Go behind the scenes in the life of a Navy officer: Weapons and Warfare

Apr 10, 2024 at 03:00 AM CDT

In this episode of Weapons and Warfare, former Navy Aviator Rob Roy uploads videos to show viewers an inside look at life as a naval aviator. — Image credit: U.S. Navy League

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This episode of Weapons and Warfare features former naval aviator Rob Roy, who is sharing his military experience with host Ryan Robertson one video at a time. Roy takes viewers inside the cockpit of the soon-to-be-retired C-2 Greyhound for an up-close education of what it’s like to work and fly from what’s been called a floating city.

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Also featured in this episode:

The Navy is sending specialized equipment able to lift tons to help the recovery efforts in the Port of Baltimore.
The first of a new unit of Triton drones touches down at Naval Air Station Sigonella.
The U.S. Marine Corp is deploying its new Amphibious Combat Vehicle after delays from training issues.
This week’s weapon is an unmanned aircraft system that could be a game changer for the U.S. Navy.

You can subscribe to the Weapons and Warfare podcast on the platform of your choosing here.

Ryan Robertson is the anchor of the Straight Arrow News video podcast Weapons and Warfare. He wore many hats in his career — from photographer to news director — and firmly believes honest journalism will save our Republic.

Tags: Baltimore, Baltimore Bridge Collapse, Drones, Marine Corps, Navy, U.S. military

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[RYAN ROBERTSON]

HELLO AND WELCOME TO WEAPONS AND WARFARE, FOR STRAIGHT ARROW NEWS I’M RYAN ROBERTSON AND FOR THE NEXT TWO WEEKS WE’LL BE COMING TO YOU FROM NATIONAL HARBOR, MARYLAND, IT’S ABOUT TEN MILES SOUTH OF WASHINGTON, D.C.

WE’RE HERE FOR THE NAVY LEAGUE’S ‘SEA, AIR, SPACE 2024’, THE LARGEST MARITIME EXPO IN THE UNITED STATES. OVER THE NEXT FEW DAYS WE’LL BE GATHERING STORIES TO SHARE WITH YOU OVER THE COMING WEEKS AS WE TAKE A LOOK AT WHAT THE FUTURE LOOKS LIKE FOR THE NAVY AND MARINE CORPS.

BUT FIRST SOME HEADLINES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED.

ABOUT 50 MILES NORTHEAST OF HERE THE CLEANUP AND RECOVERY CONTINUES AT THE FRANCIS SCOTT KEY BRIDGE IN BALTIMORE. SHORTLY AFTER THE COLLAPSE, THE U.S. NAVY ANNOUNCED THEY HAD SENT SEVERAL PIECES OF SPECIALIZED EQUIPMENT INCLUDING A 1000-TON LIFT CAPACITY DERRICK BARGE AND A 200-TON LIFT CAPACITY REVOLVING CRANE BARGE,

THE BARGES WILL BE USED BY THE NAVY’S SUPERVISOR OF SALVAGE AND DIVING TO REMOVE SUBMERGED PORTIONS OF THE FRANCIS SCOTT KEY BRIDGE.

THE FIRST MQ-4C TRITON HAS ARRIVED AT NAVAL AIR STATION SIGONELLA. THE TRITON IS A HIGH-ALTITUDE, LONG-ENDURANCE, UNMANNED AERIAL VEHICLE, AND IS THE NAVY’S NEWEST SURVEILLANCE, AND RECONNAISSANCE PATROL ASSET.

THE NAVY HAS YET TO ANNOUNCE HOW MANY TRITONS THEY PLAN TO SEND TO THE BASE OFF THE ITALIAN COAST.

NAS SIGONELLA, WHICH IS ON THE ISLAND OF SICILY, PLAYS AN IMPORTANT ROLE WITHIN NATO. AS IT’S STRATEGIC LOCATION HELPS THE U.S., AND ITS PARTNERS, MAINTAIN SECURITY AND STABILITY IN EUROPE, AFRICA, AND CENTRAL COMMAND.

AND THE MARINE CORPS HAVE DEPLOYED FOR THE FIRST TIME WITH THEIR NEW AMPHIBIOUS COMBAT VEHICLES. THE U.S. NAVAL INSTITUTE REPORTING THE USS BOXER RECENTLY LEFT SAN DIEGO FOR A DELAYED DEPLOYMENT WITH THE 15TH MARINE EXPEDITIONARY UNIT. TRAINING ISSUES LED TO THE DELAY AFTER, MULTIPLE ACVs WERE KNOCKED OVER DURING TRAINING ON A BEACH IN CALIFORNIA. THE BOXER WILL ULTIMATELY END UP IN THAILAND A TAKE PART IN THE COBRA GOLD TRAINING EXERCISE.

