By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor

With the litany of political investigations abound in Washington, DC, another of lesser consequence–and admittedly equal in relevance–involved errant U.S. Navy Aviators who drew a ginormous sky-borne phallus using contrails.

Surely, most everyone in Okanogan County probably found a good laugh, but someone just had to complain to a Spokane news medium and the controversy unfolded.

I am greatly relieved that our national security was assured as a result of this investigation.  Yet, unfortunately, the additional laughs garnered probably did not live up to the budget spent on their revelation.

Navy Times reportedly obtained transcripts and information from this subsequent investigation.  It shows a clear conspiracy on behalf of naval personnel to lighten-up an otherwise uneventful training mission. The offenders hoped the schlong-trails they drew would dissipate quickly and not generate much notice. Not that drawing a penis across much of the sky in daylight would raise any obvious suspicion and discovery, they apparently did not consider the idea of a covert effort of phallus drawing during a nocturnal mission.

As our host suggested in his article on the topic from a year-and-a-half ago…

“I am ready to represent the pilot and argue that this is really nothing more than a cowboy hat and that the suggestion of anything more is merely an example of sexual repression revealed in an aerial Rorschach test.”

…I would counter that an affirmative defense might have been that they were intending to provide the citizenry of Okanogan a lesson in Maths but were interrupted before the formula could be fully expressed:

The inspiration for that day’s artwork germinated when the crew of an EA-18G Growler noticed that the aircraft’s contrails were “particularly robust” and of course the natural progression of thought logically results in the need to draw a giant penis in the sky.

The investigation turned up a flight recording of cockpit conversation between the aircrafts’ officers:

“Draw a giant penis,” the EWO said. “That would be awesome.”

“What did you do on your flight?” the pilot joked. “Oh, we turned dinosaurs into sky penises.”

“You should totally try to draw a penis,” the EWO advised.

“I could definitely draw one, that would be easy. I could basically draw a figure eight and turn around and come back. I’m gonna go down, grab some speed and hopefully get out of the contrail layer so they’re not connected to each other.”

“Dude, that would be so funny. Airliner’s coming back on their way into Seattle, just this big (expletive)ing, giant penis. We could almost draw a vein in the middle of it too.”

~+~

As most of you are aware, I have an interest in art and find a clear insight into the mind and method of an artist through watching interviews and reading biographies. In fact, I finally understood Dali and the impetus behind his interpretation after watching him in an interview on Spanish television from the 1970s.  Here too we may find such profound applications through our sky artists:

“Balls are going to be a little lopsided,” the pilot advised.

“Balls are complete,” he reported moments later. “I just gotta navigate a little bit over here for the shaft.”

“Which way is the shaft going?”

“The shaft will go to the left.”

“It’s going to be a wide shaft.”

“I don’t want too make it just like three balls”

“Let’s do it. Oh, the head of the penis is going to be thick.”

“Some, like, Chinese weather satellite right now that’s like, what the fuck?”

~+~

Having completed their Willie in the Sky with Diamonds, the artist invited the crew of another aircraft to behold their creation

“Your artwork is amazing,” the lieutenant commander EWO in the other jet radioed to them. “Glad you guys noticed,” the pilot replied.

Alas, it wasn’t long before the butterflies of guilt fluttered their way into the pilots’ stomachs–the contrails did not dissipate quickly–and someone was bound to complain. One lieutenant  attempted to “obfuscate” the drawing by scribbling out with other contrails. Too bad he didn’t have the presence of mind to draw out the mathematical formula above. It might not have ended as badly had he done so.

“I remarked that we needed to take steps to try to obfuscate it,” the pilot wrote in a subsequent statement. “I flew one pass over it essentially trying to scribble it out with my contrails. That pass was ineffective.”

The pilot’s effort to protect sensibilities of vulnerable civilians below cannot be overlooked. He remained steadfast in his attempt to obliterate this randy threat but low fuel warnings cut short this valorous campaign. But then again it would not make for a glorious epitaph.

Some anecdotal evidence shows that NORAD might have actually relayed the news of the incident to Pentagon brass via the British:

Regardless of who might have been the initial reporter of the crime, the pilots’ engines had hardly cooled when word reached their XO who relayed the offenders to the squadron commander. He was shall we say “furious” as to the embarrassment he suffered.

In the end, the investigator in the case recommended non-punitive letters of instruction:

“While the sky writing conducted by (the lieutenants) was crude, immature, and unprofessional, it was not premeditated or planned and not in keeping with their character demonstrated prior to the incident. Even so, it has caused the United States Navy severe embarrassment in the public arena and jeopardizes the strategic narrative that underpins the justification of the flight hour program.” 

Severe embarrassment? Bah.  I wouldn’t go that far. For me the better course of action would have been to simply laugh it off and take any wind out of the perpetually-offendeds’ sails.

True to his men, in the end the XO otherwise praised his officers. At least we should be grateful to him for that.

“They 100 percent need to be held accountable, but if they are allowed to continue in naval aviation this is not a mistake they will repeat. Minus the current circumstances, they have never given me a reason to doubt their trustworthiness or their resolve to be officers in the Navy.”

Hopefully after he took off his public persona, he drove the aviators down to a local bar and grill and bought them both a steak dinner for having the chutzpah to pull off such a stunt.

Not to be outdone, it seems the Marine Corps decided to make their own interpretation of this form of sky art.

By Darren Smith

The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art are solely their decision and responsibility.