SPEAKER_03:We're in the head of that one out.
SPEAKER_08:Uh oh, yeah, I forgot. You can't say dog's age anymore. Right, that's good. Um that's crazy. How long did you spend in uh Northern Ireland?
SPEAKER_03:That was like a uh four-day four-day port call, probably.
SPEAKER_05:But it was legit. They had like a celebration for us. It was right around Christmas. So when we went to the bars, it was like the last day of all the teachers in school. So they all hit the bars too. Oh, yeah. It was a good time.
SPEAKER_07:Did you meet your wife while you were in the Navy?
SPEAKER_05:Uh yes. In Northern Ireland. Not in Northern Ireland. I knew you were going with that one. Um funny story how I met her. If you guys want this story.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:It's a good story. Um, I was interested in a girl. Went to visit her in Nashville. Okay. Said girl's roommate is now my wife. Is my now wife, I guess. Just kind of magic, right? So this girl, um, yeah. I was interested in her. I tried to date her a couple times before. We I was like, ah, just always the one that kind of got away. And for whatever reason, when I went to visit her, I was like, I'm just not feeling the chemistry. Like, I'm sorry. I just thought I was hoping for more. We were both like feeling it out. Like, that's why I went to visit her. And as soon as I went and visited, I was like, I'm just not feeling this chemistry too well. And that same weekend I visit her, my wife was kind of third wheeling the whole time because this girl was like, ah, can you just hang out with us for a little bit? I know this guy, but not that well. And my wife's like, sure, I got nothing. Yeah, right. Maybe this is why I didn't feel any chemistry. Um, so my wife third wheeled the whole time, and I just remember being like, everything was that my wife did was cool. I was like, that's awesome. She's like, I would I love the military. I'm like, I'm in the military. Yeah, she starts tap dancing and you're like, I love tap ranging. Kind of stuff like that. It's just fun. No, like it was. We were like, I was a bit of an a cappella nerd then in that in that age of my life. Loved a cappella. I don't know, it was weird. It was like a phase of life. The tone rangers? Hell yeah, dude.
SPEAKER_08:I'm here for it.
SPEAKER_04:I don't okay, Tone Rangers.
SPEAKER_08:Uh Tone Rangers, that's the uh the breakup reference for all of that. Uh, okay.
SPEAKER_07:I thought you were talking about like the different color tones of the Power Rangers. Nope. It was a poor reference.
SPEAKER_05:Uh the Grays Grayscale Power Rangers?
SPEAKER_08:Like primary. So you can still sing? Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Not right now. I got a shitty voice right now.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, you're coming off the cold.
SPEAKER_05:Coming off the cold. Um, no, I loved a cappella. Uh there was what was that show? The sing-off? Was that what it's called? It was like an a cappella group. Okay. But I heard about like straight no chase. Anyways, I'm big into like a cappella. My wife's like, oh, I was part of the I led the a cappella group in college. I was like, Marry me. Marry me. Stop talking.
SPEAKER_08:Have my children.
SPEAKER_07:So when you would go out, like I think it's always interesting to bring up to like military guys that found their spouse in the military. Like, we talked with Paul, like like their wives are low-key a part of like the military. Even though like they they still serve, but they serve at home, like making the houses, maintain kids, and all that. Like, you clearly didn't have necessarily maybe that.
SPEAKER_05:I didn't I never deployed while we were to uh that's a lie. Sorry. I deployed for one three-month deployment while we were dating, and then for like a little month here and there while we were starting dating, but never when we were married or had kids that I deploy. I just got the timing of it all worked out. I got to a short tour where I was instructing and then to the command where Paul was.
SPEAKER_07:What's uh what's like instructing like? Because that's got to be interesting. Like so far. I've been in the bird for you know X amount of years. You're pretty expert at it now, right?
SPEAKER_05:And you're training the next guys and the Seahawk. It was just so much fun.
SPEAKER_08:Why are we here for the pocket holding dependopodic?
SPEAKER_05:I disagree with at least my my wife. Yeah, not my wife, not my wife.
SPEAKER_08:Is this something I've You never heard of this? I'm only now learning about it.
SPEAKER_05:This is like the women who are like, My husband, do you know who he is? Like, no, ma'am. When they go to the gate, like my husband's an E6. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:And the guy's like Staff Sergeant Johnson. Right, right.
SPEAKER_05:Do you know who he is?
SPEAKER_08:Never heard of him?
SPEAKER_05:Nope. Never heard of him.
SPEAKER_08:No, ma'am. And with all due respect, I'm gonna need you to put some pants on. Um or please, just something not so skin tight. We can see everything. Um we do not want to. Yeah, anyways.
SPEAKER_05:Never heard you never heard dependa pod? Oh, it's good. It's good. Or just dependa for short. Dependa for short. Terrible.
SPEAKER_07:The dependent on the thing. So funny, dude. Well, can I close the can I close the loop on my wife's story?
SPEAKER_05:So she's the third wheel with us, and me and this one girl, we talk like it's not gonna work out. So I leave that weekend, I'm like, I'm never gonna see that one girl again, my wife. The third wheel. She was she was awesome, but I can't ask for her number. That's just not cool. That's rude. Very, very rude. Yeah. Um, so she texted me though, out of the blue, a year after that. What uh right when I got back from that deployment. The odds. Seriously. The odds. And what the backstory on that was And the balls your wife had to have.
SPEAKER_08:True, true. To go to her friend who She didn't quite do that. It was close. Oh, she like snuck that of her cell phone. Like almost.
SPEAKER_05:No, her friend, her friend to her credit was like, Hey, is there anyone you've been wanting to date? You haven't dating anyone or whatever? Anyone interested. My wife, apparently apparently, she was like this. She was like, oh, someone like that guy, Alex.
SPEAKER_08:Even though I know she really was like, Oh, please, that boy, Alex, I need his number. The Acapellet Navy boy.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, give it to me. To her credit, though, her friend gave her the number, gave her my number, and he's like, Yeah, he just got back from deployment.
