NORS-Free Record and Intercept Picture

While I was there, the 667th set an enviable record.  The Radar site was NORS-FREE for more than a year!  NORS meant Not Operationally Ready-Supply, which, translated into civilian language meant that we were not capable of performing our mission because one or more pieces of our major equipment was not working while we waited for repair parts to be shipped to us.  Thus, NORS-Free meant that we had absolutely no "down time" because of a lack of repair parts for more than a year and this was accomplished even with the added handicap of having one of the longest supply lines in the entire United States Air Force!  It was really a most remarkable record.

Shown below is a composite graphic I made which has the masthead of the newspaper of the First Air Force (responsible for the entire Eastern Arctic Air Defense of the United States), the actual article recognizing our site for the Nors-Free record and a picture of two F-102 Delta Dagger  interceptor jet aircraft used in intercepting and identifying the Russian bombers which regularly flew within our sector of coverage.   You may also be interested in viewing the picture from the USAF Museum showing an actual intercept and the link to the USAF Museum.

Barney:  A great achievement but we cheated to accomplished this. We had almost every critical part hid in the old eight tower. Someone reported it to SMSGT Suppes. He told us it had to go . We made several trips to the dump but the most of it wound up hid under the 93 tower. At the next monthly awards party SGT Suppes received the Horses Ass Award . I received the ruler of the purple shaft with the barbed wire wreath. And unknown snitch received the Rat Fink Award. These awards were given in fun and to poke fun at ourselves. We also had two height finders transmitter tubes that held the record for most hours of a magnetron. Both had over 30,000 hours.