Good evening all,
I'm sharing this to shed some light and give accuracy to the crash of the KC-130T that went down in the Tennessee soybean field and the men of VMGR-452 and 2nd Raider Bn who were aboard it. Seven months ago, I left 452 for 3rd Recon Bn after a lateral move. I left with about 1000 hours in the KC-130, many with the crew that was lost and aboard the fallen aircraft. One in particular was a very close friend. We came up together, from the basic schools to deployments. We were brothers. I knew the other 8 as friends. Five aircrewmen, two pilots, and two maintainers made up the crew. The other seven were Raiders, as you all may know by now. I know guys who knew them. Great men, all of them. As for what caused it, I'm at a loss. Hercs don't just go down, hence the name. I had so much weird shit happen during my time on them, yet we always came out of it. Whatever happened was immediate and catastrophic. So much so that the very seasoned crew aboard didn't have time to declare an emergency or even one damn mayday. It's simply just keying the ICS. There are so many safeties and redundancies about that aircraft. There are also systems that monitor everything, all the way down to air temp inside bleed-air manifolds. Regardless of it all, my heart breaks. Not only for those I was close to, but for everyone. Especially the families and friends. Fair winds and following seas, brothers.
I'm sharing this to shed some light and give accuracy to the crash of the KC-130T that went down in the Tennessee soybean field and the men of VMGR-452 and 2nd Raider Bn who were aboard it. Seven months ago, I left 452 for 3rd Recon Bn after a lateral move. I left with about 1000 hours in the KC-130, many with the crew that was lost and aboard the fallen aircraft. One in particular was a very close friend. We came up together, from the basic schools to deployments. We were brothers. I knew the other 8 as friends. Five aircrewmen, two pilots, and two maintainers made up the crew. The other seven were Raiders, as you all may know by now. I know guys who knew them. Great men, all of them. As for what caused it, I'm at a loss. Hercs don't just go down, hence the name. I had so much weird shit happen during my time on them, yet we always came out of it. Whatever happened was immediate and catastrophic. So much so that the very seasoned crew aboard didn't have time to declare an emergency or even one damn mayday. It's simply just keying the ICS. There are so many safeties and redundancies about that aircraft. There are also systems that monitor everything, all the way down to air temp inside bleed-air manifolds. Regardless of it all, my heart breaks. Not only for those I was close to, but for everyone. Especially the families and friends. Fair winds and following seas, brothers.