SPEAKER_05:You know, here's his number, give him a text. So to her credit, to Leah, my wife's credit like she she had the balls, like you said, to shoot me a text, like, hey, it's Leah. I'm like, oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_08:Shout out to Leah, dude.
SPEAKER_05:Dude, for sure. And it was like great God timing. I was like kind of coming back to my faith strong, and I was like in a really good place, like morally and and I guess emotionally, right? Um when you kind of fall away from your foundation, you're kind of floating and just grasping. I dated a girl then that entire deployment, and when I came back, I'm like, why did I date her?
SPEAKER_08:I just need somebody to write me letters. Boom. That's seriously, but to your point though.
SPEAKER_05:I was the dependent on that relationship. Please write me a letter.
SPEAKER_08:There not with so off of the woman portion of it, but like going back to the religion portion of it or like the faith or whatever rock you hold on to when you lay down at night, um, like there is nothing that will like finite that or like define that for you than going through, you know, like multiple deployments. I mean, what's the quote? Everyone's an atheist until they get into a foxhole.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, it's like they they say too on like on a plane, too, is like, you know, everybody's an atheist until they experience turbulence.
SPEAKER_05:Or right, and you start crashing, you're falling down in the sky. Like, don't they even do that in Seinfeld omas? They start they don't quite, but in the last episode, stupid last episode. But uh, yeah, no, that kind of stuff will definitely like help you find if I can go on a quick tangent, yeah, right, faith life, it's very important to me. And I think I mentioned to you Exodus 90. So that whole deployment, you're right. I I was dating this girl, and I don't mean any disrespect to her if she ever hears this. She doesn't live, she's not from here.
SPEAKER_07:She would find letters like Moses.
SPEAKER_05:Not quite, but she would like send, you know, you know, a care package. It was just nice having a foundation. Where in where my foundation should have been something more uh long-lasting, infinite, right? With with religion, God, right?
SPEAKER_08:With God. Just that in that internally, like foundation. Like it needed to be more foundational.
SPEAKER_05:But not like, hey, a girl who could break my heart tomorrow.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, not so superficial, but more foundational.
SPEAKER_05:Exactly. So that was that deployment dating that girl, and I was like, and I came back from deployment, like, I'm the same dude. I didn't grow at all. Like, I need I'm still waking up hung over on Sunday to go to mass. This is bullshit.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And uh, it was a great moment in my life. I talked to my uncle and a good friend of mine who's a priest, and I tell my priest friend every day, or not every day, uh often, like, dude, you saved my life. You know, and and it's not I don't say that to be like dramatic in a way, but you saved my soul, really, truly. Because he's like, hey dude, break it with this girl, because you know it's not good for you, and then go to Exodus 90. And I told you about this Exodus 90, I'll go to a plug for it here. Basically, it's a super asceticism course where you like cold showers, no TV, no drinking. Um basically to get rid of everything, get rid of all distractions in your life, minimal inner internet use, um just and you're focusing on prayer and and um it's like a program.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, it's a program. It's like uh Andy Frisella's like uh 90 Days Hard or whatever.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, similar. It's a similar concept.
SPEAKER_05:Uh so I like this here daily prayer, holy hour, no desserts, aestheticism, cold showers, no technology, right?
SPEAKER_06:Just get rid of no dessert?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, brother.
SPEAKER_06:No sweets.
SPEAKER_05:You're fasting on like Wednesdays and Fridays, no meat on Wednesdays and Fridays. It's like hardcore. It's a great reset for your bot for your life. Gotta have my raisin brand, dude.
SPEAKER_08:I gotta have my rain.
SPEAKER_05:I don't know if that counts as a sweet, but we'll see.
SPEAKER_08:Okay. Alright, I gotta have my raisin brand. I think it means like no cake.
SPEAKER_07:You just gotta get regular Cheerios, no honey nut.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, no honey nut, motherfucker. Oh yeah, dude, that's what's up. I did this.
SPEAKER_08:Dude, this is sick though.
SPEAKER_05:It's good. And it really brings you back to like foundation things. Speaking of foundation, right? And it's for they call it Exodus because you're going through your Exodus.
SPEAKER_08:For the rock, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:What was the Jews? The Exodus was like, hey, you're out of Egypt. You need a cleansing.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Well, not biblical Jews. Yeah, sorry. Biblical Jews, easy now. It was a cleansing moment, right? You're not ready for the Holy Land. You gotta go through the desert.
SPEAKER_07:Yeah, for 40 years.
SPEAKER_05:For them, unfortunately. And they say 90 days for this because that that's like, you know, the scientifically the time to break a habit and form a new one. 90 days to like get I thought it was like two weeks. Three months. Three months. It takes three months to make her break a habit. Which 30 days of September? Hell yeah. Yeah, 21 days. All right. Hell yeah, dude. So I was doing this when my wife, my now wife, texted me. So I was like on fire, flank like you're fucking rolling. Rocking and rolling. Which was which was again a God moment, because had I not been, had I still been like floating around trying to chase girls and like find that as my foundation, she'd have been like, nah, was your wife already Catholic?
SPEAKER_07:Yeah. Yeah, she's Catholic.
SPEAKER_05:And she's just a rock solid lady. And um, had I been like fucked hard, excuse me.
SPEAKER_08:Uh excuse me, I'm so much worse than you are.
SPEAKER_05:If I had been fucked hard, she'd been like, eh, yeah, not so much. So truly, God's timing and God's like that's why I tell my my priest friend, I'm like, dude, you saved my life. Seriously, he getting me to start this program, getting me to revisit my life and re like order my life again with that foundation is and I'm not perfect by any means. Fail a lot, and I need to sometimes like do this again to kind of like, hey, motherfucker, wake up hard reset.
SPEAKER_08:Exactly.
