brickhistory

The program where guys retired from AD and then went AFR is all but shut down now. It ramped up following 9/11, worked well to bring rated guys into staff slots and let current guys fight the war. With the drawdowns and bills coming due as to who pays for what, it is damn near impossible to do it now. To answer your question, it is my understanding that say you retired as a Lt Col from AD. Then you filled a Lt Col AFR slot. While you were working, you were paid as a Lt Col again and retired pay was stopped. Then when you retired again, your retired pay was bumped up 2.5% for each year served. You could not compete for promotion while in the retread position. That's what I remember from several years ago when a guy tried it, but I stand to be corrected by somebody with the written words. It does not mean that things could change by the time you try, but the word in AFR now is 'fuggedaboutit.' End strength uber alles..................

Whisper the words "diminuation of value" into USAA's ears. You'll be amazed how quickly they respond to your request to total the car. Not a lawyer nor did I stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night, but I learned this trick some years ago. Essentially, they HAVE to pay you the difference of what your repaired but heavily devalued car is now worth vs. what the Blue or whatever book they use to determine market value of an undamaged car. State insurance laws differ so that's could be an out for them, but probably not. They hate this and might decide to drop you afterwards, but it worked for me to get them to respond to a similiar accident. And they did not drop me.

and '2'

Truly Old School Location, Location, Location The world’s oldest continuously operated airport, College Park Airport is a pretty little field nestled in the green pines and colorful oaks on the outskirts of Washington, D.C. Long a thriving aviation entity due to its convenience to downtown, today that same proximity threatens its very existence. The Smithsonian Air & Space Museum has referred to this little aviation jewel as one of the “five most historically important airports in the world,” College Park Airport’s resume boasts a long list of aviation firsts; the first woman airplane passenger, first military officer to solo a government airplane, first U.S. Army aviation school, first aimed bomb drop tests, first aerial machine gun firing, first Postal Air Mail service, and the first controlled helicopter flight as well as many other feats. Establishing a Tradition In 1909, after several years of trying to interest the U.S. Government in the practicality of the airplane, the Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur, finally won a chance to sell their craft to the U.S. Army’s Signal Corps. Part of the contract included a provision that the Wright brothers had to teach two Army officers to fly. Initial flight tests had been conducted on the Ft. Myers’ parade ground. That field, however, was deemed too short to operate a Wright Military Flyer, a redesign of their earlier craft in order to seat two aviators. The Wrights looked for a large enough site to fly from, offering convenient transportation to the government offices yet was far enough that the hordes of on-lookers that had plagued the initial Ft. Myers-based flights would stay away. Thus was College Park Airfield born. A large open pasture near the then Maryland Agricultural College (today’s University of Maryland) in College Park, the site offered access to the B & O railroad tracks for moving the people and parts needed to set up an airport. The Government leased the land, set up a temporary hanger, cleared the scrubby brush and by October 8, 1909 the Wrights began instructing U.S. Army lieutenants Frank Lahm and Frederic Humphreys in the art of airplane operations. A few weeks later, Lt. Benjamin Foulois joined as a third student. Lahm and Humphreys soloed in November, 1909, after just over three hours of instruction. With this achievement, the Wrights fulfilled their contract and the U.S. government fully accepted the Wright Military Flyer into its inventory. In the worsening weather of wintertime, “Uncle Sam” moved his fledgling aircraft section to Ft. Sam Houston, Texas. He would be back, however. Soon after the Wrights began operating from the Army aviation school at College Park, several civilian entrepreneurs and inventors also recognized the attractiveness of the field. The first of these individuals was Rexford Smith, an inventor and patent attorney. He set up the Rex Smith Aeroplane Company using a craft of his own design. On his heels came the National Aviation Company and the Washington Aeroplane Company. Two of Smith’s test pilots went on to other aviation fame: Paul Peck became a renowned exhibition flyer, a “barnstormer” in the vernacular of the time, and Tony Jannus, the first commercial airline pilot. Jannus achieved that milestone in 1914. Meanwhile, Smith’s company became something of a darling of the Washington social set by offering flights around the Washington Monument and downtown. In 1911, the U.S. Army Signal Corps expressed a renewed desire in aviation and built a permanent aviation school at the College Park Airfield. Leasing 200 acres for $325 per month, the Signal Corps built wooden hangers parallel to the railway and a headquarters building. Such was the geniality of the times that when the Army came back to College Park, it requested that Mr. Smith move his hanger to be in line with the newly constructed ones. Mr. Smith happily complied. With six officers (one of them, Lt Henry “Hap” Arnold, would lead the US Army Air Forces during World War II and be a prime mover in establishing an independent US Air Force), 15 enlisted mechanics and a doctor, 1Lt John P. Kelley. Because he cared for the aspiring pilots, Lt Kelley became the nation’s first flight surgeon. For the next two years during the glorious Maryland spring and summer seasons, Army flight training continued at College Park. During the wet winters, the Army moved the operation to Georgia and better flying weather there. Finally, on June 30, 1913, the Army left for good. Civilian use of College Park was firmly established by that time and the field continued to flourish. Government interest in the airport soon peaked again when on August 18, 1918, the first Postal airmail service in the country began with a flight from College Park to Philadelphia and on to New York. By 1919, the U.S. Postal Service had built its own hanger and a “compass rose” (used to check the magnetic compass of the airplane with fixed magnetic bearings marked on the ground) on the field. Both are still there today. In 1920, inventor Emile Berliner, one of the sponsors of the Washington Aeroplane Company began his experiments with vertical flight. As background, Berliner invented the gramophone, the telephone transmitter (mouthpiece) and several other devices. He and his son, Henry, focused on aircraft with upward mounted engines and propellers. By 1924, their Berliner Helicopter No. 5 achieved an altitude of 15 feet, maneuvered within a radius of 150 feet while maintaining a forward speed of 40mph. This first controlled helicopter flight laid the foundation that other aviation pioneers, most notably Igor Sikorsky, built upon to fly the first really viable helicopter in 1940. Henry Berliner went on to found the Engineering and Research Corporation (ERCO) in Riverdale, Maryland. One of its more famous products, the Ercoupe airplane was designed to be virtually unspinnable and thus safer. The Ercoupe flew its initial flight from College Park’s runway. With more than 5,000 aircraft produced, Berliner made his mark again in aviation with the airport’s assistance. By 1927, College Park began a period of expansion under the direction of George Brinckerhoff. “Brinck” ran a flying school until there until 1959. During his tenure, he held many air shows, air circuses, and air races at the site, all designed to increase business and the aviation-mindedness of the surrounding communities. Brinckerhoff is thought to have taught more people to fly in the Washington area than any other single pilot. Also about this time, the National Bureau of Standards developed a field station to aid in its quest to provide instrument aids to flying in bad weather or at night. It built a 70-foot radio tower equipped with a 500-watt transmitter. This equipment was used in a series of experiments that resulted in many of the instrument landing system procedures still in use today in American and the world’s skies. By 1934, however, Depression-era funding cutbacks forced the closure of the College Park station. By 1966, however, College Park began to show its age. Deteriorating infrastructure and a landowner looking to sell led a group of aviation legends banding together to save the facility. Generals Frank Lahm and Benjamin Foulois, Paul Garber, curator of the National Air Museum (forerunner to the National Air & Space Museum), and Henry Berliner worked with Ken Lewis, president of the “Save the Airport” campaign to educated the public and sought support for the airport. In 1973, their efforts were rewarded by the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission’s purchase of the airport. The Commission’s charter regarding the airport was to keep it operating and to add it to the National Register of Historic Places. In 1981, the Friends of College Park Airport offered financial support to begin the work of opening a museum. The College Park Airport Museum swung open its doors for the first time in September of that year in two former school board buildings. By 1992, however, College Park councilman and “Field of Firsts” founder Jim Schultz convinced state, county and federal agencies to fund a new facility. Today, that 29,000 square foot facility houses 11 aircraft, including the original1924 Berliner helicopter, an Ercoupe, and other representative aircraft of the types to use College Park Airport through the years. The Museum’s collection also includes more than 1,300 College Park Airport-related artifacts and 4,000 photos. More than 50,000 visitors a year pay the low $4.00 adult/$2.00 child’s admission fee to learn the history of this jewel in Maryland’s crown. Threatened Future Prior to 9/11, College Park based almost 100 aircraft alongside its 2,740-foot runway. Another 6,000-8,000 transient aircraft flew into the field for a variety of reasons. The location to downtown was ideal. With a metro only two minutes away and thus downtown Washington, D.C. a convenient 18 minutes from landing, many businesses used the airport to conduct transactions in the nation’s capitol. An avionics (aircraft instrument) shop and an aircraft repair facility kept a steady stream of customers flowing. Scouts would camp on the grass adjacent to the runway learning about aviation and the careers available in the industry. Airshows and other aircraft-related events drew a steady stream of interested and, more importantly, paying customers into the airport’s grounds. In the post-9/11 world, however, College Park Airport lies very still. Despite the fact that none of the hijacked aircraft were of the type that utilizes College Park, federal homeland security agencies deemed airports within 30 miles of the nation’s capitol as potential threats. In College Park’s case, the airport was totally closed to civil use for five months. When allowed to reopen, the strict security procedures devastated the field. Flight operations declined by 92 percent. The federal government dictated that no transient operations would be allowed, so instantly thousands of aircraft that previously stopped for gas and other services were but memories. For those aircraft based on the property prior to the attacks, the pilots had to undergo vigorous background checks, file flight plans prior to flying (previously, it was matter of get in and go), leave the area and fly outside the newly designated capitol area restricted airspace. No “touch and goes,” closed-pattern flights, a vital component of pilot proficiency, are allowed. The same restriction for coming home exists. Both businesses on the airport eventually relocated to other airports. The number of planes based at College Park dropped by 60 percent as pilots voted with their wings and based their birds at less-restrictive airports further away from Washington. No non-aircraft related events are allowed on the field, so Scout encampments and other educational events are but memories as well. Says airport manager Lee Schiek, “The hardest part of all this is the lack of communication between the airport and the federal government. In the nearly three years since these restrictions were placed on us, not one government official or agency has been out here to see what the effects have been. I have gotten nothing but a royal run-around when I contact them. “We are still hanging on, but just barely. Thankfully, the Commission (Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission) has pledged to keep us open until, hopefully, better times arrive, but without a easing of the restrictions placed on us, I am not optimistic. That is a shame, considering the historic significance of this airport. “A lot of our traffic used to be students or brand-new pilots just wanting to have our identifier, CGS (“charlie golf sierra” in aviation parlance), in their logbooks. Just to say they’d flown here. Now that is not an option. We are giving up our heritage for the perception of ‘security.’” Experiencing History First-hand College Park Airport is a Maryland treasure. Besides its rich historic heritage, it is an oasis of tranquility in busy DC-contiguous Maryland. The opportunity to see living history is one to value and work to save for future generations. Take the scenic drive or Metro’s Green Line and walk two minutes (unfortunately, you can’t fly there anymore unless the restrictions are eased) to see the field and the Museum. It is worth the trip. SIDEBAR – Other “Firsts” at College Park Airport 1909 - Mrs. Sarah Van Deman, a close friend of Katherine Wright, sister to Orville and Wilbur, became the first woman airplane passenger when Wilbur took her up on October 27, 1909 in that aircraft. 1911 – First use of a bomb-sight for bomb-dropping experiments in an airplane. Using a goldfish pond at the end of the runway as a reference point, the Riley Scott-designed sight proved successful 1912 – First aerial firing of a machine gun from an airplane 1912 – First “mile high” military flight. Unlike today’s risqué club, this flight really was the first to achieve 5,280 feet above the ground. 1931 – First all-instrument landing made 1934 – first completely dependent on instruments flight made from College Park to Newark, NJ. SIDEBAR – College Park Airport snapshot Elevation 50 feet above sea level (MSL) Runway 15/33, 2,740 feet long (2,600 usable) long, 60 feet wide Fuel 100LL, Jet A

Well, that's good enough for me. Based upon your major, you say? So what specific evidence based on this specific premise do you base your conclusion upon? You determined the result based upon what experimentation? Yeah, VMI/A&M/other four year cadet schools, what a waste of time, they must do it totally differently................ And your theory about what the Academy instills and how it does that is based upon what? Oh, we're back to your opinion again........... I hope so. But your vouching for him is based upon what? You can evaluate his pilot skills based upon expert knowledge? And for his officership, you have logged how much total commissioned time? A great adage - never miss an opportunity to not speak. Academy/ROTC/OTS - farm teams for the big league. It's not how you got there, it's how you play and if your teammates want you on the team at all......

