Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for November 21, 2009

I swear, you could cut Jeff’s head off and I don’t think he’d be any dumber.

And after he delivers that message, we may find out.

A little concerned about the Whumpa-Whumps… Whup-whup-whup is one thing, if there’s a heavy load (like water tanks).

Pretty amazing just how smooth rotor sounds can be made with the right sanding and finishing, almost ‘stealth’. But I hear it’s a fine, almost lost, art.

We’re close enough to an LA County Fire Camp and the PD’s eyrie that we hear quite a few of them.

This little trip could become an adventure in a heartbeat.

Cute. Are the geek and the goofball supposed to be falling in love?

I was crew chief on a Chinook, Joe, only we didn’t call ‘em “Chinooks”, if you know what I mean.

Predict the helicopter will not make it to Kandahar and she’ll have to rescue his worthless behind.

I’m with pbandrob. That’s a UH-60 Blackhawk they’re in and they don’t sound like that unless something is wrong. I was in a EH-60 (no typo) Blackhawk crew in West Germany and Bosnia. Bill Case might be right!

And relax, I know you can ride in a Blackhawk and talk about Chinooks. Not saying anyone was wrong.

Oxford English Dictionary spells it d’oh. (True, it was added 2 years ago.)

You know, just because there’s a WHUMP WHUMP sound effect doesn’t mean anything’s wrong. Maybe that’s just GT’s rendering of blade noise.

Nice catch on the sound effects - that isn’t quite the right sound, although I’m not convinced it was intentional. I certainly hope there is no romance about to happen. The last thing she needs is another jerk in her life. I wouldn’t mind seeing her save his hide though.

Chinooks - First time I rode in one, I pointed out that hydrolic fluid leaking all over the place. Crew chief smiled and told me I only needed to worry when it stopped leaking.

I thought they were supposed to sit *on* their helmets, no?

First time I rode in a Chinook was to jump out of one, at about 6,000 feet. Much nicer than jumping out of a C-130. You don’t have to fly around and wait as long to do the jump.

Dmajor: Only if you didn’t have a flack vest to sit on.

I first jumped from an H21 at 2500 feet. Pre Huey.

P.J. Liggett - Now that’s doing it old school! The old flying banana! My mothers husband knew Frank Piasecki during WWII. Really great engineer.

Doty’s right when Jeff screws up, he screws up good. I’m doing to be the first to predict that he screws this up right, and all you Jeff haters can choke on your bile.

That’s really interesting. Can you tell us more?

i’m more familiar with CH-46’s and 53’s, they make all kinds of great noises and they leak all kinds of hydraulic fluid. You don’t run out the back hatch, you slide out!

After reading this three times, I finally got it.