SPEAKER_05:And that's what this is. It's a hard that's why I kind of recommend it to you. If you're trying to come back into the faith, yeah and like just see what that's all about again. Go all in. And you don't need to do this for life, right? Yeah. Give it a shot. 90 days, and it's a I mean, wow, think about no distractions.
SPEAKER_08:Get rid of Insta, get rid of Twitter, get it rid of all that shit. Just delete my life, dude. You'll hey, can you hold down the podcast for 90 days?
SPEAKER_03:Sure, man. You can still do podcasts, just can't look your shit up.
SPEAKER_05:Just have just have Tom look it all up.
SPEAKER_07:Tom, I don't know what's going on in the world, dude. Tom, I'm gonna need you to edit audio for 90 days.
SPEAKER_05:No, but I did. I deleted my Facebook. I like cut off all my friends I used to go boozing with. It was like a hard reset. Anyways, that was after that deployment. Commercial when you transitioned. So what was that like? So when I transitioned. Wow.
SPEAKER_08:We just opened No, we're back. So we are back. We are in fact opening with when you transitioned. What was that like?
SPEAKER_05:It was it was a difficult time. No one understood me. Yeah, no one understood what I was doing. Um so that kind of took a it was a longer than just a one-step process, right? So I was instructing in the helicopter, which was very fun. You kind of asked that question before. It was a lot of fun training new people, and you're kind of expert flyer in the Seahawk now. Yeah, you're the SMI, dude. And the SME. Yeah. And you get these young kids like, I don't know what I'm doing. Like, hey, watch this. And you're like, yeah, watch this. I can hover with two fingers and you're a little fun. I also got to instruct Saudi Arabian pilots. Not as fun. Terrifying.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, because terrible drivers. Yeah, exactly. Dude, dude, those are the guys. And they're like, inshallah, inshallah. They're like, no, motherfucker, let's go. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Those are the guys with like the mopeds that they stack like fucking 40 feet of cargo on a moped. I'm like, dude, what are we doing here?
SPEAKER_05:Um so I got to instruct some of them and it was a good time. Uh yeah, dude. So while I was instructing though, I was like, dude, I think I might want to do this airline thing. So I had some fixed swing time, right? Beginning of my training, but a lot of my time is is rotary. Rotary. And so the airlines don't really care. They're like, cool. You fly helicopters, that's not a plane. Yeah. Well, that's not, you know, it's not a hundred and seventy thousand pound plane. Like, we don't really care if you're flying a helicopter. So I started getting like my ratings on the side. And again, ratings, so it's it you have your license, your pilot's license, right? And then you get a commercial license, which means it's just more advanced, right? You have you can fly instruments now and you can be paid for it. Yeah. Ratings though, is like what can you fly?
SPEAKER_06:Ooh, okay.
SPEAKER_05:So initially, when you get your private pilot's license, your rating is really just like single engine land. You can fly a single engine plane from land.
SPEAKER_08:Okay.
SPEAKER_05:So I went to get my prop plane. Yeah. So I went to get my commercial multi-engine plane. Okay. So two engines, right? Yeah. And then I got my uh instructor add-on. So I was an instructor for helicopters, it became one for a plane in the civilian world.
SPEAKER_07:Is that like your secondary pilot basically?
SPEAKER_05:No, secondary pilot.
SPEAKER_07:Like, don't some planes have like a like a co-pilot?
SPEAKER_05:So, yeah, this was like an instructor. So now all planes, almost every general aviation plane, almost every plane, period. Except for like an F-18 or F-16, have two sets of controls side by side, right? So in the 737, there's my controls and there's his controls, and they both do the exact, they're all connected.
SPEAKER_08:Okay.
SPEAKER_05:So in a regular general aviation, you go in a Cessna 172 with a buddy tomorrow, and there's controls here, controls here. So when you're an instructor, you're just sitting and mostly not touching everything. You're like, all right, dude, let's go. Yeah. Unless it's like this thing going. Unless he's like brand brand new, right? Like, all right, this is how you take off. You pull, push, and power, you do the power here at 80%, and you're as you're doing it, and you're talking, you know, you pull back a little bit on the stick, you start flying. So I was an instructor on the civilian side, kind of teaching on the side. You get some money and you get hours. I'm getting all my fixed wing hours, my plane hours. Instructing. Instructing. Or and then um and then I found a company that have you heard of Skillbridge?
unknown:Skillbridge.
SPEAKER_05:So it was a program in the DOD, they've tweaked it down a little bit.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, yeah, yeah. It it links you from what you did here and puts you into the civilian world.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, so it's an unpaid internship into in the civilian world while you're still in the military. Yeah. So I found a company, I found a company that was flying a charter in a Piper Saratoga, which is a single engine plane tur uh piston, so not turb, not super, super fast, but you could carry like four people in the back.
SPEAKER_08:Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So I was channeling people from the outer banks and like Raleigh to the Outer Banks and different places in the outer banks. Um I got a bunch of hours during that, and then I'd accumulated enough fixed wing hours combined with my rotary hours. Um I had enough total time and enough experience, and uh, civilian companies like military experience because you know I'm flying in combat zones, I'm flying in high pressure situations, it's not just like I don't a lot of discipline, and I don't mean to demean like people who go straight from civilian flying all the way up to airlines, but a lot of times they're just instructors and like, all right, we're gonna beat around the pattern, and then we're gonna fly over here a little bit, and then you can do a stall and come back. Yeah, like no, dude, I'm taking off from a boat in the middle of the Arabian Gulf where I might get shot at, or you know, it's dark and I'm wearing night vision goggles.
SPEAKER_08:Like, there's a little more like I want the pilot that's gonna land me in the damn river in New York. Yeah, yeah. You want Sully. What was that? Sully, yeah. I want to fucking Air Force pilot. I want a Sully, dude. I want to know when the shit hits the fan, these 150 people are gonna live. Yeah, I don't care if I have to land this thing on an oil rig. Exactly. We're gonna figure it the fuck out.
