Naval aviation

Yeah.

And from that point, of course, I was sold on Naval Aviation.

And I understand your mother worked for NASA's education department.

Was that, I mean, it might have been subconsciously, but did that kind of help influence your mindset? Obviously, the space program in the late 60s probably had an impact as well.

But what was your process like? And I know it's different for everybody, but what was it for like a good year?

When I was about to go to my first fleet squad and I was finishing up some other training, I was sitting in the office of the skipper for my debrief, outgoing debrief.

And as I was waiting, I saw a copy of Naval Aviation News.

I was already a naval aviator, again, on my way to my first fleet tour.

So I decided by design.

to join Naval Aviation as a Naval Aviation Officer.

I went to the Naval Academy, and there was no looking back.

Because by the time I realized that communications is important, being good in technology is important.

Exactly.

Naval air crewmen, part of Naval Aviation, are considered a somewhat elite troop in their own right.

But I was a mushroom.

I was literally stuck underground, kept in the dark, and fed on BS.

The Air Force and the Army recently held their major annual conferences to announce their major plans.

Today, we're taking a deep dive into naval aviation in the wake of the Navy's decision to award the F-AXX Next Generation Carrier Craft Award to Boeing.

Our guest today is Naval Aviation Legend and Tailhook Association Chairman, retired United States Navy Rear Admiral Mike Nasty-Menazer.

And we'll have this week's headlines in airpower.

And it's all powered by GE.

And if I'm being honest, it's not much of a myth.

He's a tamer of Tomcats, a handler of Hornets, retired United States Navy Rear Admiral Mike Nasty Manassar.

He's now with the advanced manufacturing firm Hadrian, but he will always be a legend of naval aviation.

So, um, the rest of them did two years in the surface fleet.

After that, they were able to sort of decide to go and do some other things, and a large number went off to Pensacola, the, the Naval Aviation Training Center there, um, which was hard to get into.

Even if you were a Naval Academy grad, it was hard to get into it.

A large number did that, and then a large number also went to the submarine service up in New London, Connecticut, another very hard school to get into.

Um, by the war's end, they had 288 submarines.

I think it's around 50, 51 that were lost.

Um, 22% of submariners died, and it was an even worse loss of life in that service than in the Naval Aviation service.

So it really was dangerous.

... and that civic element to it.

it.Yeah. Well, uh, so I went to school at the Naval Academy for my, uh, college years, and upon graduation, my service selection was Navy Air, which means you go down to Pensacola, and there are three pipelines you can get.

You can end up in transport-type planes that basically go out and hunt submarines, helicopters, or jets.

Um, for anybody who's seen Top Gun, they, you kinda know that, uh, I guess I'm bragging a little bit when I say jets is the, the desired pipeline.

Once you have those numbers, the math shows the object wasn't even close enough to create the dramatic optical illusion unless it was moving at Mach speeds, which would have made its infrared signature much stronger.

The AARO case resolution report released in early twenty twenty-five echoed West's conclusion and added another layer of analysis, a multi-sensor fusion approach that combined video frames, known aircraft data, and estimates from the US Naval Aviation system.

That fusion is critical because the Navy only recorded what the forward-looking infrared pod captured.

It didn't record any radar returns or acoustic signatures that could cross-verify speed or altitude.

So I was like, OK, you know, I'll give my give a shot and try this.

And so I picked naval aviation and I went to flight school.

And, you know, again, you know, we again pick on merit and whatever the Navy needs at the time.

And I was given helicopters.

That's sort of silly.

I know.

That was a blow on head work, as they say in naval aviation.

That wasn't such a smart idea.