I believe the required response in that case was, "Seig heil."

Now that everyone gets a reserve commission starting out (DGs, etc, excepted still?), your premise really doesn't hold water anymore. In some esoteric math/statistics universe, it might be interesting to see what percentage of the year groups of your examples were AFA/ROTC/OTS. Bet it's not significant, but I'm a poli sci holder - math hurt cranium...... When RIFs happened and AFA grads already had a regular commission and couldn't be cut, then ROTC and OTS reserve commission holding dudes filled the 'goodbye' quota. So, in that instance, AFA held a distinct advantage and had a better chance of moving up. It may be a bit more likely given that the Academy, historically, has much higher percentages of folks going to pilot training - many more waivers, etc. But I always thought that was a fair trade for putting up with the four years of AFA. Thus, since 99.9% of USAF four stars have been pilots, then you might have a very thin stick to try and stand on, but it's really pushing it. Now the three sources all start out equal, so the 'tool' factor is equal as well.

"Palace Cobra" by Ed Rasimus. Follow on to his first book, "When Thunder Rolled," which is also a great book. In that one, he describes being an FNG in the F-105 during 1966 and losing 2 out of 3 F-105 pilots during his year tour. Palace Cobra describes his second Vietnam combat tour flying F-4Es. In this one, he's more cynical and more reflective, but it's still a good read of aerial combat, stupid ROE frustrations, and careerists vs. warriors.

This story was the sead (pun intended) for my upcoming book on Desert Storm Wild Weasels Feeling Lucky? In the classic scene from the movie ‘Dirty Harry,’ Clint Eastwood, playing the title character, sticks his .44 Magnum in the bad guy’s face, and asks, “In all this excitement, did I fire five shots or six? You’ve gotta ask yourself one question. Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya?” In the night skies during Operation DESERT STORM, Captain Mark ‘Gucci’ Buccigrossi found himself answering the same question. Unlike the hapless bad guy in the film, Gucci was able to answer the question and shoot back to lethal effect. On the night of January 20, 1991, he was the electronic warfare officer (EWO) in the lead F-4G ‘Wild Weasel’ of a four ship protecting a stream of Boeing B-52 Stratofortresses raining high explosive hell on dug-in Iraqi Republican Guard troop positions. In less than 90 seconds, Gucci’s jet successfully evaded six surface to air missiles (SAMs) targeted at him. By the time the ride was over, the SAM site was silenced and all the bombers made it home safely. Buccigrossi and his fellow Wild Weasel crews were the primary killers of Iraqi air defenses. Built of layered systems starting with point defense weapons like small caliber anti-aircraft artillery (AAA, pronounced triple ‘a’ in combat vernacular) and short range SAMs to area defenses of long range SA-2 SAMs and large caliber AAA, the elaborate Iraqi plan capped the system with lots of MiG interceptors. Thought the densest concentration of AAA and SAMs outside of Moscow, the air planners for DESERT STORM counted on the Weasels to clear the way for the rest of the Coalition air force. Leading a four ship of F-4Gs, Gucci and his pilot, Major Steve ‘Teach’ Jenny, although experienced in handling the jet and employing it as a weapon during peacetime training, typified the non-combat veteran status of most of the Air Force. Indeed, the number 2 jet of that flight, with pilot Captain Jim ‘Boomer’ Schreiner and EWO Major Dan Sharp, had just finished mission ready qualification in the Weasel mission when the balloon went up over Kuwait. The F-4Gs of the 561st Black Knights were among the first responders sent following Saddam Hussein’s occupation of Kuwait. Later joined by other squadrons from Europe and the US, the initial crews flew from George Air Force Base in the desert of California to another desert base, Sheikh Isa in Bahrain. After an intensely painful fighter drag - following a tanker across the Atlantic and Mediterranean strapped in an ejection seat for 15 hours - the Phantom flyers landed at a bare strip of concrete not knowing how soon they’d be in combat. The base was so bare that upon arrival, with none of the usual crew chiefs or maintenance troops there yet, the backseat EWOs had to slide down the fuselage and place chocks in front of the landing gear so the pilots could release the brakes. Then they all turned to building a tent city alongside the runway. The base’s primitiveness and isolation soon earned it the crews’ title of “Stalag Isa.” Welcome to the war, boys! After a tense few weeks, it was evident that Iraqi tanks weren’t going to come down into Saudi Arabia. The F-4Gs, eventually numbering 60 in theater, shifted from a reactionary posture to thinking about the offense. They flew sorties along the border gathering information about the Iraqi electronic order of battle (EOB). Most modern anti-aircraft weapons use several types of radar to acquire, track and target an aircraft. Each radar had its own distinctive electronic ‘signature.’ The Weasels and other electronic intelligence gathering platforms went about the business of finding and classifying future targets. Finally, on January 17, 1991, the UN deadline for Iraq to leave Kuwait expired and the US-led coalition called “Fight’s on!” For the first two nights, Buccigrossi and the rest of the Weasels flew pre-planned missions. They went out on their own in hunter-killer missions - pounding the known Iraqi surface to air threats, getting the bad guys to light up their electronics so that the Weasel could respond with a variety of anti-radar weapons, the most popular being the AGM-88 HARM missile. The Weasels also flew suppression missions, going in with a bomb dropping strike package and countering any Iraqi surface to air threats before the strikers could be targeted. Just as the newer F-15s flew escort for any air-to-air threat like their World War II P-51s forebears helped out the B-17s and B-24s, the F-4Gs were the modern day equivalent of P-47s taking out flak sites. Only this time, speeds and threat ranges were greatly increased and reaction time greatly decreased. It was in this role escorting B-52s that Buccigrossi had a night he’ll never forget. “We were handed our mission from the mission planning cell. In some cases, we didn’t get our part of the frag until we were in the truck heading out to the jets, but for this one we had a little more time than that. We were to meet up with a string of Buffs and provide escort for them as they headed for the tri-border region where Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq met. They were to unload a bunch of Mk 82 500lb bombs on a Republican Guard position. “We knew the bad guys had SA-2s in the area so we were mindful of that as we stepped to the jets, thinking about what indications our electronics would display and how we could counter those threats. Ironically, the Buffs weren’t too concerned about the SAMs. They figured their new and improved on-board electronic countermeasures could negate any threat. This despite the fact that SA-2s ate their lunch during the LINEBACKER operations in Vietnam. If they weren’t overly concerned, we were.” The Weasel squadrons used beer brand names callsigns during DESERT STORM. Michelob, Coors, and Miller were some of the more common, but for this mission, a regional Texas brew donated its name. Jim Schreiner’s plans as Longhorn 32 took a big deviation when his jet broke before they left the chocks. Stepping quickly to a spare, that one was also unserviceable. Finally getting to a usable jet on their third try, they launched 20 minutes after the rest of Longhorn flight and hoped to rejoin before pushing into enemy airspace. With the new jet came a new weapons load. Most F-4Gs going into Kuwait carried four HARMs and one centerline ‘bag’ (fuel tank). Jets going further north to Baghdad carried only two HARMs and but added two more ‘bags.’ Schreiner had one of the Iraqi-configured Phantoms. Ingressing at 0200 hours with the three ship, Buccigrossi and his fellow EWOs fired up the primary sensor of the Weasel, the AN/APR-47 radar warning receiver. Most tactical aircraft carry some form of radar warning receiver (RWR – pronounced “RAW”) gear to warn of impending air to air or surface to air radar threats, but their capabilities paled in comparison to the –47s capabilities. The –47 used a spiderweb of antenna on the F-4’s fuselage, wings and tail to better acquire and identify threat emitters at much further ranges then ‘vanilla’ RWR gear. In fact, the –47 replaced the 20mm cannon of the F-4 with the need for additional receivers and associated black boxes. With only so much weight and space available to put stuff, Weasel designers decided the gun had to go. Although the F-4’s ‘nose gunner’ pilot regretted not having a gun, the added capability of the APR-47 more than made up for it. In front of the B-52s, Jim Schreiner rejoined his comrades in time to make the show. At about 0207, Longhorn 31 (Buccigrossi) detected the unmistakable indications of a SA-2 site in search mode. The bad guys knew someone was coming and were determined to make them pay. Detaching themselves and Longhorn 32 to deal with this threat, the lead F-4 crew directed 33and 34 continued on with the bomber escort. “We picked up the SA-2’s signal, first in search, then watched him switch to targeting mode. It was then we pickled a HARM at him.” Very quickly, the Iraqi air defenders had learned that to transmit their equipment for very long was an engraved invitation for a HARM in the face. This site apparently either didn’t get the word or was braver than most. A useful piloting technique for shooting a HARM was to bump the nose up just as the missile lit, then the exhaust gases of the AGM-88 wouldn’t starve the J-79 jets of air and cause a flameout. One crew lost both engines earlier in the war to this phenomenon, but luckily was able to restart both. Gucci continues his narrative, “We were at medium altitude at around 350 kts and there was a cloud base at about 1,800 – 2,000 feet AGL. We picked up an orange glow below the cloud deck at our left 9 o’clock. Popping through the overcast, we saw two SA-2s tracking towards us. Both ‘Teach’ and I saw them arcing up, so as he rolled the jet to evade the missiles, I hit the switches to ‘pop’ chaff and start our ECM (electronic countermeasures) pod. “Both missiles continued towards our 6 o’clock, but climbing while we were descending fairly rapidly. I watched the missiles explode behind us and we were far enough away that we weren’t damaged.” ‘Boomer’ Schreiner in Longhorn 32 recalls, “We saw from the APR-47’s trackbar the SAM’s line of bearing from us. We saw the glow under the clouds too, so I rolled inverted and pulled while I yelled for Dan to hit the chaff and the jammer (each jet carried an APQ-184 ECM jamming pod). I was at 25 thousand when I went for the deck and leveled at about 10 thousand. It was a standard maneuver we had practiced in training, but due to safety concerns, we weren’t allowed to practice it at night. Amazing how physics and the airplane work the same at night as during the day.” Meanwhile, Longhorn 31, continued to fight for survival. After defeating the first two missiles, they saw another pair at their right 2 o’clock and guiding. Again they evaded, trading altitude and airspeed for distance from the warhead. Again the missiles guided to just behind them and exploded. “Immediately after those two exploded we saw a third set on our left side again, so away we went again, down and around, to avoid these guys. The missiles couldn’t turn hard enough to stay with us so for the third time, they tracked behind us and exploded. “The good news was in less than two minutes we’d avoided six SAMs and made that site shoot his whole wad so he couldn’t shoot at the incoming Buffs until he reloaded and that would take him too long. “The bad news was all our turning and burning had forced us down into AAA range. I looked down at our gauges and saw that we were below 10 thousand and under 300 kts. I told ‘Teach’ “Climb or speed up” and he said, “I’m working on it.” Jim Schreiner meanwhile had ducked the first set of SA-2s but in the process lost contact with his flight lead. He and EWO Sharp started hunting for the site that had just made both crews feel old before their times. “After we avoided the SAMs, I rolled level and saw a blue glow outside. Our –47 wasn’t showing any threats so I couldn’t figure out what the glow was. “Then I realized I was still in afterburner and the glow was the reflection of the flames from my engines. What a perfect advertisement for “Here I am!” So I pulled the throttles back and started climbing so we could ‘work’ that site again.” Longhorn 31 had also used a lot of ‘burner’ in making six SAMs miss and with only one ‘bag’ slung underneath was nearly out of gas. At full AB, the F-4’s J-79s will suck down almost 18,000 lbs of gas an hour, so the gauge will go to the ‘E’ position pretty quickly! “By the time all this was over, we were heading almost due south, so we elected to continue south into Saudi Arabia and get some gas there. We called up AWACS and told them where we were and that we were going to do. They cleared us off and we were RTB,” Buccigrossi recounts. Schreiner, with the different jet configuration, had decidedly more gas, so for the next 30 minutes or so played a deadly game of cat and mouse with the pesky SAM site. “We’d point our nose at where the APR-47 showed him at and he’d go quite. Our scope would go ‘dotted,’ that is, the –47 was saying “This is the best guess of where I think the site is but he is not radiating.” If we turned our tail to the site, we’d get lit up again by him and get a solid lock on his position. “The HARM can be launched, by either crew position by the way, in a best guess mode – it’ll go to where the –47 said it thought the site was, but if we could keep the bad guys from doing anything effective without expending ordinance, then we considered that just as effective if not as satisfying. “We finally bingo’d out and returned to Sheikh Isa about 0315. It had been an exciting night, but we wound up flying another go early that morning as well.” Buccigrossi and Jenny’s night was not yet over either. Finally landing back in Bahrain, their jet had one of the few functioning APQ-120 air/ground radars so they wound up as the pathfinders for another flight of Weasels going into combat. That flight wasn’t as exciting as the first of the night, but for the exhausted and drained crew it was enough. “I finally realized that this was for real. It wasn’t another exercise where someone could call ‘Knock it off’ if a bad situation developed. We were schwacking them and they wanted to schwack us if they could. We were better and had better training and equipment so we won, but at any time it could go the other way. That is a very sobering thought.” recalls Buccigrossi today where he is an F-4 squadron commander teaching German Air Force students to handle the mighty ‘Rhino.’ Both Buccigrossi and Jenny were awarded the Silver Star for their actions in answering the question “Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya?””