SPEAKER_05:And you kind of get that a probably a little more with the military.
SPEAKER_08:And get it to the ground. Right.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Um, I think that so I I think they like favor that a little bit. Because you have that leadership experience. Yeah, just a little more. So I had a cumulative hours and I was getting in the Navy. This was in 2022. Uh this was also during the COVID times. Dang, dark years, dark days.
SPEAKER_08:You're still pretty fresh to the civilian world. Yeah, very damn.
SPEAKER_05:Um so I went to a company uh right when I got in the Navy, I went to a company called NetJets. Uh and NetJets is the best way to explain it. They are a timeshare for Uber wealthy having a private jet. So you you say, like, hey, I want access to this private jet that you guys have whenever I want it, right? It's like Uber for jets. Yeah. So but they have a timeshare. Yeah, but I'm flying it, so it's not way better. Right, right. Um Yeah, so it's I I like to think of it as a timeshare. So like when you get a timeshare, you say, Hey, I want a uh a 3-2 apartment condo in Palm uh Panama City Beach, Florida, right? Yeah. And they don't it's not the always the exact same room, but it's a 3-2 in Panama City Beach. Hell yeah. These guys say, Hey, I want this citation latitude for a hundred hours a year whenever I ask for it, and they pay lots of money. And NetJets has 300 of these citation latitudes, and the guy says, Hey, I need to get picked up in Pittsburgh. All right, cool, we'll get you a jet there tomorrow.
SPEAKER_04:All right, cool.
SPEAKER_05:So I flew for them. I've so I flew a bunch of private pilot, you know, exec they're most like an executive.
SPEAKER_07:Like an on-call pilot. So basically, like you're at home and they're like, Hey, we need to fly somebody from New York.
SPEAKER_05:I wasn't at home. We would be on for seven days. But I didn't know where I was flying to, I wasn't know who I was gonna fly. It was all just like by need, right? And they would have this big algo that's gonna figure out like, hey, someone requested this guy here. We need two pilots in a plane over there. We need someone here, right? Yeah. So I'd be on the road for seven days bouncing between everywhere. Uh get what, a week off. And then I'd get a week off. Yeah, seven on, seven off. It wasn't a bad gig. Uh okay. Yeah. No, it was good. It's a good company. It's a Warren Buffett owned company.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, shout out to Warren Buffett. Yeah. That dude's a gangster.
SPEAKER_05:Dude, and this is the funniest part. He uh he bought it because he went on, he's like, hmm, this is. Kind of nice. So he bought the whole fucking company.
SPEAKER_07:Of course.
SPEAKER_05:He's like, huh. I like this private jet thing.
SPEAKER_07:I wrote an Anuber one time and now I own the company.
SPEAKER_08:Warren Buffett walks into it basically. Walks into a PF Chang's. He's like, you know what? It's pretty sick. I'm gonna buy the whole thing. Yeah. All like this one and no. All of it. No, everything. International chain. I want the whole thing. Exactly.
SPEAKER_05:Uh so that's literally what he did. He took a net jet slide. He's like, this is pretty sick. I'll buy it. So it's under the Berktrier Hathaway umbrella umbrella.
SPEAKER_08:Oh my gosh, that's insane, dude.
SPEAKER_07:Warren, yeah, Warren is a gangster, like straight up. Pretty legit. So you go through that like basically on-call pilot thing. How long did you do that?
SPEAKER_05:Uh about 10 months. So I got out of the Navy January of 23. I got on, I was already hired by them or a what do they call it? CJO conditional job offer, which is basically like, hey, here's a job offer. Yeah. And I started with them January 9th of 23. Um and I had uh so kind of as I retraced a little bit, I sent in an application to friends of my current airline shit. I can't believe it. Okay. I sent an application to my airline um that fall prior just to kind of like get a meet and greet. You had to have an application on file. I was like, oh fuck it. I didn't have the hours, I didn't have the experience, I had nothing. Um so I'm flying with NetJets, going all happy, fat dumb and happy. I'm like, this is good. This is a good like starter gig. It's a good gig. And they email me like, hey Alex, your application looks great. Can you just submit a resume and we'll get you an interview?
SPEAKER_04:I'm like, the fuck?
SPEAKER_05:Okay. Uh sure. Yeah. Sounds good. I literally, I was like, that's out of the blue. Yeah. Um but it was legit. It was actually for real. It wasn't a uh catfish operation. Hell yeah. It was dope, dude. Yeah, so I interviewed with my with my airline, and then I got hired in November. I started with my airline in November of 23. So not even a full year at NetJets. Got hired with a major airline in the United States, which is honestly uh very blessed. Like it takes some people years to get as a as a civilian.
SPEAKER_07:The question is how much of it is actually like automated?
SPEAKER_05:Okay. A good amount. Um 80%. So what are we defining as automated? Am I just pressing like go to Phoenix and it does from the moment you get in the cockpit, right?
SPEAKER_08:And you sit down and the chalk blocks are taken out.
SPEAKER_05:Right. So even then it's not fully automated. So obviously the captain is the one who's steering us on the ground. Right. We take off, that's all us. Once we get to altitude, we hit the autopilot button. Right? The autopilot though isn't it kind of knows as long as we have with all the pre-planning stuff, so our points like are set in the computer, and it's the computer's right, it'll take you to each point. Um, but there's a lot that we can manipulate. I like to think of it as the autopilot, as the muscle. You're gonna have to move this giant one, like I said, 150,000 pound machine, which I can move by myself, but it gets tiring after a while. It can do it better than I can. So I like to think of it as a muscle, but I'm the brain, and I can control the you know, I have to manage the brain.
SPEAKER_07:We're hitting X amount of turbulence.
