A story from the old days. Some of you know I was stationed at NAS Miramar in the 70's (Top Gun, Fightertown, USA). Our shop was way out on the "high speed taxiway" way down the W end of the runways. We had two nearly identical 62? Chev 1/2T service trucks. One, the shifter would easily get bound/ jammed between gears stuck in second. So you had to "nurse" it back to the shop, get a big screwdriver, and crawl under and pry it out again
One time, I guess a weekend or holiday, my work partner and I, Dave, were "on duty." Dave was driving we were coming to the shop across the two runways. We called the tower for clearance "Cross 24 left, cross 24 right" and the tower cleared us, keyed back up and said "expedite, aircraft coming around to final"
Dave wound er up in 1st, SLAMMED it into 2nd, AND THE SHIFT LEVER BROKE OFF RIGHT AT THE ROLL PIN!!!
We got back to the shop, and rolled around in the lounge crying and bawling, "we are gonna be court martialed" etc etc etc
when I had a brain storm.
"Is this the truck gets stuck in gear?"
"No, it's the other one"
"****"
Then we went out, GOT THE OTHER TRUCK STUCK IN GEAR, and drove out the pins and switched the shift levers.
We told the Chief the truck got stuck in gear crossing the runway
One of the trucks on the far left. My 70 RR limelight, and my black '64 426 with the trunk open
View attachment 1715304492