MY EYES!! AHH, GOD, MY EYES!!!!!

Affirmative.

A little lovin' for the tanker dudes/dudettes. (It's obvious, but I'm assuming a mod would let me know to KIO if these are a waste of time) Herding Cats “When I told Gold 12 that I could be airborne in five minutes and he said “Go for it,” I knew he was in real trouble. Later, I found out that he was below 8,000 pounds and running the ditching checklist.” That was just another event in an incredible day for Gold 11, a USAF KC-10 Extender crew led by then-Capt Marc Felman. Felman explains, “Below 8,000 lbs, the fuel gauges are inaccurate. That is essentially the dregs left in the tanks.” Not much considering the –10 can hold as much as 290,000 lbs of fuel. For one long day in March, 1986, two KC-10s and 8 USMC A-4M Skyhawks all thought they’d be taking a swim in the cold, angry Atlantic Ocean. What had begun as a routine fighter drag – an Air Force tanker providing the navigation and fuel for fighters to cross an ocean – from the U.S. East Coast to Lajes Air Base in the Azores Islands, Portugal, even started on a light-hearted note from the weather briefer, “Hope you guys brought your golf clubs!” Good weather or its alternative, extra gas, was key to getting into Lajes. It is one of only a few spots in the world that aircraft usually have no alternate airport with which to divert. If the weather is forecast to be bad, one simply waits for another day. Given the rosy forecast, Felman and company had no qualms about launching out to take the A-4s across the ‘pond.’ Based on that forecast, the mission planners had gassed up the tanker with what was assumed to be more than enough fuel to get the fighters to Lajes and allow for some contingencies. But the KC-10s were not flying with full tanks since it ‘costs gas to carry gas’ and even Uncle Sam’s flyers do try to save money/fuel when they can. Cue the theme from “Jaws” Launching from Pease Air Force Base, New Hampshire, Felman’s Gold 11 was supposed to rendezvous with five Marine A-4s (callsigns Retro 61-55) from Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, North Carolina. The Marines would join up with the tanker over Nantucket, Massachusetts and off everyone would go. This same scenario was planned to occur for Gold 12 and five Skyhawks, Retros 71-75, an hour later, then again with Gold 13 and the five final A-4s, Retros 81-85. All well and good and nothing unusual in the world of military aviation. Upon reaching the join up point, Gold 11 found out that his set of fighters was having some maintenance issues back at Cherry Point and he would need to hold. “Ok,” thought Felman, “Weather all the way across and at Lajes is still good and supposed to stay that way. No problem.” Eventually, after more than an hour, the first set of fighters cancelled and Gold 11 was now going to take the second set of fighters, Retro 71-75. Gold 12 would follow with another 6 fighters an hour or so later. The last tanker was now no longer needed. Meanwhile, Boston Center, the air traffic control agency for the area Gold 11 was orbiting, asked him to move further out since the morning rush into Logan International was beginning. Gold 11 moved, again thinking, “Ok, no problem, ” but now further away than planned and using more fuel. Shortly thereafter, the A-4s arrived and as per normal procedures, each fighter in turn stuck its refueling probe into the drogue Gold 11 trailed to make sure that the fighter could actually take gas before setting across the ocean. If the refueling system malfunctioned, it was far better to discover that fact near land and friendly stretches of concrete versus far out to sea with the only hope being a nylon letdown into the frigid water. Proving the point, the flight’s lead, Retro 71, wing tanks could not accept gas. He had no choice but to abort his part of the mission and return home, taking his wingman, Retro 72 with him for insurance. Retro 73-75 got fuel just fine and off the giant tanker and his three ‘chicks’ went. During most of the flight, all went well. Felman, the aircraft commander and pilot, was on nearly his first KC-10 mission without ‘training wheels’ – either an instructor or evaluator over his shoulder. Although he had more than 2,500 hours as a tanker pilot, those hours were in the venerable Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker. Switching to the –10, Felman was glad to be in command. The Marine aviators, wedged into the tiny cockpits of the A-4s, nicknamed the “Scooter,” weren’t quite so comfortable. Besides being crammed atop an unyielding ejection seat, the immersion protection known as a “poopy suit,” was like wearing a body condom for hours on end. Due to the difficulty and real chance for something embarrassing happening, most of the A-4 drivers were probably also slightly dehydrated. It is no fun having to work one’s ‘equipment’ through all the layers of clothing, poopy suit, parachute harness, etc and then try to perform near-Olympic caliber gymnastics to answer a call of nature. Many fighter pilots instead choose to forego fluids in the hours before a long flight to avoid just such an uncomfortable scenario. Better to recharge after the jet is safely on the deck than risk screwing up by taking a leak! Passing the ‘go/no-go’ point – the spot on the chart where the aircraft had enough fuel to either make it to the abort base in Greenland, or continue to Lajes, Felman elected to continue based on the updated weather forecast still calling for Lajes to be in the clear. Each A-4 regularly cycled through the refueling station, taking gas after performing the aerial ballet needed to plug the refueling probe jutting out to the right of the jet’s nose into the 18-inch diameter drogue of the tanker. Driving the jet into the ‘pre-contact’ position, about 15 feet aft of the drogue, the A-4 pilot crept forward with about 2-3 knots of overtake, he then concentrated on the drogue and drove the probe in with a solid, but not too aggressive, click. Boom operator Master Sergeant Pat Kennedy pumped the fighter full and directed the sequence for the next receiver. About an hour from Lajes and the tranquil day ended. An unexpected warm weather front blew in, dropping Lajes to zero visibility in heavy fog. Bad news, especially for the A-4s since they didn’t carry any high-tech navigation gear to get them down through a thick soup. Arriving overhead Lajes, that tower informed him that a commercial 707 had just gone around due to not being able to see the runway. Felman directed the A-4s to make an approach and hope for the best. Retro 73 spotted the runway through a pinhole in the clouds and made it. 74 and 75 weren’t so fortunate, so Felman told them to rejoin on him on top of the fog. For Gold 11, it should have been merely inconvenient. An alert tanker was normally kept ready in Spain for just such an event. A quick call should launch that tanker and after he took over re-fueling the fighters, Felman’s crew could divert to Rota, Spain and enjoy some Spanish beer instead of Portuguese. Except there was no alert tanker available! Now Felman was in a bind; with the delay waiting for the fighters at the start of the mission, he only had the gas to get his jet to Rota, but if he gave gas to the fighters, then neither he nor they had the fuel to make it there. But if he didn’t give the A-4s gas, they would go swimming pretty quickly. He chose for everyone to keep flying while they explored other options. “I decided to get up high and try to make Rota anyway. With the fighters flying formation on us, we climbed to FL310 with the intention of getting as close to Spain as we could. I told the Retros to keep cycling through and we’d give them 1,000 lbs each time until we all were out of gas and then do the best we could. With some luck, we might have had a shot of at least getting out over the coast instead of the water.” “About then, our planning center in the States directed us to divert to Santa Maria airport which was about 150 miles further east from Lajes on another Azores island.” Scrambling for the approach plates to Santa Maria, he saw it had a 7,000 foot runway. Plenty long enough for the A-4s, but at the minimums for getting a KC-10 in and out. But, it sure beat a long, cold swim! Also, the only navigation aid was an NDB (non-directional beacon), something the Scooters didn’t have. “Since the A-4s had no radar and nothing more than a TACAN nav system, I asked Marines what their approach speed was and told them to fly tight on me and I’d take them down until they saw the runway,” relates Felman today. “A Navy guy on the ground at Santa Maria gave us the ILS (instrument landing system) frequency so using that and an ad hoc decision height I was able to get a runway course for the let-down.” “And that’s what we did. They perched on each of my wingtips and we went down to the last foot of our minimums. Our crew was getting pretty wide-eyed as we got low and didn’t see anything, but at the very last second, we saw a glimpse of the runway, poured the coals to the –10 and had the A-4s land.” Unfortunately, the crosswind was more than the young Marines had allowed for and it blew them wide. Retro 74 made it down, but 75, flying on 74’s right side, had to go-around as there was no asphalt left on his side. “We did the approach again for 75 and this time he put it down. We went around and on our third approach, we put our own jet down, using up every last foot of the runway to stop, but we made it.” Felman had to do a 180-degree turn at the end of the runway and taxied back to the small Santa Maria terminal, thinking that the worst part of his day was over. Murphy’s Lawyer While getting refueled from the airport’s antiquated pumps, Felman realized that Gold 12 and his fighters would be unaware of the Lajes weather situation and, unless warned early, would be in the same predicament as he had just escaped. By the time a cumbersome HF (high frequency radio) patch was made, it was too late. Gold 12 was low on gas as were his chicks, Retro 81-86. In the meantime, a USMC KC-130, Otis 75, at Lajes heard of the predicament and, despite not being fully fueled themselves, launched into the smothering weather to try and rescue their fellow Marines. Says Felman, “The –130 met up with Gold 12 and took the chicks. He decided to copy what I did and fly the approach with fighters in tight formation.” Gold 12 dropped off his fighters and climbed for the gas-saving higher altitudes he’d need to make Rota. Felman heard the roar, but never saw, the KC-130 going missed approach into the thick clouds. The A-4s, realizing they had one shot, tried a section landing with three jets while the others held up high. Unfortunately, they set down on the absolute end of the runway. The first and second landed okay if wide to the right, but the third aviator simply ran out of room and landed on the edge and moving to the right. The landing gear on his A-4 sheared off as he took out the VASI (visual approach system indicator) lights, spewing debris all along the runway end. He got out all right, but the runway was now unusable. The Santa Maria tower, however, couldn’t see the drama being played out at the runway’s end and cleared a civilian flight for landing. Gold 11 co-pilot Tom Ferguson pre-empted and surprised the tower controller by radioing, “Negative, the runway is closed due to a crash.” That is how the airport found out about the accident. Meanwhile, above the impenetrable clouds, Otis 75 was now out of gas and had to leave. Using the more sophisticated nav gear aboard, they made a white-knuckle landing at the still-weathered in Lajes, but the three still-airborne A-4s were out of luck. The crew of Gold 12 made a courageous decision and came back, knowing that all of them would go in the drink if a miracle didn’t happen. At Santa Maria, the miracle occurred in the form of Gold 11. While nowhere near full, boom operator MSgt Pat Kennedy knew they had been re-loaded with enough gas to buy everyone more time and suggested to Felman they refuel Gold 12. Felman agreed and the crew launched again quickly. So quick, in fact, that the crew chiefs had to be left behind as there wasn’t time to get them back aboard after engine start. Shoving the three throttles forward, Felman in the lightly loaded Gold 11 leapt from the runway using every foot available. When Gold 12 radioed, “Go for it,” Felman knew they were minutes away from having a KC-10 and three A-4s turn into submarines and, more importantly, more than a dozen lives probably lost in the process. He had Gold 12 dial up the air-to-air TACAN so that Felman could get a fix on Gold 12. Popping above the soup at about 3,000 feet, Felman rolled out in front of Gold 12 at two miles. Using the unique ‘give and pass’ ability of the KC-10, called “swapping spit” by the KC-10 community, Felman’s crew gave enough of a drink to the other KC-10 to keep him airborne long enough to for Felman’s crew fill up the by now very concerned remaining A-4s. While this unbelievable series of events had been occurring, the Air Force’s and Marine’s home bases were going through agony thinking that all these aircraft either were down or were soon to be down in the water. A scratch tanker crew from whoever could be found was launched from Spain to speed to the area in hopes that there would still be someone left to take gas. And that is what finally happened. The hastily launched tanker had more than enough fuel to bring Gold 11, Gold 12 and Retros 81, 82, and 84 to Rota. Upon landing, the Marines taxied away to their spots and the heavies went to their side of the ramp. It was then that Marc Felman realized how close to ditching Gold 12 had been. “That crew came aboard our jet and had unloaded our bags before we had even finished our shutdown checklists.” In the highly self-sufficient military aviation world, having someone else tote your bags was a high honor. Besides being alive and dry, now retired Colonel Marc Felman recalls how good it felt to finally be done with that particular day.