SPEAKER_05:Let's well I'll slow it down, I'll slow it down, or like, hey, ATC, is it better at 35,000 instead of 37,000? Like, yeah, much better. We haven't had any complaints. In fact, they say it's smooth out there. Like, okay, shit, let's go down to 37. So you manipulate this this control panel. Um, hey Jake, if you want to pull up Boeing 737 MCP, try that. See if it works up on images. MCP? Mike Charlie Papa. Um just 737 MCP. That works. Um is this the control panel?
SPEAKER_02:You're not talking about yourself like that, brother.
SPEAKER_08:Um let's see, go to pictures, because I think that's what he's wanting to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Here we go. So this panel is like, you know, your altitude, your speed. That works. You get a basic gist, right? These are all the buttons of how I tell the computer what to do.
SPEAKER_08:Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_05:So I don't want to diminish what we do by any means, but we're very much like uh managers of the entire situation. Right? You're going uh, you know, 400 miles an hour in a metal tube at different altitudes, a lot of different deconflicting things, and you're just managing the situation.
SPEAKER_07:What about landing? You said takeoff is manned.
SPEAKER_08:Takeoff is manned, landing is manned. Okay. What is the highest elevation commercially anyone is allowed to fly, like with just regular civilians on there?
SPEAKER_05:Most planes won't go above 41,000 feet. Probably like I mean, you can go as high as like 80, technically.
SPEAKER_08:Like, and everything is to be pressurized and yeah, but it's all dependent on the plane.
SPEAKER_05:So we can go to 41,000, other planes can go higher. Um, and then NetJets planes we can go to 45,000 just because they're smaller, it's easier to pressurize them, right? Wild, dude.
SPEAKER_07:Um, what about your on on intercom voice? Did you like adjust? You got like a same spiel you run through. Like I saw a reel the other day of like, hey, I know people are concerned, blah, blah, blah. We're gonna.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I saw that. They they had like something they sent us in the company, like something you could say, like if you want to die a dialogue with passengers and stuff. Oh, the federal government shut down, blah, blah, blah, blah. Um, I don't have a I didn't make a new voice. I don't know if I should. I'll find out after this podcast. Like, I'll look at the see the comments. This guy's voice sucks.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, dude, by the way, speaking of voices, can you give me your pilot voice?
SPEAKER_05:See, that's what I'm saying. I don't think I have one. But I can pretend. I can give you a fake one.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, just uh we've been we've been flying now for like two or three hours and we're about to make our descent. Can you want me to do my normal or like a pretend one? No, like do what you would do. What I would do? Yeah, just like give tell me that we're about to descend into uh Phoenix, Arizona.
SPEAKER_05:Cool. Uh ladies and gentlemen from the flight deck, we're about to start our descent here into Phoenix, Arizona. Uh it should be on the ground here in the next 20 minutes or so. Uh weather in Arizona. Uh we have winds out of the southeast, about 10 knots. It's broken clouds, so a little cloudy and a nice temperature of 70 degrees. We do appreciate you flying with us today, and we hope to see you again. That's just about it.
SPEAKER_08:Do you have a script that's gonna be?
SPEAKER_05:No, I just kind of make that one flow. That was the most nerve-wracking part of my first flight. Knowing what to say. My first flight was like, fuck, all right, all right, here we go, everybody. And you press the button like this is your captain speaking.
SPEAKER_08:I don't know what I'm doing, but we're about to hit the ground. Luckily, I'm not the captain. Dude, that is sick, dude. That's so crazy.
SPEAKER_07:As you can see, we turned off the Wi-Fi. I have no clue what the weather I don't know why I turned off the Wi-Fi.
SPEAKER_05:Uh sorry. But yeah, I think my first my first call, you know, I don't do it all the time. I'm kind of supposed to. Like, all right, ladies and gentlemen, from the flight check, we're we just start cruising out to you of 35,000 feet. I'll turn off the we're expecting some smooth air, so I'll turn off the seatbelt sign. Do ask that while you're seated. You please keep on your seatbelt sign in the event of any unexpected rough air. We got about another three hours of flying, so please sit back, relax, and enjoy the flight.
SPEAKER_06:Do you guys have like pranks or anything that you like maybe play on each other before?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, probably years before. It's a it's a very fine line, right? Because you say something and everyone's like, what the f what?
SPEAKER_08:No, no, no, not like on the intercom. Like, well, we'll do it with each other. Yeah, you'll get fucking fired for it. Occasionally. Yeah, yeah. Fucked. No, I mean like you and the other pilot, do you ever put like a rubber ducky in his chair or something? I don't know. Like, whatever. Man, you fly with someone different all the time.
SPEAKER_06:I don't know.
SPEAKER_05:I had one I had one captain who was kind of funny. What would you do?
SPEAKER_08:Is there like a running pilot? Like, I guess it's like maybe not a running one, no. Running joke or a gag.
SPEAKER_05:One I like sometimes. It's kind of it's like stupid funny. Like, so you take off, you're flying, yeah. And then you go autopilot on. You have to kind of say what you're doing, so no one's like, what the fuck, dude? Yeah. So one I like is like, I thought it was on this whole time.
SPEAKER_08:That's nice, dude. Yeah, I like that one. Real dad vibes. Yeah, I like that I'm all dad. I'm all dad jokes, right?
SPEAKER_05:Dad vibes, dude. Hell yeah.
SPEAKER_08:That's sick.
SPEAKER_05:Sometimes so I I mean it's stupid shit, but like the flat tens, you have to ask them to go to the bathroom because they have to set up a cart, you know, safety and stuff. Oh, yeah. They literally set up a cart in front. I don't know if you've seen this. I'll set up a cart in the very end of first class. So when I open the door to the cockpit, no one can bum rush and get in and you know, 9-11. Right.
SPEAKER_08:Hashtag never forget. Never forget. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Um so the I'll be like, hey, can we set up a bathroom break? Like, oh sure, we'll set it up. And they call back and they go, hey, we're ready. I'm like, for what? Like the bathroom? Like that's the best. I just do shit like every once in a while, you know. I think I think it's five minutes ago.
