How Twitter Rocked My World. By John Mason-Smith Part 1

I live in Perdido Key, FL, just on the edge of Pensacola and right next to NAS Pensacola, the home of the US Navy flight demonstration team, the Blue Angels. I have become a huge fan of the Blue Angels and follow them closely. In addition, I attend as many of the twice-weekly in-season practices that I can as well as attend their shows that occur here twice a year.
Pensacola is known as the “Cradle of Navy Aviation” and all the Aviators of the US Navy learn to fly here. The entire Pensacola area is enamored with the “Blues” and the town is a great supporter of Naval Aviation. With so many young men and women coming through this area to learn to fly it doesn’t take long to get to know many of the new stars of Naval Aviation.

Over the last two years I have been tracking the way that when the Blues are traveling back from a show – typically on Sundays, they will often fly right over the beach and the City of Pensacola. Not wanting to miss one of these awesome flyovers, I figured out how to track their approximate time of arrival and began pushing that time out to my friends on social media. From this small start, it has now become a “thing” where hundreds are waiting on the post of my best guess and running down to the beach to photograph the spectacle. For the last two years, the Public Affairs Office (PAO) at the Blues started partnering with the City of Pensacola and started giving out a more precise estimate of arrival. Naturally, I started following both the local Navy’s PAO and the Blue’s PAO – as well as the Pensacola NAS and the NAS-based National Flight Museum on social media. In fact, I also now follow many of the Blue’s themselves and all of the others in the area who are fans. My attempts at the arrival timing forecasts led to being asked by the OBA Community Website (Orange Beach, Alabama) to become their manager of Blues related events and information.

Through all of this “Social Media Tracking” on the Blues, one morning last November in 2017, I spotted this message from the Navy on Twitter:

I immediately DM’d (Direct messaged) that I was very interested in spending the night on an aircraft carrier. Later that day they replied and asked if I had ever been on a carrier, what was my age, would I be able to provide my own transportation to San Diego (of course!) Later that same day I spotted this tweet:

How exciting when I found out that I was one of those 16! The Navy sent me a questionnaire form and a medical clearance form which I filled out and returned. They said they would let me know if I was approved later. Apparently, everything checked out and the week of Thanksgiving I received the details on the experience on this email:
“As a guest of the Navy, you will be flown out to the aircraft carrier while it is at sea, departing Naval Air Station North Island (NASNI) in San Diego, CA, via a Navy C-2 Greyhound, experiencing an arrested landing on the ship; remain overnight observing day and night flight operations, and fly back to NASNI the following afternoon, experiencing a catapult launch off of the ship. These embarks are meant to increase the public's understanding and appreciation for carrier-based aviation by providing them an opportunity to view their Navy in action, and provide them direct interactions with Sailors and view demonstrations of the unique capabilities of Naval aviation. Guests participating on a DV embark should not engage in business practices by attempting to sell products or promote themselves, or any organization they may represent during the visit. Participation on a DV embark cannot be sold, bartered, or used as an individual reward, or to promote any organization. Guests that have previously participated as a Distinguished Visitor on an aircraft carrier are not eligible to participate. During the embark, guests are berthed, two per stateroom; so expect to be lodged with another guest. Males and females are berthed separately. Guests will be charged $60 to cover meals and other items provided by the ship”
The amount of planning that I came up with was probably way too much. For example, fearing that the battery on my camera would not last I ordered two spares. I am pretty sure I could take 3000-5000 photos before the first one ran out but I was ready in any event. I did look up the footwear that the Navy requires for the active-duty sailors for aircraft carriers. Oil-resistant, non-slip steel-toed boots were the uniform version. The Navy embark form suggested that I wear comfortable shoes. I found some nice black sneaker type non-slip soles shoes with steel toes. As it turned out these were perfect as I am pretty sure my toes banged every ladder in the carrier.

I would not know until after January the actual dates as they were trying to time our visit to be during a training period. They had not told us which ship we would be on – only that it would be in March-May time frame. When the word came in February I learned the “Embark” was on the USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74) and the dates would be April 20, 21, 22, or 23. "CVN" means Carrier Vessel Nuclear and 74 is the number of the ship.

Photo: US Navy used with permission

My daughter and wife wanted to come along on the trip to visit San Diego so we booked a trip that would be at least the day before the first date and one day after the last April 19- April 24. Later near the end of March, they set the date for the weekend of April 21 and 22. They originally expected us at 8:15 AM (0815) and said that the day before expects an email with some additional arrival details. The location for the event in San Diego was at NAS North Island Visitors Center and I was to arrive by 0915.

When I showed up at 0815, almost everyone was already there having thought the same as me that whatever happens they were not going to miss this event. My wife and daughter let me off and went on a whale watching adventure. I got to know the other travelers as we're waiting for the Navy vans to pick us up at the welcome center.