——————————————————-

{RYAN ON CAM}

ONE THING YOU GET AN APPRECIATION FOR WHEN YOU COME TO EVENTS LIKE ‘SEA, AIR, SPACE 2024’ IS THE WIDE CROSS SECTION OF AMERICA THAT IS REPRESENTED BY OUR MEN AND WOMEN IN UNIFORM. PEOPLE WITH TALENTS THAT EXTEND WELL BEYOND THEIR MILITARY TRAINING. LIKE THE SUBJECT OF OUR DEBRIEF THIS WEEK.

[YOUTUBE CLIP}

“MEATBALL, lineup, AOA. Meatball, lineup, AOA. Ball… BALL! BALL!! I’M NOT SO SURE ABOUT THIS ONE!!! Oh, we’re good, it’s not that scary But there’s a ton that has to happen before we ever get to this point. ”

[RYAN ROBERTSON]

THAT’S FROM A CLIP CALLED ‘BEST ARRESTED LANDING NARRATION DOT DOT DOT EVER QUESTION MARK, AND IT’S FROM THE ‘FLY ROB ROY’ YOUTUBE CHANNEL. A PLACE THAT OFFERS VIEWERS AN INSIDE LOOK A LIFE AS A NAVAL AVIATOR. AND IT PROMPTED US TO WANT TO KNOW MORE, SO I RECENTLY SAT DOWN WITH THIS CONTENT CREATOR TO LEARN ABOUT HIS STORY.

All right, Lieutenant Rob Roy, formerly with the US Navy. Thank you so much for joining us for this conversation on weapons and warfare. Really just want to kind of dive right in. I mean, you were a lieutenant in the Navy, you flew propeller planes. How did you how did you get into it? Where did you start?

{ROB ROY}

Thanks for having me, Ryan. Yeah, I was a Lieutenant in the United States Navy. I got out about two years ago. I got commissioned at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland 2001 And then I went to flight school shortly thereafter, Pensacola, Corpus Christi, Texas, Meridian, Mississippi back to Corpus, and then ultimately sort of flying the mighty sea to Greyhound at a Norfolk Virginia in the mid 2000 10s. With VRC 40 my squadron.

{RYAN ROBERTSON}

For folks who don’t know the C-2 Greyhound is one of what two propeller planes that can land on aircraft carriers?

{ROB ROY}

Yeah, the E-2 Hawkeye, it’s got the big dome on top, so if people see in the recent Top Gun Maverick movie, there’s a two-and-a-half second shot of a Hawke you know, controlling the aircraft. Basically, we are a version of that take away the dome, same propellers same cockpit basically, but a lot fatter of a body of an aircraft and take away all the officers in the back and replace them with 30 souls. So couple aircrew and a lot of passengers or 10,000 pounds of cargo or a combination of the two. So we were the cod for the air wing, the carrier onboard deliveries, we brought all the male cargo, people distinguished visitors supply engine cars for the Navy, we were literally Uber for the Navy and Amazon Prime basically delivers to the Navy, I had an Amazon Prime patch. 30 years ago, I had USPS Postal Service patch so and I would bring on like pizzas and shawarmas. And some people would get tuxedos and suits at the local markets overseas and like they would go there on their liberty call. And three weeks later, we’d like pick up all their orders and bring out huge boxes of custom-made suits and whatnot to the to the air wing. Yeah, it’s good time.

{RYAN ROBERTSON}

You have a YouTube channel? And it’s you know, you started it, obviously, when you got out of the service, is that right?

{ROB ROY}

I started it and fall 2020 Because like everyone else, I was kind of bored and COVID. So I upload these videos, in the fall 2020 are a couple of them. I knew that they would pop with like 10,000, maybe 100,000 views, no idea, no idea that would get millions of views, a few weeks and months later, because when I recorded it, it was from my wife and my mom, basically I put on Facebook, like, you know, 1000 views, whatever. And then record it for the whole point of YouTube. I mean, if I could do it over again today, knowing what I know about building a brand and, and even telling the Navy story. It’d be like, Hey, guys, you know, let’s follow me out to the we’re gonna get right. I didn’t know that. Right. I just I just you’re so focused on the mission. It was a lot of during pre-flight, you know, certainly before I did the first couple, it was really testing like, will these work? Are these GoPro grips gonna hold kind of thing. Once all that was dialed in. It was like, you know, because I’m not trying to be a nuisance to my co-pilot to the aircrew to the mission. So like you get it. There’s more important things to play than yeah, quick. And then you’re like, Okay, I’m focusing on the carrier landing on the boat and then working. We’re about 10 mins from laning boop, boop, and you’re done. Like you don’t think about any more than I just am. If you watch the videos, I completely focused on the task at hand. I kind of forget there’s even a GoPro there, maybe one or two, get ready to take a catapult shot to kind of look at it because we’re just literally waiting to launch that point. But yeah, that’s that’s I won’t start it.