SPEAKER_07:I just went right here.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, yeah, yeah. You guys took too fucking long.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, I just took a shit in the cockpit. We're gonna keep this puppy rolling. We ain't stopping.
SPEAKER_03:No stop till Brooklyn.
unknown:I ain't never gonna stop.
SPEAKER_03:Dude, I did have a captain, I liked it.
SPEAKER_05:So they're supposed to open the door to the bathroom, make sure no one's in there, right? Makes sense. So my captain would go out and be like, I go out there and I go, dude, someone's in here.
SPEAKER_03:To the bathroom. The flat is like, what? You know. I was like, I like that. That's that's good shit right there.
SPEAKER_07:Has there ever been like, have you ever been like on like in flight and somebody like smoked a cigarette or done anything like in the city?
SPEAKER_05:Uh not in flight while we're taxiing out. We'll get the call from the they'll vape. It's mostly vapors, right? Uh damn. They think they can get away with it.
SPEAKER_04:It's not real smoke. It's vapor.
SPEAKER_08:That's so fun.
SPEAKER_05:Uh and we just call them and like the flight team's like, we told them to stop or else you can get in trouble. He stopped. Like, all right, we'll just fucking keep going.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, Charlie Mike, dude. Let's keep this puppy rolling. Charlie Mike?
SPEAKER_05:Uh, continue mission. Oh, I was thinking Oscar Mike. What's Oscar Mike? We're on the move, baby. Yeah, that's right. Dude, I played Call of Duty, and that's all I know.
SPEAKER_08:Hell yeah, dude. Have you played the new Call of Duty? I don't have this. I don't have time for video games anymore. I got four kids. Yeah, I don't know what the new I heard. You know what I mean? Exactly. Oh, that's actually a good question. Do you d like dabble or have you ever in your last 15 years or so dabbled with like the flight simulators and stuff like that? Like whether it's like a Microsoft simulator? Or a console or briefly.
SPEAKER_05:When I was like getting ready for interviews. How accurate are those compared to like I can be I can speak well enough. Because it's all about like also controllability, like what buttons are at the press to do the right things. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. I've seen good setups you can find online. They're not as cheap, but like I mean that that one image of the Bone 737 cockpit, like that's something you could buy. People will set up a Bone 737 simulator. They'll get that MCP panel, they'll get all the same exact dials and everything I have up front in the in the cockpit of a oh sorry, the flight deck. Cockpit is not politically correct.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, damn. I said cockpit earlier.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I know. Um but yeah, you can get a whole full setup. So I think the simulators themselves are good. I did it for my Xbox one time when I was when I applied to NetJets, everyone was saying, like, oh, you're gonna have you ride in a simulator and feel like show them that you have decent skills, yeah, right? That your monkey skills are good enough. So I like, I'll try the simulator to see if it's gonna be worth my time. It wasn't so much, right?
SPEAKER_07:Dude, I remember my grandpa. And it was like a USB-C plugin, and it was literally just like uh like a drone controller nowadays, and it was like thrust and whatever, and then you had to adjust everything from there.
SPEAKER_05:Um but speaking of simulators, so we do simulate. I just came back from it looks like a helicopter. No, that's not a helicopter. Never mind, I lied. Not a helicopter. Um I just came back from recurrent, so every year you guys will be happy to hear. There's just 737. Hit that one, yeah. I recognize that baby anywhere. That is so that's my that's my office right there.
SPEAKER_08:That is hot, dude. What's the notepad for? Do you guys do like Pictionary up there? Tic tac-toe. Just a little bit of notes here and there. Are you guys playing hangman up front and what it gets a little boring sometimes?
SPEAKER_05:Um it can, but we're always alert. Hell yeah. Um Yeah, so I just finished with current and like Yeah, what is that? So you you go back every year and they just have you practice like, hey, engine failure. What are you gonna do? And it's just like there's procedures, right? So you just make sure you got your procedures on lock. And uh our simulators though are full motion. So like you go up, it moves, right? It moves as you move. Oh no shit. They have like a bridge comes up, it's full on hydraulics or electric motion and stuff. Oh yeah, dude. Pretty good. And it's in light of uh, you know, unfortunately, the uh UPS incident. Um it was just kind of it was kind of sobering. Like I just practiced all of these uh simulators. Uh I have done this, by the way. But not so much army. Look up a helo dunker.
SPEAKER_08:What's a helo dunker? Oh, like underwater? Yeah. Oh no.
SPEAKER_05:Done that many times.
SPEAKER_08:Like you actually go in water. Yes. No, and they make you get out of it. Yeah. They make you like you're buckled in.
SPEAKER_07:That's smart because there was just that like one helicopter crash where like the like uh I think some half the back half of the helicopter came off. She was like trying to fly out again and like it crashed.
SPEAKER_08:I did not see that. In the so in the army, we we had to do a little bit with it with the uh so he had a picture pulled up of the M wraps. The roll dunker, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I don't know if the MRAPs go in water, right?
SPEAKER_08:No, m wraps are four-wheel, four-wheel drive vehicles.
SPEAKER_05:Maybe I think the marine, what if the marines have a something that can go amphibiously?
SPEAKER_08:Before you can deploy, they send you to California and you do a bunch of bullshit. And this is one of the bullshit trains. You get hit by an IED, you get napped. Yeah, so your truck rolls over, you've got a gunner sticking out the hatch, you've got all this shit flying, all these guns and radios and cables, and you've gotta be able to navigate out of the and it's the most I did not it wasn't bad for me. Like, I don't mind being upside down and like having to dismount and shit, but like it makes me nervous thinking about it in helicopter underwater. For sure, dude. That's nerve-wracking for me. But yeah, he has a very similar process with these uh MRAP rollovers.
SPEAKER_05:It's great training, some of the best training. It's practical. Very yeah, very practical. The one thing you couldn't simulate in the Helo Dunker was Oh, he didn't practice?
