Ive been following its development for years but have never seen one in person. Late this morning while I was reading a solar charger on the nearest window still started to shake. I had time to think it might be an earthquake and about 15 seconds later I hear a very low frequency helicopter noice. Two Ospreys buzzed by, not 1000 feet in altitude. My first thought-they are loud. Ive worked around aircraft and they are loud even for heavy helicopters. Low pitched too.
That's the first thing I noticed the first time I saw two Marine Ospreys flying over head, how freaking loud they were. They are loud. With the UH-1 Huey Charley had a few minutes warning that Americans were approaching with the popping of the blade tips breaking the sound barrier. But these Osprey's are extremely loud. They have their own distinctive sound that no other aircraft has. And they are freaking loud.
I've been around and close to A-10's in Arizona and around the Nellis range in Nevada and they have their distinctive sound but the Osprey is loud and it's shakes things. But I bet many *******s in Afghanistan or Iraq know that distinctive sound of the Warthog before they see it and the urine uncontrollably starts running. Many aircraft have a distinctive sound to set them apart. The F-4 Phantom, UH-1 B,C and D Hueys, CH-46 Sea Knight, C-5 A and the B-52 taking off is an E ticket. The P-51 Mustang, you can hear it miles away before it comes into sight because you hear it's supercharger. But when there's a FA-18 or F-16 overhead at 20,000 or 30,000 feet I can't distinguish if it's a FA-18 or F-16 without making eye contact and having a pair of binoculars.
I've heard A-10s overhead that I could swear I heard their turbofans spooling up and down as a result of throttle changes. As I've said two ship elements of A-10s used to use my parents farm for training flights. Often approaching widely separated then turning toward each other and making a head on, knife edge pass before continuing on. Sometimes scared the hell out of our cows. Other times the cows just craned their heads upward and watched.
I saw a pair of Osprey's a few years ago when I was in Afghanistan. I'd never seen them in person until that day. We were all having a joint service meeting and the Marine's came rolling in on that thing. It was awesome. Just watching them take off and seeing the rotor blades rotate was cool. But yes I will agree with what others have said, they are quite loud. It's not so much the loudness but rather they sound different than anything else. We're used to hearing Blackhawks and Chinooks and whatnot but when those things arrived everyone looked around in the sky to figure out what the hell that noise was. Got a chance to chat with the pilots for a bit. They said they loved flying it, it's the best of both worlds. They all agreed that one of the scariest parts about learning to fly the Osprey was when they first saw those blades rotate downward for horizontal flight. He said few things are more terrifying than looking out the window and seeing 2 huge rotor disks moving near the cockpit and hoping that those engineers got the measurements right lol. It's not like a normal prop plane, those blades are huge and they look very close to the cockpit from the inside apparently. Cool aircraft nonetheless.
Update: Yesterday (4-7-16) around 6:30 P.M. in the Hollywood Hills where the Hollywood Left live, liberals went into fear. The ground started shaking, homes started rattling. "IT's The BIG ONE !!!" "OMFG, California is going to sink into the sea !!!" "IT's THE BIG ONE !!!" EARTHQUAKE !!! EARTHQUAKE !!! Thousands of people dialed 911, "Did you feel it ???" "Was it an earthquake ???" As two Marine Corps V-22 Ospreys flew overhead. Barack Obama is in town to pick up liberal money from the Hollywood Left. That means Air Force One, four C-17's, Marine One and a decoy Marine One and two Marine V-22 Ospreys to transport Obama's golf clubs, basketballs and reporters from MSNBC, CNN, Huffington Huff. I knew Obama was in L.A., he arrived yesterday disrupting the lives of a million Americans and about as many illegal aliens as hundreds of miles of streets are closed down, hundreds of commercial airline flights are delayed for hours and no fly zones are established. Barricades are put up preventing people from entering businesses and their neighborhoods. FYI: If you don't have ID, you can't get home if Obama is with in a dozen miles of your neighborhood. But you don't need any ID to vote. Can't figure out the logic of that ? I got up this morning, turned on the radio around 6 A.M. and I hear all of the libs talking about what they thought was the "big one," what they thought was an earthquake. Those V-22 Ospreys aren't just freaking loud, but before you even hear an Osprey, the ground starts a shaking before you even hear the Osprey.
V-22...."Old Shaky" I've never seen in one person. I left the service in 2006 and the first operational Osprey unit was with the Marine Corps in March, 2006. I lived a few miles from an Air National Guard unit that flew the F-4. They would regularly go super-sonic on training exercises, and the vibrations from the sonic boom would knock things off the shelf in my room. Probably the loudest thing, most annoying at least, I've heard aviation related remains the high-pitched whine from the twin jet engines of a Cessna T-37 USAF trainer...it's like a dog whistle, it vibrates your fillings loose. I've got tinnitus to this day and I attribute a large part of it to exposure to the "Tweety-bird" T-37.
So you also have tinnitus ? About ten years ago I was a few feet away from a rattlesnake and couldn't hear the buzz of the rattler. Not good when you are in snake country. Went to my doctor and he diagnosed I had tinnitus then asked me if I served in the military ? Yes Asked if I served when they gave you cotton for ear protection when on the rifle range ? Yes. Ends up cotton is useless for ear protection. Well one doesn't wear ear protection when in combat or out in the field when training. It all comes back to haunt you when you get older. They are seeing many vets who when getting in their late 40's, 50's and 60's who have tinnitus, especially those who served in artillery or worked around aircraft. That's one thing the VA would be fighting like Agent Orange denying that it's connected to military service. Could you see millions of vets filing a tinnitus claim with the VA ? Tinnitus can't be cured.
I have a constant ringing in my ears and most of it caused by exposure to jet noise over the years and inadequate hearing protection. I was initially rated as 0% hearing loss by the VA, you need a10% rating which gets you about $133 a month. It's difficult to prove it's all service related. I have what is approaching a 75% loss of speech recognition, meaning say in a crowded room I could not understand you unless you were literally talking in my ear. I need backqround noise all the time to cover the ringing, especially when trying to sleep, otherwise the ringing, which never goes away, would drive me crazy. Anyone who has tinnitus, I share their misery. It's 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, a relentless high pitched ringing in both ears, worse in my left ear. I'm sorry for the pity party, back to the V-22.
Tinnitus is a real pain to treat. There are less aggressive treatments like white noise machines and hearing aids. There are also medications that can help, like antidepressants (antidepressants are used for many things besides depression) but they have side effects. Normally medical causes of tinnitus are ruled out first like high blood pressure, or earwax. You guys were around loud noise, that is probably the cause.
I was working in aerospace system development at the time the V-22 was being developed in the late 80's/early 90's. My cubicle mate had responsibility for the cabin pressure system on it. The program had many delays over the years during development, almost canceled many times, and in fact 2 went down killing mil personnel NW of Tucson at the Air Park about 8 yrs ago (?). I remember the poster passed around during the development of the V-22; showed one landing on the roof of a building and evaucating personnel in the middle of a city (similar to the Viet Nam closed embassy event back when). Looked to heavy to land on a roof, but it was an artist's conception showing an application and purpose for such an a/c. Looks like the Marines eventually won over the DOD and the bugs were finally resolved.
