I have ridden on an Osprey or two. They are extremely loud, but, impressive. I haven't heard of any mishaps lately, and hope they have worked all the bugs out of the system.

Thanks for posting the pic, its an E model.

I'm sure the Osprey is a reliable airframe now. We all hated them when they were still in the testing phase, for obvious reasons.

Watching them fold up is pretty impressive, almost as much as their vertical take off into a quick transition to "plane" mode.

They're terrible helicopters and terrible airplanes, but a great combination of both.

I got to fast rope out of the hell hole of a Stallion in Australia. Was a blast. I was the first and had to quickly switch to taking photos of the other Marines roping down.

I rode in Ospreys a few times in Iraq they were fun. They also had some old crappy helicopters that were twin rotor but smaller and older than Chinooks they scared me when I had to ride in them.

CH-46 Sea Knight. Sea Knights and Chinooks have been around since Vietnam. Sea Stallions have been too. I've never ridden in a Chinook, and the Sea Knights feel like you're sitting on top of poorly balanced washing machine.

That S#!tter has some horse power to take off like that.

But, here is the real future of Marine Corps aviation!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=WHA8PlieHIg

Hahahaha!

Oooooh K. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" />

If I remember right, we called them Jolly Greens. Only ones I saw were in the Philippines WAY back in '74-77. They were search and rescue there.