Operation Field Trip

After gymnastics class, all the boys and their moms loaded up in the car and made a trip to the airfield.  Our friend's husband flies a C-130 (also known as Hercules) and invited us for a little field trip.  Pretty soon, the planes will be leaving the Nashville airfield, so we had to squeeze it in before April.  

We had to go through security and park our cars at different points.  We had to ride in a "bread truck". That's what it looked like but the boys enjoyed bouncing around and throwing themselves all around the place. 

 As we got on the airfield, the boys got really excited to see all the planes.

 Here is Captain Chris, giving us a little history on the planes.  These planes can hold a hummer and can drop them from the air without actually landing. He described how it felt when that much weight left the plane and how he had to correct the plane to compensate for it.  These planes do a lot of aid efforts by dropping off supplies. (I am writing this blog weeks after our field trip, so I wish I could remember more details.)

 Dylan got a chance to take the plane up in the air...ok not really, but on the way there, he asked if we were going to fly to Africa.  Everything is about Africa when we talk about flying.  Guess this boy wants to go to Africa. (One day he said, when I get older can we go to Africa so I can see if I can run faster than a cheetah.)

 Here he is with his bud Thomas (Captain Chris' son).  He has a look like, oh no, we are in trouble :)

 Lots of buttons and levers to push. Captain Chris assured us that they were ok to touch anything. It still made us moms nervous.

 Here the boys are looking at the side...what it would be like to sky dive out the side of the plane...they can only imagine.

 He looks so small compared to this aircraft.

 After the tour of the plane, we went inside to check out some other goodies. First up, the night vision goggles. obviously, I don't have a picture of them wearing the night vision goggles as the light would hurt their eyes with the googles on. Here are the googles though...

 Captain Chris took them in a closet and broke a glow stick. The boys thought it was way cool. Then myself and another mom had to check it out.  I asked, if I wanted to buy a pair, what would they cost, like $500?  No, more like a few thousands...here you go. Let me give you these back before I break them.

After the night googles, the boys got to do a parachute simulator. They put on googles that made it look like they were really falling from the sky. It was pretty cool.

 Here are the boys with Captain Chris.  Trying to get a serious picture of 4 energetic boys, mission impossible.

Thank you so much Captain Chris for giving us the tour. Best Wishes at your next mission.