Winters at Minot (Read 5,806 times)

Chasing air leaks in the weapons bay has to be my favorite. You just hope they keep the hanger doors closed and the heaters on. I think my hands are still cold from then. A close second was busting my butt on the ever present ice with my tool box in hand. Tools went everywhere.

We used to have to go out and change the maps in the aircraft whenever we got changes issued. I was changing a T-33 and slid down the wing to change the rear seat charts. When I went to pull away I found myself stuck to the fuselage. That was the first time in my life that had ever happened to me, and I had alredy done time at Ellsworth and Loring.

I know what you mean.
I left the Griff one day on a TDY to Minot to work a EWO B-52.
left Griffiss at 60 degrees and landed at Minot -52 degrees.
Thats minus.
Minot cold!

One day the van and truck froze solid when the temps hit -98. My supevisor came over and used his car to push our van into the garage. It was a bit tall, but it went. We opened the hood, pointed a space heater at the engine, turned it on full, covered the opening with blankets, closed the garage door, and covered filled the opening with more blankets. It took days to thaw enough to start.

Even the truck was frozen for the first time.

Later in the year we lost all heat to our place when someone worked on the gas lines and forgot to turn ours back on.

I think I really hurt a Minot tech rep's feelings when I explicitly made my opinion of the underwing access panels and their multiple-length screws with identical heads known while getting a JP-4 bath on the defuel pad. That poor bastard (don't remember his name, but he was an APG tech rep. I was Instruments) stopped and told me all about how the panel was chemically milled and ultra lightweight and the variously-sized screws all contributed to what made the Six as fast as she was. This was NOT the thing to tell a 22-yr old bigmouth who smells like a gas tank! Fortunately it was summer, so the fuel temp was +50F and not -35F.

Now--why in the hell couldn't Convair have put the fuel panels on TOP of the wing? I have never heard a good explanation as to why they were on the bottom.

Winters at Minot were indeed an experience. I was born and raised in Wisconsin so I didn't think it could be much different. WRONG. I had never experienced such bitter cold. We were issued all the cold weather clothing we could wish for but working on the flightline with those elbow-length mittens was impossible. Instead, I think I wore out about a pair of gloves a month. I was thankful for the muk-luks. I used up several pair of those. And why was the only airplane on the flying schedule the only one outside. It never was one of the sixes parked in the revetment. I don't remember what they were called, so I'll say revetment. The flight shack was an old house trailer. Boy, that was really insulated well. It was warmer than outside though and that's what mattered.

The winter of '70-'71, somebody thought it would be great fun to try a different kind of work shift. Instead of three 8 hour shifts, let's try four. Swings and mids were unchanged. Day shift was broken into two shifts. The early shift went 0400-1200 and late shift went 1200-2000. I was on the early shift so I was up at 0300 to s**t, shower, and shave. Got to work at 0400, got the flying schedule and did the preflight. By the time that was done, the chow hall was open. I think they had the best food at that chow hall. We were hungry as hell so maybe anything would have tasted good but they did have some good food. The sos was especially good when it was fresh. And it was fresh when we got there. I got three eggs over easy right on top of the sos with a side of bacon or sausage. Man, that hit the spot. Then it was back to the line for launch.

The shift seemed to go quickly because we were done at noon. The problem was when your buddy was on the other shift and you had nothing to do in the afternoon. Remember, this was winter. They started this great experiment on January 1 and ended it at the end of March. I came very close to becoming an alcoholic during those months. Winters in North Dakota were very much like the arctic in terms of daylight. The sun rose about 0800 and set around 1500. At least that's what it seemed like. There was very limited daylight in the winter. Maybe that was so we could see the Northern Lights better.

I just know it was damn cold and the wind was relentless. They said it never snowed in North Dakota. The snow was blowing in from Montana. And I'm sure you heard that the wind didn't blow, it sucked. The state bird is a mosquito and the state tree is a telephone pole. Did anybody see a jackalope? The one over the bar in Ruthville doesn't count.

Winter at Minot. My roomate and one of our buddies had motorcycles. We were sitting around one Saturday and Norm says he'd love to go for a ride. It was one of the warmer days...only 19 below. Well guess what we did. We went for a bike ride. I have pictures of it because I knew no one would believe me. We only stayed out a couple hours, but it was a good time. We didn't get frostbite either. Thank goodness for the winter weather gear.

That winter, the first three weeks didn't get above minus 10 degrees. When the cold snap broke and it got to zero and then 10 above, we were walking around with our parkas open. Talk about balmy.

As it turned out, that was the only winter I spent there. I didn't join the AF to see North Dakota. I wanted to see some of the world. And the war was still going on in Vietnam. I heard so many great stories about Southeast Asia that I wanted to get some of my own. I put in for Thailand and Vietnam. I got Thailand and left Minot in August '71. I didn't know it at the time, but I left with some great stories of Minot AFB, ND.

Does anybody remember the critters and bugs they had there? It seemed like there was a season for each of the species.I think I'll start a new thread with that idea.

Minot-Freezen is the reason!!! The worse I remember was in Dec 91, it never got above 0. One night it was -45 ambient, -80 windchill. Myself and a couple of my cops were chasing a drunk captain who jumped the south gate and was running toward the WSA. I finally tackled the idiot in 4 inches of snow and when I wiped my mouth half my mustache was frozen to my parka sleeve. Oh yea, the dogs weren't out because it was to cold for them.

Another time we ran red ropes from the dorms to the chow hall during an all day white out so the troops would not get lost. I had a snow cat pick me up at my on base house to take me to work. From there we took MRE's to the gates and told the guards we'll be back, just don't know when.

During a snow storm before Halloween a young kid fell through a 5 foot snow drift. We found him about 20 minutes later after some intense searching. Thanks to some fast thinking by our Lt who kicked in a door to get him warm, and the CE guys plowing a path for the ambulance, we were able to save his life.

I also remember the inside of our walls to my house freezing it was so cold.

Winters at Minot were, well interesting!

:patriotic-flagwaver I got to Minot in the summer of 83 and left in 88 (Retirement). I was stationed on the SAC side in the hydraulic shop. We had 52's and 135's and then it was split between the two types of aircraft. Can remember being snowed in where it took 3 days to dig us out of base housing one winter. The last winter there, Christmas of 87 and New Years of 88 had snow (side ways) and wind chill at 100 below zero. The things we did for our country. :us_flag :

I know we're talking about the winters, but how about those tornadoes in the summer!!!! Minot was the first place I seen a wall cloud. Now that scared the S**t out me. The next thing I saw were two funnels coming out of the sky. I was a cop at the time and we were taking a smoke brake at the range. One of the guys from South Dakota said oh S**t and took off in the squad car. The next thing I remember is the desk saying get the hell out of there and evac the modulars to the Pride building. It was a mess. And the hail kick the crap out of us. That stuff really hurt! But yes, I miss those good old days. Winter and summer.

Oh yea, the only time it didn't snow the 4 years I was there was the month of August, tornado time.

:fire_missle_ani :e8new