The “where ya from’s” stretched from Montreal to Barcelona, Spain. The group of visitors known as Distinguished Visitors (DV) included a few from the local area. Most were Twitter followers and the others were regular connected people (business, defense manufacturing) or politically connected individuals who were waiting in line for a chance to experience the carrier embark.

We were told to set aside our overnight bag and we wouldn't see it again until that evening. They tagged those bags. Our carry around bags (mine had camera equipment) we could check the plane side and those would be handed to us once we landed. We were given our DV visitor name tags which identified us to everyone on the ship as a VIP.

COD
As mentioned in the email we were to fly out to Stennis on a C-2A Greyhound. This is known as the COD which stands for Carrier Onboard Delivery. We went into the NAS North Island Flight Terminal and to its only gate and went through a briefing about the Navy, the Carrier’s part in the system and the role of Navy in keeping the free market working. Without the power of our Navy, shipping chokepoints such as the Middle East and the South China Sea become up for grabs. I also learned that while Pensacola, FL. is known as the “Cradle” of Naval Aviation, NAS North Island is known as the “Birthplace” of Naval Aviation. The carrier training has a three-point priority: Warfighting, People, Readiness.

Our Navy has 11 total of traditional aircraft carriers – though technically many ships can carry aircraft. For those 11 traditional ships, there are 9 carrier air wings that are assigned to operation vessels. Since the carriers rotate in and out of service there is no need for a matching number of air wings. Our carrier, the USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74) is a few months away from going on deployment. The carrier is the center of a group of ships known as a Carrier Strike Group. At this point in the Carrier training, only a few of the other ships are involved. We did not encounter any of the other ships during our embark.

After the briefing, we were instructed about our pending flight and trap landing. The Flight team "Providers VC-130" offered some awesome squadron patches and a challenge coin that I picked up.

We all put on military green self-inflating life vests that buckle and zip, the helmets with ear headsets (called cranials), and clear goggles. The active military duty passengers get their own version of the same gear. Ours had the DV (Distinguished Visitors) initials to identify us as ones who do not know what we are doing.

On the flight, we would be strapped in a four-point harness. The flight instructions focused on two issues; what to do in the event of a water landing and what to do in case the cabin loses pressure during flight. It was pretty close to the same as an airliner. The difference was that we were flying a pretty utilitarian aircraft on metal seats with thin cushions.

Additionally, we were facing the back of the plane as we flew, which works out in the advantage when you stop on the other end. The plane is a turboprop and is very loud, so built into the helmet was ear protection. We also had “foamies” earplugs under them to cut down on the roar.

Knowing that there was a trap landing ahead, the anxiousness of the trip over to the carrier built up the longer we flew. We were about 30 minutes out, we were told. As we neared the carrier, a warning light saying to prepare ourselves came on overhead.

The “Providers VRC-130” for the COD are all professional and they helped us prepare for the landing. They told us at landing to take your right hand and put it on your left shoulder, take your left hand over the right shoulder and brace yourself. They said they would let us know when to brace. We will be going from 130 knots (150 MPH) to zero in 2 seconds on the deck. The captain came over the loudspeaker and said we have reached the Stennis but we needed to circle so it would be 10- 15 minutes before landing, “Everyone sit back and enjoy your flight”. As we lined up on the final approach all kinds of flight adjusting were going on, speeding up – slowing down, left, right – then the flight crew who were seated in the very back, but in front of us, all waived their hands in the air and yelled: “Here We Go”. Three seconds later we came down hard with a loud screech of steel on steel and we all were pressed nearly though our seats. Then it was over!

We all cheered like our team just won the Super Bowl. It was one scary experience, but one I saw repeated dozens of times - as a matter of fact, every 2 minutes another plane came in and did what we just did right behind us. Only instead of Turbo Prop C-2 Greyhounds, they were FA/18E Super Hornet jets. We were still on our plane and the noise from those landings was incredible. They had our plane just roll out of the way and in the rest came. The flight deck crews timed our exit from the plane to be clear of incoming jets and we moved across the flight deck single file. It was the most chaotic place in the world. We stepped out and were being blasted by jet exhaust from a taxiing jet, and then we stepped around missiles waiting to be loaded. Planes were parked all over the deck, some hanging over the side. While it seemed crazy, these sailors were truly professional, organized and knew exactly what was going on at all times. The email we received the night before has a flight deck manual we were all to read. In it, the flight deck is described as the most dangerous place in the world. For me, I felt totally excited as I experienced this strange place which is truly the front lines of our defense of the free world.

At the bottom of each section of this story, there will be a link to read the rest. There are 9 sections in this Story.

In Part 2 we head out into the Flight Deck. Click here to read Part 2