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Here's a videosomeofyoumight have seen of an F-16 crashing at an airshow:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 48&q=crash
In it, you hear the radio crackle what sounds like "knock it off" several times.
I've heard this before in other videos, and I'm curious if any of you folks know what it means. It's been baffling me since I was a kid. lol
Doesn't it mean stop the show, i.e. break formations off and stop. That would be my guess.
I agree, it must be some signal to end the show. Thank god the pilot ejected at the last minute.
"Knock it off" is a term used commonly in the Air Force and more commonly in the flying community (especially the fighter world). It basically means "Stop everything". Anyone, from the newest LT in the squadron, to the General keeping his currency or flying an "orientation" flight can call a KIO. Basically, if something looks wrong, or goes wrong, and one of the pilots (or crewmembers in heavies) sees something that jeopardizes the safety of the mission or people, they call a knock-it-off. It can be called for pretty much any reason relating to safety, whether it's something like the situation above, or something as simple as a pilot or crewmember lost his "whits" or got really spooked by something, and needs to end training. At this point, everyone stops all type of manuevers or whatever training they were engaged in, they evaluate their situation, and then usually return to base to discuss the KIO.
One of my old commander was a Strike Eagle driver, who LOVED used fighter terms, and who thought that fighter pilots were a notch above everyone else. Anyway, we had a squadron policy, that if we saw something wrong during training, specifically something that violated training regulations, the UCMJ or anything that was "iffy" in regards to regs, anyone, from the lowest ranking member to the squadron commander could call a Knock-It-Off, and we'd immediately stop what we were doing and meet to discuss why the KIO was called.
More recently, as I somewhat started flying with the Air Force, we'd use the term "knock-it-off" more commonly in pre-flight brief, such as "If this happens, we'll just knock-it-off and come home". Only used it once in my short time flying though. My IP (a Ret. Full Bird F-111, F-4, F-15 and F-16 pilot, and a really nice guy) and I got caught under some rapidly building CBs (those things can build into severe t'storms in like 30 minutes in Colorado... It's amazing!) with the downdrafts from the virga pretty strong, and with OATs at something like 26 degrees and the Density Altitude approaching 10,000' at the surface (field elevation is already at 6,500') we just couldn't climb or get any performance out of the airplane, and ended up "knocking-off" the rest of the flight and going back. Was nothing like the video though, just a casual "Let's just knock-it-off and head back before it gets real ****ty out here."
I'm sure Moose may have some much more interesting stories from his flying days though!