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Message no. 1
From: Jeffrey Jacob Mach <mach@****.CALTECH.EDU>
Subject: Tailhooking
Date: Thu, 17 Oct 1996 12:54:20 -0700
*****PRIVATE: Lilith
>>>>>[Re: Jen and Gabe, thanks for the info; I'm feeling better already.
Decker's, mages, sams, and riggers? You're right, they've got to be
kidding, you sure you don't mean that they split up the jobs?
Jack-(asses)-of-all-trades, masters of nothing.... Hell, I've been told
by a wage mage who nearly cried when he looked at my "aura" that if I had
ever had a chance at being a mage, it was long gone with the junk that I
have shoehorned into my petitly stylish frame.

As for the ride: looks like it's going to happen on <Encrypted>, you
free? Mind sending the measurements of you and your SO so we can make the
tanks nice and comfy? Trunked into the supercomp, we're talking as much
full ASIST rigging as you can handle, you won't know you're not on the
tarmac and you'll swear you can smell the hot asphalt. Don't forget your
flight suit.

I've convinced the "Old Man" that this is still an unofficial-preliminary
evaluation simulation by outside personel. So, we won't meet you with a
brass band nor pile you up with glossies and brochures, just a few hours
to let you get the feel of the thing and maybe try a bit of engagement,
after that, we can go somewhere and unwind (or I can sneak you out to the
tarmac and see if MAX will let you take her for a real ride, I already
have a live fire test scheduled for the afternoon). To tell you the
truth, I think I could push the bird a little farther in real life than
the control laws that we have running on the sim. [Note: you break it,
you bought it. And I don't think you want this coming out of your
paycheck.]

As for the party, we don't have plans for Friday night. Don't know why an
Air Force belle and a Marine pounder of ground would be doing hanging with
"Belly-button pilots" but sure, sounds like fun. Should I go casual or in
uniform (haven't tried that on in a while), or should I just wear my
flight suit? You know how the female version has those bladders that just
flatter so well. :P We'll be arriving in my Chry-Lamb Lupo.

By the way, have you ever heard of a poem that mentions "vorpal blades"
and "slithy toves?" Sounds like old English. Jenny's got me worried
lately about her sanity. ;) ]<<<<<
-- Arashi <12:56:33/10-17-57>
Message no. 2
From: "Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Re: Tailhooking
Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 01:09:16 +0100
*****PRIVATE: Arashi
>>>>>[No, they don't split. Decker-mage-samurai both, plus Gabe is
supposedly a rigger. Ho ho bloody ho, as Quinn likes to say.

Funny you mention magic... Jason might have been a Wolf shaman... except
he had a few years of "exceptional trauma" and never manifested any
magical ability. He has an active metagene, but it never did anything,
then he got the cyber and the whole point became moot. He's from a line
of magicians and his daughter is a Tiger shaman, so go figure.

We should be able to make time for a check ride. I assume you know a
barely-official report on what we see will go into the Air Force and
Marine Corps hierarchies? We'll .cc them to you, naturally, anything
else would be unfair.

Measurements...
+++++include file: biometrics.Leopard Lady
+++++include file: biometrics.Psychopath

That good enough? And be warned, we both grew up in old-fashioned
aircraft, and we use rigger gear for feedback and HOTAS for output.
Force of habit, hope you can cope.

This sounds like a very enjoyable check ride, anyway. Just don't worry
if Jason keeps complaining about gust response at low level. Any
altitude in double digits is "stratospheric" to him.

As for a real ride... not yet. I may yet end up on the eval team anyway.
if you get a procurement decision underway, so a simulator ride will
help a lot.

The party? The Navel Aviators are good guys. But they _will_ rag you
senseless unless you're triple-digit trapped on carriers. I'd go for the
flight suit, if I were you: Jason and I will both be there, and the
dress is most definitely casual :) Plus, they'll get the "landing test"
out, and a flight suit both dries faster and flatters more when wet ;).
Parking's safe and properly patrolled, and the anti-ethanol detox
patches are free when you decide to call it a night.