There are many opportunities for exchange school slots when it comes time for that. Many of them require being rated, but not all. Also, USAF can/do go to USA and USN schools and vice-versa. Would be cool, I think, to go to a different country's IDE/SDE and learn something new vs the canned "We're great!" mantra of ours.

There are also exchange ABM jobs with the RAF, Canadian Forces, RAAF. There used to be instructor jobs with the JASDF, been too long away from that side of the world to know if its still an option. Possibly others, those are just the ones I know about. (For those that care.......)

I believe that is, technically speaking, the F/A-130 since you can drop sh!t out the back.................

There is an awesome feature article on Gen Olds in the new Aviation History magazine. As well as a 'hubba-hubba' Hollywood photo of his starlet wife. The man did it all. If you don't get it or want to spring for it at the bookstore, check the base library.

You are suppossed to get your CC's signed approval for stuff like that. You'd have to read the reg to get the specifics but consider what the USAF would do/think if you were hurt while earning a $ from somebody else. You probably would be covered insurance-wise by your secondary employer, but USAF is now out a healthy body because you were working for someone else. I'm not sure how that would go over unless you had previously asked, "Mother, may I?"

Canadian, eh? CLUNK Canada’s first (and only) homegrown fighter You have to love an airplane called “The Clunk.” Okay, technically it is the Avro CF-100 ‘Canuck,’ but to a generation of Canadians, the CF-100 will always be the Clunk or the Lead Sled, CF-Zero, Zilch, Beast, and several other names not suitable for print. In aviation, the more nicknames an aircraft has, the more beloved it usually is. So it was with the CF-100, Canada’s only indigenously produced operational fighter. First conceived as a gleam in the then Royal Canadian Air Force’s (RCAF) eye back in 1945, the design that became the CF-100 was envisioned to defend the skies of the vast Canadian expanses and develop the nascent Canadian aerospace industry. Also in 1945, the first steps to grow such an industry were taken by Roy Dobson. Mr., later Sir, Dobson, arranged the financial backing to purchase the government owned Victory Aircraft Company. Formerly the National Steel Car Company, Victory had been busily producing the famous Lancaster bomber for the RCAF and England’s Royal Air Force (RAF) during World War II. As the war wound down, Canada’s Director General of Aircraft Production, Ralph Bell, envisioned the need to encourage a national aircraft industry, not just one that sub-contracted to overseas manufacturers. Enter Roy Dobson and the emergence of the A.V. Roe Canada, Ltd for the sum of $1.9 million. For this amount, the Canadian government sold Victory and the dream was alive. Usually referred to as Avro, the new company immediately set out to win a leading place in the world aviation market. With two novel proposals, Avro sought to bring Canada into the jet age. One of these was the CF-102 four engine jetliner. First flown in 1949, the CF-102 could have been positioned to take the lead in the emerging jet transport market. However, the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950 and the need for Avro to proceed on it’s other jet proposal, the CF-100 fighter, placed the CF-102 on the backburner until too late. By the time Avro could return to the CF-102, Britain’s De Havilland Comet and the U.S.’s Boeing 707 had stolen a march that could never be recovered. As unsuccessful as Avro’s airliner had been, the CF-100 was to be an unqualified success both in its military role and as the impetus for an entire Canadian aviation industry. The original RCAF design requirement, National Defence Specification AIR-7-1 called for an aircraft “to be powered by two gas turbine jet engines…have a crew of two…be of all metal construction with a pressurized cabin…be capable of operation throughout a temperature range of -57ºC to +45ºC…have a range of not less than 650 miles, capable of 15 minutes combat operations at that distance, at a height of 40,000 feet, have a sea-level rate of climb of not less than 10,000 feet per minute, and a top speed of not less than 490 knots (.85 Mach).” Since no aircraft in the world had such high performance at that time, this was quite a challenge to ANY aerospace manufacturer, much less an upstart like Avro Canada, Ltd. Nevertheless, Avro turned to with gusto to meet the challenge. As already mentioned, the design was first envisioned in 1945 before the advantages of swept wings and tails was known to the Allies. Thus the CF-100 would have straight wings and tail surfaces. Indeed, the Cf-100 would bear resemblance to its World War II predecessors. It was in the engines, however, that the true challenge of building an industry from the ground up would be met. Roy Dobson and Avro had moved quickly at the end of the war to also acquire the government’s Leaside, Ontario-based Turbo Research Ltd., a pioneering experimental jet engine laboratory. The Orenda family of jet engines was the result. Each generation of the Orenda was more powerful and reliable and would power succeeding marks of the CF-100. As part of the Orenda development, the industrial ripple effect became apparent. Since jet turbines operated at higher temperatures and pressures than did reciprocating engines, new metallurgical techniques had to be developed. New manufacturing plants and distribution chains likewise sprang into existence to support the roll-out of the CF-100. Not so slowly and very surely, the desired goal of building a Canadian aviation industry proceeded. Avro’s efforts were given a jump start with the Korean War. Fearful of a Soviet escalation of the war and their ability to carry nuclear bombs on the Tupolev Tu-4 (a copy of interned U.S. Boeing B-29s) on mission over the North Pole, the RCAF recognized that it’s piston-engined Mustangs and Tempests were inadequate to protect the homeland. A “hurry up” was delivered to Avro. Although the Mk. I prototype had first flown on January 19, 1950, bugs in engine placement and aircraft structural weakness delayed the type’s introduction into operational service. The Mk. IIs were pre-production types intended to integrate fire control systems, weapons and upgraded Orenda engines. The first of these flew in July 1950, but still problems with wing root strength dogged the jet. Despite this, the CF-100 flew many tests and in front of many military dignitaries on both sides of the US/Canadian border, impressing all who saw a the chunky-looking fighter with its rugged lines and excellent performance. By 1951, the Mk III became the first combat version. At first armed with “only” eight .50 cal machine guns in an innovative half-ring design underneath the belly, the Mk III was a stop-gap version for the RCAF until the Mk IV was ready. The Mk IV also fired .50 cals, but in addition carried 2.75 in. folding fin aircraft rockets (FFARs) in pods on each wingtip. The CF-100 wasn’t the only air defense fighter to adopt this armament. American F-86Ds, F-89s, and F-94s also used FFARs as primary armament. As the Cold War superpowers improved their bomber fleets from piston-engined B-29s and Tu-4s to jet powered B-47s/B-52s and Tu-95s, military planners realized that a machine gun or cannon armed fighter could be outgunned and/or outrun by the new breed of bombers. The unguided FFARs, fired in a dense cloud, would conceptually, swamp the incoming bomber and bring it down at longer ranges than were possible with the gun. By 1952, the first Mk IIIs were entering service and the era of the ‘Clunk’ began. In 1957, the US and Canada formed NORAD (North American Air (now Aerospace) Defense Command) to increase effectiveness and reduce redundancy in the two countries air defense structures. The CF-100s reason for being was air defense and for most of its life, it soldiered in that role. Using ground-based radar sites to detect incoming, unknown aircraft, “bogeys,” in air defense speak; a pair of Clunks would scramble from a base on near the coasts or the northern reaches of Canada. The pilots and radar navigators (navrad) would race from their alert facility to the waiting aircraft, not knowing whether the call was for the start of a war or merely a drill. Having nothing more than an initial vector to steer and altitude to seek, the pair of CF-100s would climb swiftly to altitude and contact the ground site (GCI – ground control intercept) for further instructions. Once the crews had contact, they were given the mission particulars and commenced using their on-board radar to acquire the target the longer range ground radars had detected. The fighter lead followed the GCI controller’s instruction until the fighters had radar lock. The controller strove to position the fighters in a “lead collision course,” or a nearly head-on approach. The lead collision approach offered several benefits, one being that most bombers had only vestigial tailgun positions, the fighters could avoid any defensive fire. The most important reason, however, was the fact that the new jet bombers were nearly as fast as the CF-100. Remember, the Clunk was designed originally to intercept slow moving propeller planes; the new jets were an order of magnitude faster. A WWII-style tail chase could be a lengthy one with the Clunk only slowing closing the range, all the time the presumed nuclear-armed bomber approaching its target. A head-on shot closed in quickly. The flight leader usually was responsible for identifying the bogey and the number two was the ‘shooter’ if needed. Most times, however, the bogey was either an off-course airliner or a USAF Strategic Air Command bomber practicing its deadly mission. Either way, the unknowns and skills practiced were valuable training if the real thing ever occurred. Claude Montour flew the CF-100 from 1956-1960. As a twenty-two year old, he was excited to be turned loose on one of the best all-weather interceptors in the world. He recalls being assigned to 425 and later 416 Squadrons near St-Hubert, Quebec, near his home. He tells of the feel of the Clunk when firing its weapons, "When I fired only the machineguns, it was like riding over a rutted road. The plane also noticeably slowed whenever I fired guns only. When pickling the rockets, there was no noticeable vibration although one noticed the cloud of rockets racing off. Since the rockets were unguided, they didn't always fly a straight course, many times they corkscrewed wildly as they raced off." Another Clunk-ism was the unreliable cockpit heating system. Many crews relate the same complaint that they couldn’t get the cockpit temperature regulated. It was either blisteringly hot or perishingly cold in one or the other of the crew positions and any adjustments to balance the two just exacerbated the problem. Since, most of the CF-100s life was spent in the far north of Canada, never known for its balmy days, a two hour flight in a freezing Clunk was akin to flying in a refrigerator. Montour also relays a unique story about pushing the CF-100s flight envelope. Once, while returning from a firing exercise, the Clunk was light since it wasn't full of armaments and fuel. He decided to see how high he could take his jet. "At fifty feet off the ground, I push our bird to maximum speed, throttles pushed up to .85 Mach. I pull to the vertical while my navrad, 'Rosie' Drinkle notes the results. It took us four seconds to go through 4,850 feet, 22 seconds and we were through 15,000. It took us an additional 14 seconds to claw to 17,000 as the Orenda jet engines started to lose some of their 'push.' The speed is dropping dramatically and I begin to doubt making it to 20 thousand. At sixty-eight seconds from my initial pull, we are just about there, but there are only 90 knots remaining on the clock. "The Clunk stalls above 90, so as the zoom climb ends, we start to go backwards. All I've got left for control is engine thrust as we tailslide, I pull the right throttle back and keep the left forward. Slowly, we swap our back for our front and as the nose heads downhill, I push up the right throttle again until we are at a comfortable flying speed. I recover from the dive and we head home, out of gas but happy in our ability to wring the most from our mount." Despite Montour’s and other Clunk pilots delight with the aircraft, the CF-100 was considered ‘meat on the table’ for the more nimble day fighters of the day, like Canada’s CF-86 or any of the NATO day jobs. They single seat fighters were usually faster and more nimble than the Clunk, hence another of the CF-100’s nicknames, “Lead Sledge.” Occasionally, however, the Clunk pilots were able to turn the tables on the visual only fighters. In one instance described by Col. “Irish” Ireland in the definitive study of the Clunk, “The Avro CF-100,” by Larry Milberry, the all-weather fighter was able to defeat resoundingly a flight of French Mystere fighters. It seems that the French pilots were reluctant to fight in the vertical plane for fear of entering an unrecoverable stall followed by a spin. In Irelands’s tale, he tells how the Clunk pilots would wait until the Mysteres’ were just out of gun range and then they’d flog the CF-100’sOrenda turbines for all they were worth while simultaneously pitching straight up. The Mysteres would initially follow, but as the climb became steeper, invariably would back off and level out. The Clunk would then pitch over using a stall turn and descend onto the Mystere’s tail in firing position. Voila´, French toast! In 1956, the last version of the Clunk rolled off the Avro line. The Mk V featured even more powerful Orenda engines, a longer wingspan, larger tailplane, and deleted the guns entirely. With the larger wings and a lighter all up weight, the Mk V had a ceiling of 55,000 feet, more than ten thousand more than the Mk IV. The CF-100 was the most numerous NORAD interceptor throughout the mid-1950s and well into the 1960s. 14 RCAF squadrons flew the Clunk over Canada and as a major component of NATO based in Europe. During the heyday of the Clunk the Belgian Air Force was also in the market for a top notch all weather interceptor to replace its aging Gloster Meteors. The Belgians flew three squadrons of CF-100s from 1957 until 1963. By then, the Canadian jets were facing obsolesce as newer generations of fighters and bombers entered world air forces' inventories. The Avro Company had developed an outstanding follow on to the CF-100, one which would correct all the faults of the Clunk and continue the rising competence of Canadian aviation expertise, the CF-105 Arrow. A Mach 2 supersonic, delta wing interceptor, the six prototype Arrows were a bright ray on the air defense horizon for Canada. Inexplicably, the Canadian government cancelled the CF-105 and ordered the prototypes scrapped in 1959. With no replacement in sight, the Clunks were thus forced to soldier on for longer than ever imagined. American-made F-101B Voodoos and BOMARC missiles eventually replaced the Clunk in front-line squadrons, but the CF-100 Mk V was converted to an electric countermeasures (ECM) training aid. 414 Squadron hung jamming pods and electronic spoofing equipment on the wings and became the target for the next generation of NORAD warriors, an ironic role after the many years of being the hunter not the prey.