SPEAKER_08:Oh yeah, he stayed out of the hatch and got Damn, that's uh not a great time. Yeah, rest in peace, brother. Rollover drills are very Yeah, it's a big thing in the infantry. Mechanized infantry, they are all very familiar with the uh rollover drills. For sure. 100%. But the underwater though, so what was that like?
SPEAKER_05:Um, kind of what you expect. So you're strapped in either in the back or like you're in the cockpit, like flying or the front flying. Um, and yeah, they just kind of goes in the water and it spins over, and you have to wait till like fully spun over to unbuckle. You find your window, you keep your reference point, find your window, push the window out, and like pull yourself out.
SPEAKER_08:At any point, you do.
SPEAKER_05:So we we flew with oxygen that was good for like 10 minutes, they said. Okay. But I had never scubaed before. So if you haven't like thought of that brain kind of function, right? Like for I don't know if you guys have scuba, but the first time you scoop, you're like, I can breathe. Like you know, you're like trying to breathe normally. Yeah. So I didn't like doing the oxygen, so I've just kind of hold my breath. Really? And you kind of make it work, yeah. Um maybe now that I've scuba it, I would actually use the oxygen, but it's hard because your nose is like fully open. It's not like you know, scuba, you got a mask on and all that shit. And you're here, yeah. You just plop in. Um it was it was it's good training. It's I guess all I can say. And they give you blackout goggles. So they give you goggles that are like are painted black, so you can't see it like simulated at night. Yeah. So you just have to kind of feel your fucking way and kind of see like where you're going. It's all like no swimming, like you just gotta hand over hand find your way out. Or if you're in the left seat, like all right, boom, we're done, we're under. You grab your reference point right here, you unbuckle, or the window you know is on your left side, because it's all upside down. Yeah, so you know your window's on your left side, doesn't matter what it looks like, just pop that thing open and then grab it and go. Yeah. Um, the one thing that, like I said, they didn't simulate is should a helicopter go under, that thing is sinking probably so fast. And that I can't imagine just that feeling of rushing down. Yeah. I mean our helicopters probably weigh like 15,000 pounds, 16, 17, right?
SPEAKER_08:And then as soon as that cavity fills with water, you are tired.
SPEAKER_05:You're a brick. So you gotta get out kind of quick and then like swim, inflate, and god hope your LPU inflates, you know, your Yeah, dude.
SPEAKER_08:Your life vests. Um that is sweaty. Um so you've been flying now commercially for for a few years, and and you're loving it. Yeah, and we're wishing you nothing but the best for sure. But appreciate it. You've done a ton of training, been through a ton of uh you've got this a massive amount of perseverance within you, and for that I applaud you. But a lot of folks at home um that are going through similar situations, maybe not piloting or whatever, but what have you, whatever their challenge may be, we like to ask, like during your most challenging moment, whatever that moment may look like, it could be daunting, it could be depression, it could be whatever. It could be at any point through any of your training. Did you ever have a dark moment where you were like, I'm not cut for this, or this isn't cut for me, or I'm gonna get out, or this is dumb, or whatever. And then more importantly, in that moment, what was it that kept you on the right path and like brought you here to the day's grim today to talk about piloting?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, for sure. Thank you. That's a good question. Um So I think training uh in the helicopter, you have to become an aircraft commander, right? And it's a pretty long, lengthy process.
SPEAKER_04:Right.
SPEAKER_05:And they ask all these questions and it's like, how do you much knowledge, you know? And they throw scenarios at you, like, how are you gonna handle this scenario? What are you gonna do now? What are you like? And it's tough. And there I I didn't pass my first two, just for kind of nuances here and there. Yeah because it's really specific, and they get I kind of get like, oh, you said one thing wrong, you're like, We're left. Um, and man, that was tough because you're like you've been told that you failed, right? And you you literally meet failure in the face and it says, Yep, you failed, that sucks. Not good enough. Yeah, exactly. Um, and that can be tough, and you it's very easy to in that moment to be like, fuck it, I'm done. This is stupid. I can go find another job, I'll do something else. Um it was an element of I guess just like kind of what got me through a lot of the military was just a little bit of the the pride of like, hey, I'm not gonna be the one who quits. Right? And I don't know if that's like a value, a virtue, right?
SPEAKER_07:It's perseverance, I suppose, right?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it's like I didn't want to be that guy who everyone's like, oh, he quit. That sucks. Um and I and then for myself too, I didn't want to be a quitter. Um and so I think I just kind of looked at it that way. It's like, no, I don't think I am a quitter. That's not in me. And it is the option's there, like you can quit. I knew a guy who did, he's like, eh, it's just not for me. I don't want to do it. That's a little too much. Like, I get it. That's fair. Um in that in that time, I think it that's kind of what you know. I do take that second, like, is this what I want to do?
SPEAKER_07:Your morals kept you going.
SPEAKER_05:For sure. Yeah, I think just my foundation, my my family values, like we don't quit. My mom would say all the time, like, never don't say I can't. This is actually McConaughey. He has a good little quick bit. He's like, We don't say I can in this family. We say I'm having trouble, right? I'm having trouble with this situation. No, so and that's actually where we're starting to say in our house. Like, our my little two-year-old's like, I can't do it. I'm like, we don't say I can't. We say I'm having trouble and I'll come help you out. Yeah, I'm struggling. Yeah, I'm having some troubles with this. I help I'm struggling with this. Um and so that's I think that's a huge that's a good lesson in life. It's just like, hey, you can. You might need some help from someone, you might need to take another uh take another beat, take a second, but we can, you know, it just you're having some troubles. You're struggling a little bit.
