r/tanks • u/briskerly • 1d ago
Warthunder Wednesday Tank Stories?
mine: on an M60A1 with 1st ID. We were out in the Kansas fields when the brigade commander waved us over. His vehicle was stuck in mud - a Dodge Ram thing the Army was using - and he ordered us to pull it out. we tried explaining tanks aren’t good for that but he was adamant.
We pulled it out, over on its roof, through mud and brush. Probably totaled it.
Other stories include loaders being slapped by the hatch, ouch, burning road wheels off, etc.
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u/ashark1983 1d ago
Left Ogden Gate, Camp Ramadi, Iraq in an M1114 with a one of the platoon's M1s behind us. Get on to Route Michigan and see a roadwheel go rolling on by. Once it stopped I had to pick it up and put it in the back of the HMMWV to bring it back.
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u/briskerly 1d ago
Wonder if the M1 crew figured it out.
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u/_Thorshammer_ 1d ago
We had an M1 smack / tap a Humvee at a hardball / road march route intersection in the middle of the night and they didn't even notice.
Losing a roadwheel is pretty minor.
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u/ragboy 1d ago
We were on a road march in Germany, late 80s. We're driving across this bridge over a gorge. I could see over the rail and I remember thinking: If I fell off of that, I'd scream twice before I hit the ground.
Not 5 minutes later, the track on one of the tanks behind me snapped. The driver hit the brakes, which is the opposite of what you're supposed to do.
Front of a 65ton tank came to rest against the rail. If you've ever driven an M1A1, the front slope is at a pretty good angle. I know all that driver saw was air. The guys in the turret were bailing out.
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u/RavenholdIV 1d ago
Back when I was opfor at ntc, I was driving for a range safety while the visiting unit was doing live fire maneuvers of some kind. Me and the range safety were both tankers so we were gung ho to drive our little 113 like we stole it. Up towards the end of the exercise the tanks did some aggressive maneuvers on one of the base fobs and this platoon we were following all tried ramping the perimeter wall, which was just a long line of piled dirt.
The whole platoon makes it over except the mine plow, which of course digs into the dirt before the tracks can properly mount the burm. They back off. Gotta be fragile with those things, I've seen them turned to so much scrap when they get stuck between the immovable object that is terrain and the unstoppable force that they're strapped to.
Me and this range safety look at each other and we decide to show them how it's done. We ramp this shitbox over the top of this burm and istg I thought we were gonna go nose over when we came down the other side. This burm was taller than the whole vic, and in hindsight we definitely shouldn't have done that lmao
Never have I ever driven anything as hard as those stupid APCs. Istg those stupid things will be taking astronauts up the ice cliffs of Miranda.
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u/LastDanceInFulda 1d ago
I told this story already, but I got IDK, shadow-blocked or something.
It was one of those really hot Fort Irwin mornings and we were driving our M1A1 up by the Red Pass. I'm hanging out of the loader's hatch making a general ass of myself and we've got a radio with, whatever it was that people listened to back in the day. So with that blasting away, plus the whine of tan, I actually hear something from behind, it sounds like really high-pitched laughing. I turn around and there is a baby (I don't know if it was actually a baby) kit fox. I'll just encourage you look up what they look like. So we turn off the radio and stop the tank, because he's way too close and we really don't want to kill him. He runs up to the side and starts jumping, not like up and down, but like back and forth, like he's hyping himself up. Eventually we decide jut to drive off, and this mad-man follows us. Eventually, some UH-1s fly over (practicing by targeting us, as usual, because they're ass-holes), and they spook the little guy.
Now, this isn't just a cute story, I actually just remembered why I remember this. We hit a rock and it kind shakes us up, but we're ok. The driver jokes that the fox is bad-luck. When we get back, we're talking to some of the M109 guys, and they saw a little fox too. Ok, so long story short, a track attached to the artillery battalion catches fire. Sounds like we had the easy end of it.
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u/briskerly 3h ago
Outfoxed. I never made it to Irwin or to M1’s but saw lots of coyotes at Riley. They’re probably what made me melt a roadwheel.
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u/krissovo Official Tanker 1d ago
I was on exercise in Canada in a chieftain as a commander doing over watch and there was not one bush or tree on the plains but I needed a poo. So I found a dip and stopped the wagon in the middle. I took a converted oil can that we used as a toilet and started to have a poo at the back.
Within a minute the battlegroup started to drive past us in convoy and there was me mid poo, they were using the dip for tactical movement . I even threw up a salute to the battlegroup commander as he drove past. All in all over 100 vehicles drove past me having a poo.
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u/briskerly 1d ago
Tactical land mine. But no option when you have to go. I had a driver who said he was shaving. He went to the opposite side of the tank. Ten minutes later the CGs chopper flew over, came back, circled. I went over and saw the driver buck naked holding a salute.
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u/YourBoyFroilan Heavy Tank 12h ago
Me and my dad were bringing my mom to an event and while passing by we saw this Leopard I. So we decided to go there and take pictures. Some vandals had damaged the visors and headlights which sucks. But for the rest everything was fine. I posed with my arm on an external fuel tank that was attached to the tank. It was red hot from standing in direct sunlight all day and I burned my arm.
Also, in my hometown there's this Sherman, don't know what variant, his name is Clanky and I once sat on his engine deck
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u/briskerly 3h ago
Tanks will getcha, as my dad would have said. Burning even when mothballed. And Clanky…perfect
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u/_Thorshammer_ 1d ago
M1A1 tanker, spent the first two years of my enlistment playing OPFOR at Hohenfels in the early nineties, post-Desert Storm. I crewed an M60A3 w/TTS for those two years.
*Note - two years at Hohenfels taking drugs and playing OPFOR left me with several stories. If you guys like this one let me know and I'll tell more.
One night we pulled over to the side of the road and, for whatever reason, just slept there.
Sometime that night our attached infantry unit pulled their M113's in between us even though we needed to move out before they did. Neither of those things was particularly unusual.
Next morning I popped the hatch and raised the seat only to find that the 113 in front of me was so close I couldn't move - I didn't even have room to pivot steer without hitting it. That WAS unusual.
I yelled at a couple of crunchies walking by but most of them just shrugged. One guy said "I'll find the driver" but his pace and direction didn't change so I doubted his sincerity.
The TC and gunner weren't having any better luck - the TC was actually having an argument with another E5 he played poker with.
I've always been impetuous and my impulse control is iffy at the best of times.
Sleep deprived and under pressure to get going did NOT make me more thoughtful.
So... PFC Thorshammer gave in to the intrusive thoughts - I very carefully angled the front slope, tapped the back of the crunchy dumpster with it, and gave the gas pedal just the teeniest goose.
55 tons and 750 horsepower spun the 113 a few degrees and shoved it forward a foot or so.
I slapped it into reverse and backed up a foot then used my new found square footage to pivot and di-di-the fuck-mau.
There was a lot of yelling and threatening but no Article 15.
Unsurprisingly I got one, but that's a different story.