Well done.

Sorry, it's a little long (only time I've ever been able to say that..............) The Blackburn Buccaneer In the early 1950s, Great Britain’s aviation industry was a robust, thriving entity. Its jet designs for fighters, commercial transports, heavy bombers and helicopters were some of the most advanced in the world. Britain’s Royal Navy (RN) likewise was a serious player on the world stage and the RN’s aviation branch, the Fleet Air Arm (FAA) was a major part of its striking power. Also in the early 1950s, the then Soviet Union was in the midst of a major military growth period, including its navy. One of the USSR’s key components of its new ‘blue water,’ that is designed for operations away from its own coastline, navy was the “Sverdlov” class of heavily armed cruisers. Initially armed with ‘only’ heavy cannons and numerous light anti-aircraft positions, the Sverdlovs posed a significant threat to the newly formed North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in general and to Great Britain, so heavily dependent on maritime trade for its survival, in particular. Being as the Sverdlov was a naval threat, the RN wanted an aircraft specifically designed to counter that threat. This is the origin of what became the Buccaneer. In 1953, the RN issued “Naval Staff Requirement Number 39,” which invited United Kingdom (UK) aviation manufacturers to submit their designs for a carrier-based aircraft that could carry a nuclear weapon internally, fly at a speed of Mach .85 at an altitude of 200 ft, and operate over a combat radius of at least 460 miles. Total weapons load had to be at least 4,000 lbs, the aircraft length could be no longer than 51 feet in order to fit on the existing aircraft carriers’ elevators and the maximum weight could be no more than 45,000 lbs. Quite a requirement to meet! Although several companies submitted designs, the Blackburn and General Aircraft Company’s B103 design won the competition and was awarded the production contract in 1955. At that time, no one in the UK could have imagined that this design would be the last purely British strike aircraft to take wing. Blackburn’s design was innovative in many areas. To meet the high-speed, low-level strike requirement, conventional engineering would use the smallest possible wing area to reduce turbulence and drag. However, the precise flying envelope needed to effectively operate aircraft from an aircraft carrier called for a much larger wing area to provide effective low speed handling. Blackburn’s solution for this dilemma was to incorporate a “boundary layer control” or “BLC” system on the B103’s swept wing. The BLC used a network of ducts that took bleed air from the jet engine compressor flow and routed that air to the leading edges of the wing and horizontal stabilizers. Air was also blown over the flaps and ailerons thus increasing these control surfaces effectiveness at low speeds. Taking power from the engines did reduce the usable thrust, however. No engineering tradeoff ever comes cheap. The B103 met the carrier deck size restrictions by having folding wings, a nose cone that pivoted to the side to reduce length and the tail cone-mounted two-petal speedbrake opened, also to reduce overall length when parked. By 1961, the first operational model, the S.1, was introduced to Royal Navy squadron service. The type was also officially named “Buccaneer,” fitting for its intended role of striking quickly at ship targets. As mentioned above, the use of bleed air to augment the flight controls at low speeds took power from the S.1’s two anemic de Havilland Gyron jet engines. Each Gyron pumped out 7,000lbs of thrust with no afterburner capability. Crews overcame this deficiency by keeping the throttles forward to keep the engines putting out more power and relying on the speedbrake for speed control. The later S.2 version, becoming operational in 1965, used much more powerful Rolls Royce Spey engines with 11,400 lbs of ‘umph.’ Designed as a ship killer, the “Bucc” relied on precise piloting and navigational skills as well as intricate low-level attack tactics to carry out its mission. With no terrain-following radar, the Bucc’s pilot had to keep the jet above the waves for long periods of time. These low level tactics were a necessity in order to sneak under a ship’s radar coverage. Only by minimizing the ship’s reaction time, could a flight of Buccaneers hope to successfully destroy the target and return home. Additionally, RN crews practiced multi-axis attacks to divide and confuse a ship’s anti-aircraft response. Although the Royal Air Force (RAF) was offered the Buccaneer at the outset of the design as an effective overland strike aircraft, the air marshals declined the offer never dreaming that by the end of the 1960’s, Britain would be exiting the large aircraft carrier business and that the RAF would indeed fly the Bucc. In 1966, the British government cancelled its order for its next generation large aircraft carrier and by default, committed itself to getting out of the carrier business completely. The carriers in service were old, difficult and expensive to maintain and fast becoming obsolete. Thus the Buccaneers would have no place to roost. The RAF, meanwhile, found itself without an effective strike aircraft. Various programs of their own had either been cancelled or proved to be technological dead-ends, so the RAF would take over existing RN types as well as acquire some new builds of its own. Like its maritime brethren, the RAF found the Bucc to be a superb low-level attack jet, smooth to fly and capable of going flat out right on the deck. As a matter of fact, not a few RAF pilots and navigators had done exchange tours with RN squadrons aboard the carriers so the jet already had a good ‘word of mouth’ reputation within the Service. Immensely strong wings carried up to four weapons pylons and the bomb bay could carry either a nuclear bomb, conventional bombs, or be fitted with an additional fuel tank. A later modification even included making the bomb bay door into one of the first ‘conformal’ fuel tanks to be used anywhere. Both RN and RAF crews excelled in ‘max performing’ the jet at low level. Air Commodore (ret) Graham Pitchfork, who navigated the Bucc in both its RN and RAF forms, said that the Bucc was often in great demand to serve as the “Red Air,” or “the bad guys” in training exercises because the Bucc presented such a tracking and targeting challenge to “Blue Air” good guy fighters. The big jet wow’ed not only European air forces, but in numerous USAF-sponsored RED FLAG exercises held in the vast air and ground ranges north of Las Vegas at Nellis AFB. David Herriot, now a wing commander, was a young flight lieutenant navigator when he first flew to Nellis in 1978. “I was instructing on the Qualified Weapons Instructor course. I was teaching other instructors how to be weapons instructors so they could take the tactics and techniques back to their squadrons to pass on to those aircrews. “We took a four ship of student instructors as part of 208 Squadron’s deployment. We arrived at Nellis amidst tales of infamy about the Bucc’s ability to outrun and outfly at low-level any fighter that got within range. “It was a story we were happy to use to our advantage and to embellish as and when the right number of beers had been consumed by us and the ‘enemy’ in the O’ Club! “If we were part of the afternoon ‘go,’ we’d mission plan in the morning and fly that afternoon. Mission planning was fairly routine; the lead pilot and deputy planned the target runs and selected the initial points (IP) while the lead navigator concentrated on preparing the route to and from the target; the split to ensure safe separation over the target; the hold to guarantee the deconflicted ‘push’ time through Student Gap (author’s note – Student Gap is a geographical feature in the Nellis Range complex that generations of students and instructors have used as the starting point for RED FLAGs.), and taking account any simulated SAM threats and the need to avoid overflying Dreamland! (Author’s note – Dreamland is the slang for Area 51, a highly restricted area in the middle of the Nellis ranges that both military and civil aircraft are prohibited from over flying. If one were to do so, one could count on an unpleasant reception upon landing followed by several hours of questioning by the authorities.) “After take-off, the (usually) 4-ship would form up and fly to the range. We’d hold at Student Gap until push time. When pressing through Student Gap, we’d hack our stopwatch; from that point on, navigation became the lead navigator’s responsibility. “Now remember, there was nothing very sophisticated about the Buccaneer when it came to nav aids, particularly over land and even more so over desert. The aircraft was 1950s vintage and the navigation system in the 1970s and 80s was very much analogue or “steamdriven.” Thus, reliance was very much placed on the Mark One eyeball! “This lack of sophisticated systems meant we very much used ‘big feature’ navigation, i.e., from one ridge line to the next and using those same ridge lines to terrain mask from SAMs and Red Air fighters. You could get as low as you wanted and as fast as the big Spey engines would take you while in the ranges. Although 100 feet and 580 knots was the authorized altitude and speed, the radio altimeter was notoriously unreliable below 100 feet and unusable below 50! “After pushing, every eyeball would be outside looking for threats. The pilots primarily scanned from 10 to 2 o’clock with the navs attending to the other 240 degrees. “If a SAM locked up someone in the formation, whoever was locked called a 30 degree turn away from the threat and the formation took the evasive action, jamming and maintaining height and speed. “Although flight integrity was paramount to ensure maximum effect on the target, if a fighter was detected and lucky enough to see us against the desert floor (we had adapted a sand coloured scheme only to discover that the fighters looked for the shadows which we could not disguise!) and maneuvered for a shot, the formation would break, the aircraft being tracked would attempt to outfly by evasive maneuver, pop chaff (one bundle carried within the speedbrake tailcone!) while trying to draw the fighter away from the rest of the formation. “Although fighter escort was usually built into the mission package and we hoped that our fighters would have dealt with the ‘bad guy’ fighters before we ingressed, the fighter culture had developed a kudos to anyone who was skillful to claim a Bucc at the debrief. “As a result, we were often deliberately