Every Item In An Air Force Gunship Pilot's Go Bag | Loadout | Insider Business

I used to wear a flying if this is the flight controls I'm staring out of the aircraft looking this way through the heads-up display I'm major Riley Feeney an ac-130j evaluator pilot and this is everything I bring with me on a flight this right here is probably the second most important thing this is my helmet and oxygen mask we utilize this in order to communicate on

the aircraft as well as get our oxygen the ac-130j primarily flies depressurized so we're on the oxygen mask in order to get supplemental oxygen the entire crew wears these whenever we are employing live fire whether we're doing the guns or pgws it's got a lip light right here it's green so that I can get uh look at my knee board or any other thing that I

have I'm trying to get information from additionally up here is a night vision device mount in order to that whenever we're employing at night time I've got a good idea of how what the what's happening on the ground and what's happening outside of the aircraft what does uh what does lip light mean so a lip light is called a lip light because I'm able to use

my lip in order to push this button right here in order to turn it on whenever I'm flying keep my hands free so I can continue to fly the aircraft this right here is a finger light I wear it on my middle finger but other people wear it in different positions but it's just push activated and it gives us a green light in order to help

protect our night vision when we're flying at night uh whenever I'm filling things out on the kneeboard quick turn this on Scribble down whatever I need to scribble down it keeps me informed as well as it allows me to do scans around the cockpit whenever we've got thing pitched black in there uh just to check to see if anything everything is as it should be I

fly with probably three or four of these just in case the battery fails and I've got another way to pop this up this in conjunction with the lip light allows us to keep a totally blacked out cockpit when we fly and not give our position up because of a highlighted cockpit yet again like I was telling you with the majority of the objects at this point

in my career they're more like Lucky Charms or things that you know remind me that I am completely decked out and ready to go that's why I like the finger light to go along with the helmet and the night vision goggle Mount or the night vision goggles themselves we utilize these whenever I'm flying the aircraft I'm looking out of the side heads-up display and looking at

the projections that it puts on the ground I'm able to see the friendly Force as well as the enemy Force utilizing these guys at night and it's an incredible uh addition to my situational awareness to have uh these be present you're able to adjust the filter here but there's no real magnification that these provide simply I'm just able to take a God's eye view of the

battle space and then make a assessments and decisions as the leader of the crew whether or not to prosecute a Target or whether or wait a digital section or whether or not I'm friendly for following the helicopters or the friendly uh ground assault Force why would a pilot wear night vision I can use my Mark 1 eyeball during the daytime but I don't have the ability

to see it during the night so this really helps me on our aircraft we have two sensors but we consider the aircraft Commander to be the third sensor and the large scale or scope with which they're overseeing they don't have the granularity that our sensor operators are able to see but we're able to make better decisions on being able to see the entirety of the battle

space and that's what makes it really important and why these guys are super valuable at night also these things are super useful to see Tracer fire so if people are shooting rounds 50 miles away these guys give us a really good beat of hey something's going on over there that our sensors might not be able to see I usually wear a flying if this is the

flight controls I'm staring out of the aircraft looking this way through the heads-up display probably the most important thing I bring on any flight with me is the electronic flight bag this is an iPad that's utilized in order to contain all of my pubs as well as everything that I utilize to do instrument approaches both here and abroad and anywhere in the world if I take

this with me and I get it fully synced I'm able to go pretty much anywhere in the world and I have external batteries that I use to charge this if I'm staying on an exceptionally long flight but this right here keeps the illegal safe and also able to fly in any weather condition um oh a pub is a publication so there are DOD Publications Air Force

regulations Air Force instructions and manuals that are all required for flight if there's ever a question about any situation we get into whether we're legal to do something or whether or not we need to call the higher headquarters this will inform you of who I need to contact and how I need to contact them in addition to that it has all of our flight tech orders

which are the checklists we follow in order to conduct flight and if we follow the checklist we remain legal to fly how long have you guys used iPads so we've been using iPads for as long as I've been in our first Special Operations Command since 2016. but they've been using them I think as early as 2012. the next thing up that we have is just a

standard normal David Clark headset this one is one of the fancy models that comes with noise canceling so I can save myself a little bit of hearing loss and keep me flying for longer these ones are traditionally used for day flying or whenever we're doing pilot proficiency training uh just as a simpler smaller version than having to wear this entire helmet headset it also provides a

redundant means for us to have communication within the aircraft in the event that my headset in the helmet fails so always carry a spare that's good for not only flying but also for life this right here is a kneeboard I've been flying with a kneeboard since I've been going through pilot trading what's really awesome about an e-board is you keep all your flight information right here