SPEAKER_08:Speaking of help, what uh what advice do you have for I mean we could look at it from the civilian sector, so I guess for both, for folks that are looking to go into the military and get into aviation or or and or you know, folks that are civilians and maybe they're flying single prop planes, but they want to get into the commercial world. Like, what advice do you have for for those folks at home? Dang. Um very open-ended. Um actually one of uh I have we have a listener that actually flies rotary, uh Gareth Anderson. Um we deployed with him in uh Afghanistan.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. For him, for someone specific like that, uh it's just building time. You gotta get the experience, find ways to get the experience, get your instructor so you can make money while you're getting hours, and it helps build experience. So you get put in some odd situations, right? Um it it is kind of not so cookie cutter. There are some cookie cutter programs, but if that's what you want to do, I'd say sooner than later, right? If that's if you want to become if you've gone from zero to hero of I've never flown a plane in my life, like you know, it it's something to start sooner than later. Um, because it can be a great career, but it takes time and it takes a lot of money, unfortunately. I was blessed to avoid the paying debt because I got to fly and get all my ratings in the military and use some GI Bill stuff.
SPEAKER_07:Get those hours of flight logged.
SPEAKER_05:Hours of flight logged, right? And get the experience. Because hours kind of not maybe one for one, but like I don't know, one for two or one for a half, equal experience, right? Right. If I have 10,000 hours in aircraft, you're like, dude, that guy's flown a lot. That's 10,000 hours. I don't know how much that equates in his life, but that's it's a shit ton. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08:Um it's a it's a dog's age.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it's a dog it's Malcolm Gladwell would say, like, hey, you're an expert now. Yeah. All right. So it equals experience. So just getting that experience, and that's also just the metric that airlines use or companies will use or anyone will use, right? Hey, how many hours do you have? Like, oh, I got 3,000, you know, it's some split between here, here, and there. Um, and uh honestly, this is gonna sound very cliche, but like keep on learning as much as you can.
SPEAKER_08:That is not cliche. That is that is one of our steeples here. Like we uh we are constantly preaching. Like that's why we we do what we do. We interview multiple different people, different disciplines. You can never stop learning.
SPEAKER_05:I agree. And it's easy to kind of get complacent where you are. You know what I mean? We're like, I'm good, I got I've learned to love.
SPEAKER_07:I got this shit on autopilot. Yeah, boom.
SPEAKER_05:But you still gotta be managing that autopilot. How's that autopilot doing? I like it.
SPEAKER_07:I like it. What about uh as we wrap up last minute shout-outs? Who's got you to where you're at? Who's keeping you going?
SPEAKER_05:Well, obviously, I'd be remiss if I didn't thank you guys. I'm just kidding. Uh no, but seriously. Yeah, it's it's a big deal. So um, well, first and foremost, I mean, my wife, you guys are ah, we were good to talk about deployments. I didn't my wife never deployed or went on deployment while we were married with kids, but I go on little mini four-day deployments every week, right? So I'm gone for four days at a time while I'm flying. Yeah, and she's home with the kids and she's a freaking rock. It's amazing. Uh, people are like, how does your wife handle my? I don't know. She just does. Like, she's just badass.
SPEAKER_07:She used to hear about all those EPS, you know, wives or whatever that were freaking out, you know, nothing. I'm sure, yeah, no, I'm sure.
SPEAKER_05:And I don't know, and I'm sure my wife even after that happened, she goes, Hey, it's close to home. Like, I bet. But she's so amazing at just keeping the house steady and allowing me to go work and provide for our family without no stress. I don't have to worry about like how she's gonna be okay at home by herself, you know what I mean? Um, for sure, her uh, I mean there's a couple instructors I had in the military who were very like fundamental because they weren't like the screamers. I don't know if you guys experienced in the military, like the screamers like good job, you know.
SPEAKER_08:Those are the only ones I had, I feel like. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Uh and it may be different in the in the infantry world. You kind of need those guys. Yeah, 100%. In the aviation world, that didn't help me. I like I I was not, I don't react very well to negative criticism of just beating me down. Like, build me up and I'll be your best freaking pilot in the world. Um that priest friend I told you about who kind of saved me. I was definitely a shout out. His name's Father Serby. He has his own podcast. I don't know if I can plug. Father Serby? Serbi, S-E-A-R-B-Y.
SPEAKER_08:Where out of what parish?
SPEAKER_05:He's out in Virginia.
SPEAKER_08:Oh, okay. Nice, nice, nice, dude. Can I plug his podcast?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, holiness for the working day.
SPEAKER_08:Holiness for the working day. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07:You're almost a working day again. Oh yeah, dude.
SPEAKER_08:I'll be a working day in what's today's day. I don't even know. But yeah, in a couple weeks. Hell yeah, brother. That looks like it. Uh yeah, Father James, sir.
SPEAKER_05:There we go. That's it. That's it. Um, he's one of my best friends. Uh, and then I don't know. It's a tough that's a good question. I should have thought about this question more.
SPEAKER_07:But it's just so much your family, you for sure spiritual mentors. Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_05:Um, an uncle of mine is uh another kind of spiritual mentor of mine. He was my confirmation sponsor, and he's kind of the wise sage. A couple uncles I have that I I look I look to very often as like the wise, you know, give me some guidance here. What do I gotta do? Oh yeah, dude.
SPEAKER_07:Well, dude, Alex, it's been nothing short of an honor. We got to spend roughly two hours here with you. This has been awesome.
SPEAKER_08:I've had a we've only had one other pilot, and we've gone so much more into detail with with what you uh with uh aviation in the military and stuff with you. I was super pumped about it. So yeah. Um this is awesome. I appreciate you guys having me. Yeah, seriously, thank you so much. Um, and then also thanks to you guys uh for listening, watching on YouTube, hit the like, subscribe, the whole thing. Um, this has been another thrilling episode of the Day's Grim. My name is Brian Michael Day. My name is Thomas Grimm. And this has been Alex. Thank you so much to heal. Thank you. Thanks, guys.
SPEAKER_00:Come on, yes, come on, you're gonna get you to do it.