targeted by the fighters to gain their ‘Bucc-killer’ reputation rather than engage in traditional fight 1v1 as per the RED FLAG script. However, our tactics were successful in the main and almost invariably outran our opponents and got our bombs through to the target. “The next time I did a RED FLAG in 1981, the Bucc had gained a limited self-defense capability by being fitted with one AIM-9G Sidewinder air-to-air missile. The thought of a Buccaneer looking for a fight with a one-shot, limited performance Sidewinder against an Aggressor (Northrop F-5 MiG simulating aircraft) or worse, an agile F-15 or F-16 makes my blood curdle! “Nevertheless, the missile did act as a deterrent and any unwary fighter who dropped mistakenly into the middle of the flight, thinking he was behind the last man, often met an untimely ‘death’ from the ‘real’ last man who was dealt the ace of the day and presented a juicy target ripe for the taking!” Mike Nelson, a retired USAF Lieutenant Colonel flew as an exchange navigator with the RAF in the Buccaneer. He came from the back seat of an F-4 Phantom II and after rigorous training found himself in the back seat of the Bucc. Says he of that cockpit, “It was not logical at all. If you think about the weirdest place to put controls and instruments, that’s what it seemed like the designers did. “The flight instruments – airspeed indicator, altimeter, etc were down by my left knee. The controls for the bombsight used by the pilot up front were in my cockpit. For those jets equipped with TV Martel (a TV-guided air to ground missile) the monitor was situated between my knees. “On the plus side, the cockpit visibility compared to the F-4 was tremendous. In the F-4, my vis to the front and rear was very limited. In the Bucc, the seats were offset so the pilot’s ejection seat was actually 5 inches to the left of the centerline and mine was 5 inches to the right so I could see very well forward. “The intakes blocked a lot of my side peripheral vision, but it was good to the rear and up as well. “The overall cockpit was smaller than my previous jet. I had to learn to not store anything I would need during flight in the lower leg pockets of my flight suit because once I was strapped in, the sidewalls of the cockpit and the instrument panel in front of me kept me from reaching down.” Nelson says his exchange tour with the RAF and in the Buccaneer was the best of his 20-plus year career. “We thought we trained hard, but those guys were amazing! They practiced and practiced and were merciless in the debriefs. Excellence was considered the norm and not getting reamed out for something was a good debrief. Tough at times, but it made for outstanding airmen. “The RAF squeezed the most out of their equipment and people, but that made for a very effective weapon.” As for driving the Buccaneer, few men have more experience flying the jet than Dave Southwood. As an operational squadron pilot, Buccaneer demonstration pilot and then test pilot, he racked up a significant number of hours in the jet, most of them spent at the very edge of the jet’s performance envelope. “When I was detailed to become the squadron’s Buccaneer demonstration pilot, I had to develop and present all the maneuvers and demonstrations sequences to RAF Headquarters. The odd thing was that once I had submitted my plan, I was not going to be allowed to make any changes after trying it or else they’d throw the whole thing out. Since the plan had to be approved and the first show was not too far off, I wanted to get it right. “I looked at the list of approved maneuvers and decided to end the display with a vertical roll and roll-off-the-top. Amazingly, that was approved! However, I knew of no one who had done it before and there were no piloting notes on how to do such non-standard (for the Bucc anyway) maneuvers. At what speed did you enter? There was no one to ask, so I had to experiment on that and several other events prior to starting the formal display work up. “For that particular maneuver, I found that if I had a light, clean aircraft and I entered the climb between 530-550 kts, it worked but that involved trial and error in finding the right speeds and control movements. “Eventually, we put together a plan and I spent a extraordinary year demonstrating the aircraft at various venues. Typically, with the exception of the final vertical roll, I stayed away from looping or vertical maneuvers as they were too large and you went too high. Instead, we performed mainly in the horizontal plane, especially as the Bucc had a very impressive rate of roll. “If I wasn’t doing aerobatics and limited turns to no more than 20 degrees of bank, I could descend as low as 100 feet at a public venue; the heights raised to 300 ft for non-aerobatic maneuvers and 500 ft if aerobatic. “The Bucc handled very well above 300 kts. Stable, good field of view and the ability to gain or shed speed quickly, and being a big and very visible aircraft that made a lot of noise always made it a crowd pleaser! “Below 300 kts, however, its flying qualities became less pleasant. When going slow, it was very easy to exceed the angle of attack limit with only small stick forces and displacement and this could result in you losing control of the jet and having to eject. This was a particular issue when the wind was blowing you toward the crowd. Southwood, as mentioned, also flew as an operational squadron pilot. He flew in one of the most famous Buccaneer ‘ops,’ Operation PULSATOR in 1983. In that year, various countries had set up military enclaves in the civil war torn city of Beirut, Lebanon. The US received the most publicity since it was the United States Marines who occupied part of the Beirut Airport, later being subjected to a suicide bombing with a loss of more than 200 Marines. Other countries, however, including the UK, had troops in Beirut. Southwood, by now assigned back to 208 Squadron at RAF Lossiemouth, recalls receiving hurried instructions to be part of a Bucc strike force that was to fly from the UK to a base on Cyprus that was closer to Beirut. “We took six jets with crews from both 12 and 208 (Squadrons). We left on a Friday. On Sunday, we received an Air Tasking Message that essentially told us to “Beat the s*** out of the city” as a show of force for anyone planning to attack our Army contingent in the city. “Although the message and the mission was supposed to be classified, the media was alerted to be at the British Embassy in Beirut the following day at 0900 and 1100 local time. “The first two aircraft went off and flew a route inbound from the Mediterranean, over the Beirut airport, over the British HQ, then the Russian Embassy, turned around, went over the American Embassy, finally back over the airport and back out to sea. “When it came our turn, the detachment commander dictated us to fly the same profile as the earlier flight; same route, speeds, altitudes, etc. Now that didn’t make a lot of sense to us tactically since if there were anyone up to any mischief waiting for us, they would already be alerted and looking for us to do just what the previous flight had done. “But we agreed with the boss albeit reluctantly. “We took our 2-ship, armed with a single each AIM-9B, escorted by two F-4s, unarmed due to political restrictions, and flew over the city. “Perhaps through the city might be a better description. Although we flew the same route, we flew at 50 ft at 550 kts. I was in the number two position when we crossed the airport. My nav said later that he was looking level at the driver of a dump truck on the airport! We flew below a US Navy helicopter, and below the roof level of many of Beirut’s buildings. “We found out after we landed that we had, indeed, been shot at. We couldn’t tell it in flight, but an Air Marshal’s wife called wanting to know if we were all all right. When we said, “Of course, why?” she replied that those on the ground had seen gunfire directed at us. “It was the best 2 ½ minutes flying of my life and our troops suffered no fatalities and only one injury during their mission in Beirut whereas many of the other nations suffered significant casualties.” Mike Nelson also recalled a low-level Bucc moment that he still cherishes, “We were practicing ship attack and after simulating the bomb run, I can remember looking up at the bow of a US Navy destroyer as we crossed in front of it.” The Buccaneer flew in the British contribution, Operation GRANBY, to DESERT STORM. Initially, it carried a laser designator for other aircraft to drop laser guided bombs to use as an aimpoint. Very late in the war, the Buccs did their own marking and bombing. This was the only time the British Buccs fired shots in anger. The only exports went to the South African Air Force who bought 16 and used them effectively in several border skirmishes. The last Buccs in the UK flew with the military test center at Boscombe Down. Dave Southwood had earlier gone through the test pilot school there while in the Service, returning as a civilian instructor after his retirement. He relates that the very last British military flight of a Buccaneer was actually flown by an American test pilot doing an exchange tour with the RAF, Rick Husband. Husband, tragically was killed later in the Space Shuttle Columbia accident in 2003. As with the Lightning, the Buccaneer still lives on with a private company in South Africa, where for a substantial lessening of one’s wallet, the thrill of a Bucc ride at ‘nought feet’ over the ocean is still available.

Ok, going into ever narrowing circles until the fundamental orifice is reached, you used FEDEX/UPS numbers which, in addition to the numbers already explained about widebody/narrow, differ markedly from the major carriers, i.e. "airline pilots" which was the term used. Run those numbers and get back to me if you think they (airline F/Os and low time left seat domestic guys) are making the $140K + numbers as they did in years past. UPS/FEDEX management would love to wind their pay scales back to those of, say, United or Delta. I'm not defending either side, just my observation on the pay issue. Now, as to the USAF fuel burn issue, since I am not a military pilot, I can't voice a pertainent argument. But training like you fight - as mentioned the difference in handling/performance for a heavyweight assualt landing/T.O vs. a 'fuel efficient' sortie is but one difference between the civil operators who are out to be the most efficient vs. military which is supposed to be the most capable in its role. It is an apples and oranges comparison in my non-rated opinion. I am exiting this fight as a non-player...............