I have a pretty set way of how I keep my forms on my kneeboard between how I get the weather at an Airfield between the Tactical scenario that's developing in a battle space or in a restricted operating zone I'm able to write everything down and I battle track with my kneeboard whether it's getting grids from The Joint terminal attack controller or whether it's keeping a Time

Mark of an engagement I'm able to then have a thorough set of notes both for me to reference in Flight as well as out of flight if anyone asks me any questions of what occurred I know exactly what happened using this kneeboard I wouldn't go anywhere without it you wouldn't be a pilot in the United States Air Force if you didn't have some set of cool

glasses we've got Oakleys here these are the ones that I traditionally wear during flight during the daytime these are approved forms of glasses and we have to specifically get these from our resource advisor in order to fly to make sure that they are in fact legal to fly with you'd be surprised on the cloudiest days you break through the cloud layer and then all of a

sudden you got a bunch of sun staring in the eyes and makes it really tough to fly so I really don't go anywhere without these uh ready at any point in time so you couldn't go you could the the one way to remain legal in the United States Air Force is make sure that you get these approved via a the Air Force so that you don't

get yourself in trouble by flying with something you should be flying with additionally right here these are my dog tags not only are you legally required to fly with these per Air Force regulations but also it is an incredibly important thing to have on you in the event anything goes bad so that they can identify you as well as at this point they've become somewhat of

a good luck charm for me I always carry them in the same pocket in order to make sure that I'm ready if any time I forget that I'm flying with these I know I'm a little bit more risky because I'm not following my normal procedure in standard in order to go fly part of stepping hit our helmet there are no noise canceling features so you got

to make sure you bring some foamy ear plugs these are also great for whenever you're walking around doing your pre-flight inspection in the auxiliary power unit is running I've spent a long career listening to very loud sounds and the less that I have to hear that's loud the better for me both in terms of just my comfort but as well as knowing that I'm my next

flight physical someone won't tell me that I'm losing my hearing and then these ones are the ones that I fly with there are other versions there's other ones that are molded into the ear that members of our Squadron have I just prefer the foamies they fit the same all the time basically just take this one and I know other people wear them different ways but I

put it pretty much put this guy in crush it down a little bit and you put it right into the ear like this and at this point in my career it's just a incredibly relaxing feeling to just zone out every other noise that's going around out there as within anything white in life you should also tell whale hydrated so I always carry around this issued Hydro

Flask I've got all the stickers from all the squadrons I've been a part of in my life uh and it's just a Keepsake for me not only to remember where I've been from but also if I haven't filled this up before a flood I make so I do so immediately in order that I can stay hydrated especially on exceptionally long sorties you kind of just lose

track of time and if you don't have water you'll quickly find yourself uh performing poorly all right this is more of a personal thing I really like to fly with gum I pretty much throw in a piece of gum right prior to starting engines and before we start checklists on the aircraft this is just a way to calm me down and get myself in the Rhythm

to make sure I can execute it properly it helps me think more clearly when I'm chewing on gum I'll probably go through four or five pieces on a flight depending on the length it reminds me hey I should be drinking water I should be having food but on top of that it just helps keep me calm and more importantly keep me in a rhythm kind of

notice good Crews running a good Rhythm so I would I don't want to say that the gum is the metronome that runs that machine but maybe it is I wouldn't be in the military if I wasn't pushing some form of of energy drink I personally drink Red Bull sugar-free this is kind of the go-to for me for nightlines especially when you find yourself lagging a little

bit you never want to be behind the aircraft so usually crack one of these open probably halfway through the Sorting in order to get the rest safe get the rest of the flight safely obviously this is for when you're not wearing the uh O2 mask unfortunately there's just no way to get Red Bull into your mouth while you're wearing uh your mask so you have to

be deliberate about hey making sure you have your Red Bull at the correct time of flight to make sure you're still energized for your entirety of the story and then this right here is the helmet bag this is the first patch that I ever got whenever I got to Air Force Special Operations Command so I just kind of wear it on my bag as a reminder

of uh back when I was Lieutenant Feeney learning how to fly the gunship but I pretty much keep everything that I need inside of this bag to include other items such as flashlights reflective belts anytime you're not in the aircraft at night need to be safe or just fall regulations that the Air Force requires you to follow and this is everything that I take with me

when I go fly an ac130j it's notorious within the aircraft commanders in the AC-130 community that we all have bad backs after we retire as a result of that weird head pivoted emotion and these things are not light especially given that their moment arm is fairly far away from the neck so there's that