{RYAN ROBERTSON}

Well, thank you for staying focused on the mission and keeping YouTube secondary.

{ROB ROY}

Oh, yeah.

{RYAN ROBERTSON}

But also, thank you for watching this because you give people an insight into something that, you know, we don’t see on an everyday basis, and you have a good personality and you had some humor to it. So yeah, from from your audience perspective, I understand why it popped.

{ROB ROY}

So when the when the idea came to do like, hey, you know, these videos are doing pretty well. I’m going to start leaning into it. Like, obviously, you’ve gained some notoriety within the world of, you know, YouTube streamers and all that kind of thing. What’s kind of been the, the personal impact, like you get recognized when you’re out and about I’ve been recognized

twice, like, actually randomly once was at a restaurant in Washington State and just with during COVID with a mask on and everything. And that was kind of very surprising. I kept hearing like, Rob Roy, maybe I’m like, hearing things. And they were being really nice. And then one of the time was at Oshkosh, we just kind of made sense because I was there at the Big Air Show. But no, nothing too crazy. I think the reason is because a lot of my videos my visor is down, we didn’t wear a mask like a hornet guys can’t even see who they are but their visors down. You can’t hear me talking because again I recorded in 2015 I didn’t really I wanted to record the audio but I just couldn’t get the time between Amazon and you know, BH photo and video like whatever I couldn’t find the adapter for the very specific Navy plugs. So yeah, I think as my channel grows and pivoted some kind of moving towards more of a general aviation direction the next couple weeks and months. I think it will definitely get more exposure with my face and my voice but the time you know a lot of my navy buddies have reached out and just you know, said they liked what I’m doing. then, you know representing the Navy in a good light.

{RYAN ROBERTSON}

I think that’s just about all the questions that I had for you today. Really appreciate your time, Lieutenant Rob Roy, and we talked about this before we hit recording but your namesake is awesome. And for folks who are not fans of history, you should look up Rob Roy, not just the movie that Liam Neeson was in but also the man from history, right?

[ROB ROY]

Yeah, no relation, unfortunately to the McGregor clan, I wish that I was. But I pay a lot of respect to Rob Roy. And I feel like if any McGregors in Scotland listening want to give me a free pass to a clan meeting. I’d love to join up because I have a lot of, you know, a lot of feelings in my heart because my whole life just you know, been associated with with him and whatnot. He’ll be somebody I think it’s a call sign but now it’s my real name.

A BIG THANK YOU TO ROB, IF YOU WANT TO HEAR MORE FROM HIM, WE’LL BE RELEASING A BONUS PODCAST THAT INCLUDES OUR ENTIRE CONVERSATION ABOUT HIS LIFE IN THE NAVY, AND HIS TAKE ON WHAT CHALLENGES THE NAVY IS FACING TODAY. AND CAN FIND THAT WHEREVER PODCASTS ARE DOWNLOADED. NAVAL INSTITUTE REPORTING THE USS BOXER RECENTLY LEFT SAN DIEGO FOR A DELAYED DEPLOYMENT WITH THE 15TH MARINE EXPEDITIONARY UNIT. TRAINING ISSUES LED TO THE DELAY AFTER, MULTIPLE ACVs WERE KNOCKED OVER DURING TRAINING ON A BEACH IN CALIFORNIA. THE BOXER WILL ULTIMATELY END UP IN THAILAND A TAKE PART IN THE COBRA GOLD TRAINING EXERCISE.

—————————————

{RYAN ROBERTSON]

TIME NOW FOR OUR WEAPON OF THE WEEK, AND FOR THIS ONE WE’RE TURNING OUR EYES TO THE SKIES FOR WHAT COULD BE A BIG PLAYER FOR THE NAVY.

MEET THE MQ-25 STINGRAY. IT’S SLEEK, IT CAN CARRY A LOT OF GAS, AND IT’S UNMANNED. THIS IS WHAT THE NAVY HOPES WILL HELP CARRIER AIR WINGS AND CARRIER STRIKE GROUPS MAXIMIZE THEIR AIR POWER.

BUILT BY BOEING, THE MQ-25 IS THE RESULT OF YEARS OF ENGINEERING AND TESTING. THE PROJECT WAS ANNOUNCED IN APRIL OF 2018, WITH BOEING RELEASING A VIDEO ANNOUNCING THE PROJECT. AS YOU CAN TELL, WHAT WAS IMAGINED, AND WHAT WAS EVENTUALLY BUILT, WERE TWO FAIRLY SIMILAR-LOOKING AIRCRAFT. LESS THAN FOUR YEARS LATER, THE REAL VERSION OF THE STINGRAY HEADED TO SEA FOR IT’S FIRST TEST ABOARD AN AIRCRAFT CARRIER.