And now, for something completely different................................. The English Electric Lightning Mention the name 'Lightning' to any aviation aficionado and he or she will most likely bring up the illustrious Lockheed P-38 'Lightning' of World War II fame. He might even say it is the name for the United States Air Force's newest jet fighter, the F-22. Although technically, that aircraft is called the 'Lightning II,'[ WRITTEN before Raptor became official] it is still not the focus of this article. A third fighter bearing the name 'Lightning' was the English Electric, later BAC- British Aircraft Company, still later Bae - British Aerospace, Lightning interceptor. The jet equipped the Royal Air Force's air defense squadrons for several decades. In the 1950s and 1960s, if America was known for its muscle cars like the Chevrolet Bel Air and beefy airplanes like the and the Republic F-105 'Thunderchief,' then Great Britain was the home of the elegant sports car like the MG and its flying equivalent, the twin jet Lightning. First conceived in 1947 as a result of a British government research project, the aircraft that eventually evolved into the Lightning started out as a transonic and low supersonic test bed. The English Electric Company, however, proved farsighted in that the design submitted would be capable of being developed into an operational interceptor. It was designed to get airborne quickly, climb steeply and intercept the perceived threat of the time, the Soviet Union’s long-range bomber force. After several years of model and wind tunnel testing, the first true prototype, the P1A was completed in the spring of 1954 with its first flight occurring on August 4th. British test pilot Roland 'Bee' Beamont made that first flight and would be with the Lightning program for decades to come. On August 11th, Beamont took the Lightning past Mach 1 in level flight, a first for a British aircraft. In the P1, the basic design of the Lightning, two turbojet engines, mounted in a unique 'over and under' configuration, shoulder positioned swept back wings, low mounted horizontal stabilizers, nose mounted intake and cockpit recessed into the fuselage above the intake took shape. The placing of the wings dictated a long, spindly undercarriage for the jet complete with narrow, high pressure tires. One of the first thing manifested during the P1's testing period was the Lightning's lack of endurance. This was a problem that would dog the fighter throughout its career, although much time and effort went into increasing its 'legs.' Another item brought out during testing was the aircraft's phenomenal climb ability. From releasing the brakes to reaching 40,000 ft, just over two and half minutes would pass. For a 1950s jet, this was stunning performance; indeed it was still able to hold its own in this category well into the 1980s. In 1956, the first order for production versions was issued. The Lightning F1 carried two 30mm Aden cannons and two de Havilland Firestreak heat-seeking missiles on pylons mounted on either side of the nose first entered squadron service in 1960 with No. 56 Squadron. In short order the F2 version appeared in 1961. The main difference between the F1 and F2 was the latter had fully variable 'reheat (afterburners)' while the former had a unique four position setting for using reheat. The F3, thought by many ex-Lightning pilots to be the best version for sheer flying qualities made its debut in 1963. The F3 used upgraded Avon Series 300 engines producing 13,500 lbs of thrust (16,000 with reheat), an improved airborne interception radar and Red Top missiles. The 30mm cannons of the earlier versions were removed and the F3 served as a missile carrier only. The short legs of the Lightning had been stretched by adding a refueling probe on the left wing. This bolted on, fixed probe enabled the Lightning to rendezvous with an aerial tanker and insert its probe into the drogue 'basket' trailed by the tanker. Even with the aerial refueling capacity, the F3 still had room for improvement. The final and definitive version, the F6 first flew in 1964, again ‘Bee’ Beamont making the type's maiden flight. Many of the F3s were subsequently rebuilt to F6 standard. The F6 added a ventral fuel tank that increased somewhat the range of the fighter without needing a tanker. It was also in the F6 that unique overwing fuel tanks were added. These tanks, intended for ferry service added 4,300 lbs of fuel to the F6’s internal 10,000lbs, to give truly long range to the type for the first time. Initially, the F6 was also a missile armed interceptor, but a later modification placed two Aden cannons in the front part of the ventral fuel tank, making it a 'gunfighter' as well. Lightning F6 Specifications: Length: 55.25 ft Height: 19.58 ft Wingspan: 34.83 ft Max weight: 41,700 lbs Max speed: Mach 2.0 Engines: Two Rolls-Royce Avon Mk 302s, 11,100lb thrust dry/16,300 with reheat Armamment: Two Red Top or Firestreak missiles Two 30 mm Aden cannon with 130 rounds each Fire Control: Ferranti Radar Type AI23S Navigation: Integrated flight instrument display, moving map display Ejection seat: Martin-Baker Mk 2, 0 ft altitude at 90 knots up to any altitude, 600 KIAS Two-seater trainer versions of the Lightning, the T3 and T5, were built, both for the initial training of Lightning pilots at the Operational Conversion Unit, and for issue to each fighter squadron’s use as a means to give additional instruction and 'check' rides to squadron pilots. The T-models were simply widened at the cockpit to provide a side by side arrangement. They still retained the full operational capability of the single seaters. One of the idiosyncrasies of the T5, however, was the fact that the throttles for the right hand seat, usually occupied by the instructor, were mounted on the right side of the cockpit forcing the pilot to switch hands to fly. In other words, in the single seat version, as well as every other fighter in the world, the pilot, controls the stick in his right hand and the throttles with his left. In the T5, that natural feel was reversed. Says retired United States Marine Lieutenant Colonel Frank Pieri of that arrangement, "Since most throttle and stick movements are a reaction type of movement, you had to be careful not to get the hands confused." Pieri flew as an exchange pilot with the RAF's No. 23 Squadron, based at RAF Leuchars in Scotland from 1966 to 1969. Pieri relates some of his Lightning experiences, "I was an instructor at NAS Beeville, Texas when I was selected for the exchange program. I was teaching new students in the Grumman F9F-8 'Cougar' and went from there to the Lightning conversion course in England. "The bird was OK for its mission, i.e., spot interceptor. It had very short legs. The F3, which I mainly flew for the first part of my tour, only had something like 7,700lbs of fuel. I can remember one day when I did four hops and only logged 45 minutes total time! "That jet was somewhat tricky landing with crosswinds because of limited aileron throw (only 8 degrees), and a high touchdown speed of 155 knots. The landing speed was fast because you had to watch the landing attitude; if you landed too nose up, you could strike the tail and cut the cables to the drag chute. With Fighter Command runways all being only 7,500 feet long, you definitely wanted the drag chute to work! "Some of the good points about the jet were its advanced, for the time, auto couple throttles and flight controls to the ILS (Instrument Landing System).” "In my second year, I was a flight commander and squadron instrument rating examiner, so I mainly flew the T5. The squadron had also transitioned to the F6 during that time, so I logged some time in it as well. The T5 had all the problems of the F3 - short legs and landing handling problems of the F3, and then some. The F6, however, had much longer legs with the overwing tanks. Its handling was greatly improved because the ailerons in this model had 15 degrees or so of throw with the flaps down. "In flight handling was fine. One 'no-no' was getting too slow or like our (Chance-Vought) F-8 'Crusader,' you ran a real risk of experiencing inertial coupling problems. "Another of its greatest hazards and one of the most difficult to recognize was the flat spin which was very benign. Often times the pilot wouldn't realize he hadn't gotten himself into one and the wingman had to call it out. We lost a jet once due to that. "A very experienced squadron pilot had to be told that he was in that situation. He finally had to eject and there was much talk that if his wingman hadn’t told him, he might not have recognized the problem and gotten out in time.” Although Pieri never had his Lightning landings not equal his take-offs, he related a couple of incidents during his exchange tour that were pretty hairy. "I had a night launch and the canopy came off just after take-off. It lodged in my tail but the airplane was still flyable so I stayed with it. I was too heavy to land and the Lightning didn't have a way to dump fuel so I had to fly around for a half hour or so. Naturally, it was cold and snowing. I was one very cold pilot by the time I finally landed. "On another flight, I had an engine flame out on short final. Made for a very interesting minute or so of flying.” RAF technician Alan McCormick was one of those that had to find and fix such an engine problem. He recalls that access to the various components in the Lightning left something to be desired. "The aircraft was an absolute bastard for accessibility in general. For example, if we had to change an engine, we (the engine tradesmen) would remove the engine, either the No.1, the lower, or the No. 2, the upper after the other specialist tradesmen - hydraulics, electrical, etc. - had disconnected their bits. "If it was the lower, we used four manual hoists, one at each corner and lowered the engine onto its cradle. We'd be supervised by a senior NCO during the operation. "If it was the No.2, we’d remove the upper hatch, disconnect the engine from the various fittings and attach a crane to lift it out. "Each of these operations was very time consuming and could take up to 5-6 hours per engine. Once an engine was removed, other tradesmen would use the opportunity of the vacated space to check their areas and do whatever repairs or replacements were needed.” For all its faults - difficult to maintain and chronically short of range, the Lightning stood guard for Britain's skies for far longer than could be imagined. Despite an expected operational career of around 10 years, the RAF kept the Lightning serviceable and ready for a quarter century. A few of the jets were exported to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait for their defense needs, but the majority served only in RAF colors. The last Lightning squadron ceased operations in 1988. The very last military flight of a Lightning occurred in 1992. Several F6s assisted in radar trials for the Panavia Tornado multi-role fighter, the type that eventually replaced the Lightning. Even though the Lightning no longer graces British skies, a few still thunder on in South Africa. For a price, aviation thrillseekers can ride in a T5 operated by a private company that specializes in offering rides in retired, but still adrenaline-producing fighter aircraft. So, it may not have gotten the publicity of the other fighters that shared its name, but the EE/BAC/BAe Lightning is definitely worth remembering as a classic.

Errr, seen recent airline pay scales? In more than a few cases, the AF pays better................... but I understand the point you were making.