The poem, BTW - according to Quinn - is "Jabberwocky" by Lord Monty
Python. I disclaim all responsibility for the accuracy of that
statement... I merely report, I do not claim the words as truth :)

Side note - are you and Vernier available for hire for consultancy for a
mercenary unit, soon to be acquiring eight reconditioned and updated
MiG-37s, to help kick their pilot and maintenance cadres into shape?
They're also getting eight LZ-2049s, but those are ludicrously easy to
operate, it's the fighters they're sweating: they've got six competent
pilots full-time and want more, and are especially short of
groundcrew.]<<<<<
-- Lilith <01:10:17/10-18-57>
Message no. 3
From: Jeffrey Jacob Mach <mach@****.CALTECH.EDU>
Subject: Re: Tailhooking
Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 16:16:13 -0700
*****PRIVATE: Lilith

>>>>>[I understand about the reports. Not a problem, I think that may be
one of the reasons why the "Old Man" decided that a more formal invitation
was in order.

The biometrics were almost more than what was needed, Vernier tells me.
The tanks will be nearly custom fit for you guys when you get here. At
least both of you are within normal human body-size, tanking a troll can
be done, but stuffing him into a human sized capsule can be mighty
uncomfortable, if not embarassing. :)

As for the interface: can do. I hope you guys can accept datajack feed
like from a sim-sense deck or have that built into your rigger system,
else your going to need a 'trode system that I fully admit will not be as
good. In case you when you mean old, you really mean _OLD_ I'll spell it
out: Your tank won't have any windows. You see through they eyes of the
plane, plus, the ASIST will cut out your balance center and reorient it to
the plane, therefore you get to lay down comfortably in the tank and give
your poor heart some help going through the turns (also means that the sim
will feel a lot more like the real thing, since the supercomp just has to
worry about translation to datajack anyway). Besides, the plane's sensors
are better than anything you can plug into your body. Wherever/however
you want to look, the system will take that input and shift camera angle,
etc and more, it just takes a bit for your brain to realize that you are
not a hominid anymore and accept you are the mind of a fighter. The
cockpit data readout's are virtual including a fully 3-D threat display
with some other non-visual clues running through the feedback, I'll brief
you on that when you get here, but trust me it is about as intuitive as
they can make it so they can stuff all that information into your brain at
max speed without confusing you so much you can't fly let alone fight.

Before either of you raises an objection, basically the system is
redundant enough that if that system fails, your wings would have ripped
off several seconds earlier and you should be ejecting anyway. The system
doesn't override G-stress or else the pilot can still kill herself, so in
the sim, it will give you some feed on that angle. It does have legal
ASIST limits, but you can't cheat and ignore the little level of pain it
can give you, you'll know when the signal starts to fade on the input (for
fairness, we will all have the same pre-set g-threshold). The plane is
still designed to do what the pilot asks, killing the pilot if they really
ask for it (i.e. overriding all safeties and trying to pull a Mongoose at
Mach 4), then and only then does it consider breaking up.

I myself am a WITAS (Wired Into Throttle And Stick) girl, myself. My meat
body just isn't fast enough or delicate enough to control the plane with
the kind of speed and precision that I can with a full-rig system.
Needless to say, I also have some connections that I don't let the general
public see that are about the same size as the matrix trunk of a small
corp.

My backup for rig-output failure is a throttle and stick that can come up
to my Left and Right hands respectively as well as a high throughput
datajack connection to data and controls, in yours, they won't be
retracted. They are the latest standard from the UCAS, so you shouldn't
be surprised. Just don't press the mauve button. ^_-

Tell Jason in regards to the gust response that he should trust his
autopilot to worry about gust response, and that one of the reasons why
this design is so maneuverable is that while all the RAM and shaping you
can do and all the coatings you can spray on a plane can help reduce
radar, IR, and lidar returns, they're still not as good as a hill between
you and the guy gunning for you. And since the same can be said,
vice-versa, you need to be able to move with your belly on the deck. Just
don't suck a duck or hit a tree.... But no, while it can store a few
PGM's on external stores in its less-stealthy, non-hypercruise "let's give
the Earth Pavers some backup" mode, it's capability as an Attack aircraft
is an add on to make some ancient fellow in the Pentagon happy.

