attached and in October, the squadron showed an officer strength of 38,
with nine pilots,
In November 1953, the official strength of the squadrm
settled at 0 officers and this remained its strength throughout Operation
CASTLE,
A full-scale air rehearsal, occurred off the coast of California,
27 October 1953, and was called Operation TIGER/CAT.
This test was to
allow the Air Force.-and Navy aircraft to become acquainted with operational
procedures for CASTLE and to check the communications networks,
Any
deficiencies were to be corrected within the three months before the series.’
During these maneuvers, the 1,926th Test Squadron (Sampling) operated
from the San Diego Naval Air-Station,
The F-8hG aircraft took off from
San Diego and flew some SO miles to sea where they came under the control
of the Command Ship, the USS ESTES, which vectored them to the B-36
sampler controller aircratt,2° In turn, the controller directed the jets
through simulated sampling maneuvers and returned them to the command ship
which sent them back to San Diego.
for the air-sea rescue aircraft.
The rehearsal was important experience
me of these aircraft flew directly under
the B-36 sampler control, while another was under the control of the
command ship,
Mission aircraft would be no farther than 50 miles from
emergency landing facilities at any time during the rehearsal,
"This
will be par€icularly appreciated by our little brothers in the P-8h
thunder jets," a briefing officer declared, "who will be-flying long range
and endurance mission in single engine, high performance aircraft,"
TIGER/CAT was successful.
Communications equipment aboard the
Command Ship, turned up many malfunctions and the ship put into San Diego
101
AFWU/HG
SWEH-2-003),
\~