2. Outstanding!

Here's one for the 'Vark lovers. First time any of the Libya raid guys have talked publicly. A version of this draft comes out in Flight Journal's December issue. They put the text with some great F-111F photos. TIMING IS EVERYTHING “I saw a bright flash and fireball just ahead to my left. I knew it probably marked the spot where somebody was going down, but I didn’t know who.” This is one of the vivid memories that “JP-4” Pearson carries to this day. He was the last of eighteen strike aircraft hitting targets in Tripoli, Libya on the night of April 14/15, 1986. In addition to be being the prototype of today’s precision-guided strikes against terrorist targets, Operation EL DORADO CANYON included the longest fighter mission in history. THE PLAN Throughout 1985 and into 1986, Libyan-sponsored terrorists had struck repeatedly at American targets. Tensions rose until the final straw on April 5, 1986, an explosion at a Berlin nightclub heavily frequented by US servicemen killed two GIs and wounded another 79. The Reagan Administration decided it was time to show American resolve. Contingency plans developed by the Department of Defense were built should ‘go’ be ordered. One of those units most likely to ‘go’ was the 48th Tactical Fighter Wing (TFW) based at RAF Lakenheath in the United Kingdom. “The Liberty Wing” flew the ‘F’ model of General Dynamics’ F-111 strike aircraft. Using its advanced avionics, especially its Pave Tack laser targeting pod, the ‘Aardvark’ delivered precision guided weapons on the deck at night or bad weather. Since the 1985 Christmas season, a small group of 48th planners had devised and revised a plan to send a surgical strike package of six jets into the heart of the formidable Libyan air defense system to take out one or two of Qaddafi’s high value assets. Finally, President Reagan ordered the military to respond. Instead of the small strike against closely placed targets in Tripoli, however, Reagan swung for the fence and insisted that a wide range of targets be hit. Due to the scope and geographically dispersed positions of the additional targets, both the US Navy, using two carriers then in the Mediterranean and UK-based aircraft would be needed. The Navy would strike the easternmost targets around Benghazi and provide SAM suppression and fighter cover for the ‘Varks’ area. The 48th drew three targets; the Azziziyah Barracks, a terrorist command and control center as well as being the dictator’s headquarters compound; the Murrat Sidi Bilal base, a terrorist training facility, and, well to the south, military transport aircraft at the Tripoli airport. Unfortunately for the 48th, this decision to enlarge the mission occurred only 40 hours before the fragged TOT (time over target). All the carefully laid plans were scrapped. Instead of six jets, 18 were needed to hit all the targets. The F-111 could be temperamental with all its advanced systems, so to ensure the minimum number of strikers, an additional six jets would take off as air spares. To ensure that at least 24 good jets left the ground, another six jets were prepped. In addition to the bomb droppers from Lakenheath, four EF-111s (plus one spare) would launch from nearby RAF Upper Heyford to supply radar jamming or suppression of enemy air defense (SEAD). Complicating the picture was the refusal of France and Spain to let US warplanes overfly their territories. This meant that the F-111s needed 29 air refueling tankers to strike. In all, 57 USAF aircraft would launch to put 18 on target, on time. Crews for all of these aircraft had to be briefed and primed for the arduous mission, not an easy task to accomplish in the time remaining. THE MISSION In the new plan, nine F-111Fs would hit Azziziyah, six the airfield, and three to Sidi Bilal. By taking the Barracks out, the US hoped to deal a knock out blow to both terrorism and the Libyan military’s leadership. Unfortunately, the new plan required all nine aircraft to attack along the same route. Even though the crews expressed reservations about this tactic, knowing it would leave the last strikers extremely vulnerable to alerted anti-aircraft artillery (triple A) and surface to air missiles (SAMs). However, due to the much larger joint USN-USAF packages, there wasn’t time to deconflict routes with the Navy. USAF aircraft needed to stay clear of the USN and vice-versa to avoid ‘blue on blue’ incidents. A crew would be just as dead if shot down by a friendly. Of equal importance to target destruction was the need to negate collateral damage. As vital as the military aspects of the mission were, the political ones were even more important. A strong signal to terrorists that Uncle Sam wasn’t going to be pushed around anymore would be wasted if civilians were killed and the propaganda broadcast to the world. “Big Al” Wickman, piloting Jewel 62, remembers the mass briefing for the mission. “It wasn’t everyday that you had the Chief of Staff of the Air Force in your briefing.” The presence of such horsepower brought home to many of the crews that they were really going. After the briefings, the crews stepped to the waiting jets. “Yama” Hoyes, a weapons system operator (WSO, pronounced “whizzo”) recalls, “Even though the –111s were already ‘cocked,’ that is, all steps done up to start engines, each crew carefully checked the many systems to ensure full capability. The ROE (Rules of Engagement) for this strike were extremely tight and an operating Pave Tack system and good INS (inertial navigation system) were just a couple of the ‘go-no go’ items included. Nobody wanted to be left behind for this one, hence the extra careful cockpit checks.” At 1713 GMT, using comm. out procedures, the tankers took off followed by the fighters. Immediately, the plan turned to delta sierra. The forecasted winds were not, and forced the tankers to take off opposite direction from what was planned. For the fighters, this meant instead of a gently curving join up that allowed time to sort out which was the appropriate tanker, the ‘Varks found themselves raising the landing gear and bunching up behind a face full of tankers. Eventually, sorted out and in what Hoyes calls an “armada” and Pearson remembers thinking was just like a scene from “12 o’clock High,” they headed southwest to begin the long flight down the coast of Spain, turning east through the Straits of Gibraltar, and across the Mediterranean. With a long wait until combat, the crews settled in, continuously topping off from the tankers. After an hour, the spares returned to base, frustrated that they couldn’t continue on the mission. Encountering headwinds when tailwinds were forecasted, it wasn’t too long into this droning that the fighters realized they were going to be late. Everything about the raid was based on timing – the SEAD and SAM suppression strikes, the US Navy attacks further east, and most importantly, the attack runs of each F-111F. Since the ROE specified that each target be positively identified before dropping, the planners built in a 30 second delay between aircraft. This delay would, it was hoped, allow the smoke and debris from the preceding F-111’s bombs to settle before the following striker released. Finally, the mission leader broke radio silence, “We’re late!” At that point, everyone realized the critical timing was jeopardized and all the jets bent their throttles forward to make up the difference. Even during refueling, the speed stayed up. Wickman says even though they were doing 330kts or better hanging on the boom, the F-111 “rides like a ’72 Cadillac. It really is a smooth flying machine, very stable throughout its envelope.” With an all up weight of more 100,000 pounds, even this stable ride needed occasional taps on the afterburners as they wallowed heavily behind the tanker. In the dark skies, the tension in the cockpits rose as the 0200 TOT drew near. Dropping at the designated times, each flight followed the planned routes. Each continued inbound nearly due south, then reaching the Libyan coast, turning east, descending to 200 feet. The tracks for Azziziyah and Sidi Balil were roughly parallel. The airfield strikers actually penetrated far inland and came from the south to attack. Hoyes, in Remit 33, had one of the more exciting tales of the strike. Descending from 24 thousand to 1,000 feet in the pitch black night, he recalls, “If you listen to the (cockpit) tapes after the mission, you could hear a whole lot of oxygen being used while we did TFR (terrain following radar). “The winds continued to go against what we expected. The headwinds slowed us down, so we had to keep stroking the burners to maintain the timing plan. “Now it is really dark out, and I’m headdown in the ‘feedbag’ (rubber visor that covered the ground mapping radar), checking equipment when we lose one of our TF channels. A fault like this triggers an automatic 4g pull up. This ‘niggly’ fault kept occurring; resetting, then going offline again, each time initiating the 4g pull-up, followed by the pilot pushing it back down, really a sickening roller coaster ride. “I told my pilot that I wasn’t going to be able to take much more of that. He switched to manual and did a superb job. “Remember, it is absolutely black outside and the only reference we have for terrain avoidance is what’s left of the TFR, called the ‘ride line.’ This was a line on the scope set at what the computer was programmed with as the altitudes for the current INS-based position. In those days, the INS drifted, so there was a lot of room for error. “So at 1000 feet, going 600 knots, we’re using TLAR (that look’s about right) to keep us from hitting anything.” “As we passed over Lampedusa Island, our last ‘fix’ for updating our targeting systems, we also used it to check our attitude. There is a 1,000 foot antenna there and if we passed below it, we were aborting because that would show our TFR was totally fried. “We passed by the antenna, co-altitude, but noticed another problem. The coordinates given to us for the island did not match where we were, so if a crew used the bad coordinates, their bombs would be off. Since we were radio silent, we couldn’t pass that on and had to hope the others caught the error as well. “Back on our run, we were one minute behind the first drop and all was dark until lead’s bombs hit. Then all hell broke loose. Solid streams of tracer hosed into the sky along with lots of magnesium flares that added a lot of light to the show. “There was sh** to the left, right, in front and behind us and the Navy’s HARM shooters were firing to take out the SAM tracking and guidance radars. It was just a huge mess out there.” Remit 32, thirty seconds ahead, aborted due to their target being obscured by smoke from 31’s bombs and instead of turning back into the flak filled skies to the north, lit afterburners to scream as quickly as possible south over downtown Tripoli where the fire wasn’t as intense. Continues ‘Yama,’ “At our pull, which is really a climb to loft the bombs, followed by a 120 degree banking left turn to exit the area as the weapons continue flying gravity-powered formation to the aim point, our Pave Tack died. So only a couple of seconds from pickling, we had what the ROE dictated was an abort. Since the radar was still good and had a recent good update, I felt confident that we could still drop accurately, so we did. “Post-strike we found out we’d hit a little short, but with 2,000 pounders, we still did significant damage to the area with no collateral damage. “Once we dropped, we scooted north to overfly the ‘delouse’ boat, a Navy frigate who watched us approaching on his radar at the designated height. If we were not at that height, the orbiting fighter CAP would intercept to clean off any Libyan fighters that might be trying to catch us. “As we crossed the coast, we radioed ‘Feet wet’ and ‘Tranquil Tiger.’ That meant we were over the water and had hit our target. ‘Frosty Freezer’ was the unsuccessful call.” The WSO of Elton 43, “Boots” Martin recalls that just before leaving the tanker, each F-111 took a final top off. “41 got his gas quickly, and disconnected. 42 took longer than expected so when we finally disconnected, we were two minutes late.” Dropping from 25 thousand to 1,000 feet, ‘Boots’ says, “We were doin’ Mach stink and it was totally, completely, absolutely dark outside.” To make up lost time they went supersonic, trusting in the TFR to keep them from smacking into the water. Then the Master Caution light illuminated. Checking further, they found the “wheel well hot” warning light glaring. The ROE called for an abort, but the crew decided to press. The light reset but only momentarily because the light reappeared, then went out again along with everything else in the cockpit With total electrical failure, 43’s pilot immediately pulled the nose up to gain altitude while they sorted out the problems. They could see fireworks in the distance as triple ‘A’ and SAMs arced through the sky, intermittently punctuated by explosions as the leading F-111Fs dropped their weapons. With many expletives, Elton 43 was forced to abort and worry about surviving. Says ‘Boots’, “My pilot asked ‘What heading?’ Well, I didn’t know exactly, so I said ‘Try north.’ I held a flashlight in my mouth pointing at the whiskey compass so he could point the nose in the right direction while we ran the emergency checklists.” They managed to get one of their generators on-line, but to find the tankers, they had to radio for an F –111 already at the rendezvous to ‘torch.’ For that, the ‘Vark dumps fuel from the nozzle located just aft of the engine exhausts, lights the afterburners, and sends out a 40 foot stream of flame. Using this beacon in the dark sky, Elton 43 rejoined quickly. Wickman’s Jewel 62 was targeted against the training camp. Ingressing, he bumped the jet down to 200 feet, however, he kept getting search radar tickles on his radar warning gear, so he kept easing the jet lower until the tickles stopped. Finally, at 80 feet, Jewel 62 was in the clear, although doing 600 knots, at night, using TFR. On his bomb run, he climbed to 200 feet to acquire the target and could see the afterburners of the other jets. He says, “You could see the shock rings very clearly and the flak was so heavy that if I had tried to break from one stream, I could have just as easily turned into another. All I wanted to do was to wind the seat down so I couldn’t see it anymore. “As we continued, I saw a brighter flash off to my left, but had no idea, at the time, that it was one of ours and stayed focused on the drop. “At the pull, as I turned and was looking back, I could see 63’s burners while my WSO stayed with the bombs, turning on the laser to guide them during their last seconds of flight. “After that, my main concern during egress was to make the delousing point and not make an over-eager Navy fighter pilot an ace.” The last jet in, Pearson’s Karma 53, was one of those added to the Azziziyah target despite the tactic of so many jets using the same headings over the same run-in, thus allowing the Libyan gunners an easier firing solution. Passing Lampedusa, his left generator failed, taking with it their Pave Tack. He continued on, hoping to bring the system back on-line. Turning inbound, he spied a vivid flash and explosion, probably Karma 52, piloted by Capt. Fernando Ribas-Dominicci and WSO Capt. Paul Lorence. Believing that a SAM got them but unable to do anything about it, ‘JP-4’ continued. It was so bright outside with the triple ‘A’ and flares that his WSO visually picked up a SAM launched at them. Pearson broke to avoid the SAM and it detonated behind them. The fact that the SAM operators were ready makes him believe that Karma 52 took a hit. ‘JP-4’ pressed until TOT when he aborted due to no Pave Tack. The ROE was strict, so with much cussing, the crew held their fire. They safed their bombs and dumped them into the sea. Even twenty years later, he is still ticked about not being able to drop. Now, after 17 strikers rejoined with the tankers, it was time for home. One tanker with the remainder of Karma flight orbited for nearly another hour, hoping that 52 would somehow make it out, but eventually had to leave as well. SURREAL HOMECOMING Sobered by the loss of Karma 52, the crews settled down for the long flight home. With the overheat light still glaring and unsure if their jet was going to blow up, Elton 43 diverted into Rota, Spain. Even if the Spanish government didn’t support the action, the US Navy base commander recognized a brave deed and opened up the officers’ club at 0600 for a well-deserved post mission beer and debrief. The rest of the armada continued when one of the tankers called for everyone to retune to US Armed Forces Radio to listen to a live broadcast of a White House press conference about the raid. The men interviewed for this story relate how when the broadcast ended with “Anchors Aweigh” and the “Air Force Song,” they choked up. A final, more professional tribute greeted them after turning clearing the Straits of Gibraltar. As the first lighter blue tendrils of daybreak appeared, they saw an SR-71 ‘Blackbird,’ inbound to do post-strike photo assessments, bank sideways in a knife-edge salute as it overflew the formation. Finally, with sore butts from logging more than 12 hours, the crews landed at Lakenheath where the taxiways were lined by the cheering ground staff. Popping canopies, each crewman handed his helmet bag over the side. Normally, a crew chief grabbed the equipment. ‘Big Al’ was surprised when the Air Force Chief of Staff took his gear. Most recalled being tired, unsure what, if anything, they had started and uncertain if Karma 52’s fate. Within a few days, the worst was confirmed. A TV crew captured images of Ribas’ body and Lorence’s helmet washed up on the shore. The flash seen by Wickman and Pearson indicates that they were probably shot down. The flash was likely either the jet exploding or the unique capsule escape system of the ‘Vark rocketing away from the fuselage. In a very poignant footnote, Ribas was the godparent of Wickman’s then-infant son. As a lesson for today’s struggle against terrorism, twenty years ago, 18 F-111F crews flew a very long demonstration flight.