Basically the design philosophy was to be able to get the pilot wherever
they need to be, whenever they need to be, make sure they are the ones
choosing to engage, and if they do, give them the best chance technology
can provide to be the one flying home at the end. With that in mind, they
have expanded the envelope of what you can do with the 3 axis vectoring
system in terms of speed and power, so don't be afraid to try some
maneuvers that you didn't think were possible, the bird will let you know
if you are crazy, while trying to the best of its ability to comply.

>>YAWN<< Sorry, guess I fell into one of the speaches that the boys here
always fall into when talking to a prospective business partner. Gomen.

See you at the party. I will have the flight suit on just in case, and I
think having gotten the warning relayed, Jenny's going to go for one of
her more stylish jump-suits. I'll leave my patches and bars at home,
though and just be "one of the girls." Maybe dab a little JP-X behind my
ear and break a few hearts. :P

As for the consultant work, how pressing is this, timetable wise an where
on the planet do you hide a mercenary fighter wing? I might be able to
manage some free time for it. Jenny wants in just because she's never
worked on anything that "old" before. Since you are recommending them, I
assume they are the "good guys" if not completely above
board.]<<<<<
-- Arashi <16:11:45/10-18-57>
Message no. 4
From: "Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Re: Tailhooking
Date: Sat, 19 Oct 1996 00:45:13 +0100
*****PRIVATE: Arashi
>>>>>[Sounds outstanding. Let's see...

Interface, no problem, we're both able to just jack directly in.

Redundancy... talk to Jason about redundancy :) He brought back an old
Cape Province F-15 that was missing most of a _wing_ one time... he was
hunting SAMs and the Angolans had a nicely-hidden battery of 57mm guns
on his egress route (he was lucky he played smart, the 'obvious' exit
had two Tunguskas parked on it). Since then, he gets grumpy whenever he
doesn't have perspex to see through and manual backup on the controls,
says any flight computer would have made him abandon a salvageable
airframe.

I'm not _quite_ that hidebound ;)

Low level... sounds good, the handling will make him happy. The attack
load, though... firstly, "that ancient fellow" is Sundown Cunningham,
and he's only 52. Secondly, as far as Jason's concerned air superiority
is what you do on your way to and from the target you wanted to bomb...
<sigh> He's a Marine through and through.

So he'll grouch and grumble. Me? I'm looking forward to it. So's he, but
he won't admit it... See you at the party.


As for the consultancy, it's not particularly urgent. When you're a
licenced merc unit, aircraft are completely legal, until you do
something illegal with them... the Zeps will be in the compound in
Tacoma, the MiGs will be hangared out at Sea-Tac. No ordnance to hand,
and airport security is _tight_, so the FAA are happy. A lot of the
training will be out at sea in international airspace, though
negotiations are in progress for some Aggressor work for various forces.

And yes, they're a good unit. Licenced mercenaries, and while I wouldn't
call them angels they're disciplined professionals and good guys. Run by
a Russian defector - he broke for the border after his Spetznaz team
refused to help State Security "carry out reprisal actions" on a
village.

The MiGs are a little deceptive, though... the basic airframe might be
2020s, but it's been fully relifed and zero-timed, the wing spars
replaced with modern single-crystal forgings, and most of the avionics
are new. Plus the engines are Rolls-Royce Colorados, not those smoky
thirsty Klimovs. Jenny should enjoy herself.]<<<<<
-- Lilith <00:43:21/10-19-57>

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