[Matthew Savage, Boeing UCAD Test Team Lead}

“We’re calling this the unmanned carrier aviation demonstration. To look at how the MQ operates on the flight-deck both from propulsion testing and our human factors evaluation. This is a historic moment for the Navy, and for the Boeing Company, because this is the first evaluation of this vehicle’s ability to operate with the fleet. ”

[RYAN ROBERTSON]

THOSE TESTS MUST HAVE GONE REASONABLY WELL BECAUSE IN FEBRUARY BOEING HANDED OVER THE FIRST STINGRAY TO THE NAVY FOR EVALUATION.

MORE THAN JUST BEING A FLYING GAS STATION FOR THE NAVY’S F-18S AND F-35S, THE MQ-25 IS ALSO EXPECTED TO PLAY A ROLE IN GATHERING INTELLIGENCE, AS WELL AS CONDUCTING SURVEILLANCE AND RECONNAISSANCE MISSIONS.

FOR THE RIGHT TO BUILD THE STINGRAY BOEING BEAT OUT GENERAL ATOMICS AND LOCKHEED MARTIN FOR AN $805 MILLION CONTRACT.

PROVIDING ALL GOES WELL THE NAVY’S DEAL INCLUDES FOUR MORE STINGRAYS FOR THE FLEET WITH PLANS TO EQUIP ALL NIMITZ-CLASS AND GERALD R. FORD-CLASS CARRIERS WITH THE ABILITY TO OPERATE MQ-25s.

—————————————

{RYAN ROBERTSON]

TIME NOW FOR COMMS CHECK, WHERE WE TAKE A LOOK AT WHAT YOU THE VIEWERS ARE SAYING.

FIRST UP OUR STORY ON RUSSIA INCREASING PRODUCTION OF THEIR FAB MUNITIONS, FOR THE 500, 1,500 AND 3,000 VERSIONS. OF THIS, LANCE FARMER WANTS TO KNOW.

{COMMENT} “What happened to these “Crippling” sanctions?”

{RYAN’S RESPONSE}

Well, it’s a good question, Lance. Yes, the United States in the West did put some sanctions on Russia to kind of try to stop Moscow from being able to, to operate as a normal country and and kind of help him in, if you will, some of Russia’s capabilities to produce and make weaponry. But those sanctions aren’t 100% Not not all of those sanctions, stop everything. There have been multiple weapons and muted munitions found on the battlefield in Ukraine that have parts from Western nations countries that are supposed to have bands in place to stop their supplies from going into Russia. However, Russia is a big country, they are they have spies, right? They have capabilities in place to be able to buy things on the black market and have things shipped over into Russia. In these FA B bombs. It’s the bombs themselves are older technology, putting the glide wings on them. That’s that’s the new feature. But the bombs themselves Russia is able to make those and has been able to make those for some time, and a lot of that stuff they they produce domestically.

So, Lance, to answer your question, there are a number of sanctions in place that are that are, you know, yes, stopping Russia from being able to reconstitute as quickly. But Russia has friends in China, Russia has friends in Iran that are helping them being able to produce these weapons. So sanctions in place, they’re not 100% effective, maybe more sanctions necessary or enforcing the sanctions to a greater extent, could could help slow down Russia’s ability to produce these weapons at scale. So hope that answered your question, Lance.

UP NEXT, AN UPDATE ON ONE OF OUR VERY FIRST WEAPONS OF THE WEEK. BACK IN JANUARY WE TOLD YOU ABOUT THE ARMY SELECTING SIG SAUER AND THEIR M-7 RIFLE, AS WELL AS THE M-250 SAW AS THE NEXT GEN WEAPONS FOR THEIR SOLDIERS. WELL NOW THOSE SOLDIERS ARE GETTING THEIR HANDS ON THEM.

WITH NEW WEAPONS TRAINING SCHEDULED FOR THIS MONTH THE 101st AIRBORNE AT FORT CAMPBELL, KENTUCKY BEGAN EQUIPPING SOLDIERS WITH THE NEW RIFLES AND THE XM-157 FIRE CONTROL ADVANCED OPTIC, PLUS THE 6.8-MM FAMILY OF AMMUNITION.

THESE NEW WEAPONS, DESTINED FOR THE HANDS OF THE ARMY’S CLOSE CONTACT TROOPS, ARE REPLACING THE M-4 AND THE M-249.

So Army is — the 101st airborne — very happy to be getting their hands on some of these new weaponry. You know, I wish I could have one but you know, maybe someday, but in the meantime, folks, that’ll do it for comms check. As always, if you have a question thought concern that you want us to address here on the show. You can leave a comment below in the section down below or you can send us an email, weapons and warfare, all spelled out, weaponsandwarfare@san.com

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