Greasy's Viper (F-16) stories

[JarheadBoom]

Felt like I was right there. Fuckin' awesome.

[GreasySideUp]

Details are vague on purpose.

A faint scratch of static and then all hell breaks loose.

EEEGEEEEGEEGEEGEGEEEEEEEEEGGEEEEEEGEGGGEEEE!

A wailing alarm pierces the middle of the night. A blood-curdling, ear drum bleeding screech, resonates like amplified fingernails across an olive drab blackboard rendering my body fully awake while my mind was still dreaming.

I rapidly reach across the bed in my pitch black room to smash the alarm clock off my night stand and snooze a little longer. Certainly it is not time to wake up yet. My hand, moving at a lightening fast pace to squelch the shrieking wail of the alarm, is met with a cold cinderblock wall, instantly jamming my two middle fingers on my left hand. One may be broken. My alarm clock is not there, instead a wall.

Where am I?

I fumble to the other side of the single size bed and knock a lamp onto the floor with a crash. My mind is still in a far off place, on vacation in that small void between sleep and useful consciousness.

The light switch.

Two fluorescent lights flicker to life above the dull gray commercial carpet, dimly illuminating my cold 8x10 cinderblock room while they warm up. Most prison cells are larger. This is not my home. A cheap Chinese laminated desk lies in the corner with a wobbly black office chair turned backwards to the table and my gear laid neatly over top, everything in place, the same way I have laid it out for years. My flight suit is open, draped gently over the back of the chair. My boots sit on the floor, as if someone in the chair would be wearing them. The laces are loose, the tongues folded down so they can be put on quickly. My watch sits on its side in the center of the desk.

I have no idea what time it is, but I know it is time to go.

Now.

Less than 30 seconds from the time the alarm went off and I am wearing my bag, boots on, and running out the door, the laces untied and tucked into the side. I’ll tie them later when I have time. My mind is still catching up but my body does the motions rote.

The exterior doors of the building swing open automatically and I catch the comm on the loudspeaker above. A familiar voice.

“This is the command post. Scramble scramble scramble.”

It is a full on sprint to the hanger, a football field away. A hundred yard dash where every second counts. It is pitch black outside and a dozen lights are starting to illuminate the jet inside. The hanger doors are rolling up as I run towards them, unveiling a combat loaded F-16 parked neatly in the middle. One of my crew chiefs is next to the ladder, the other is pulling pins from the jet. Good on them for beating me out here. I check my watch and it is not on my wrist. It is still on the table in my room. I glance at my chief’s wrist and he doesn’t have a watch either. It feels late. Or really, really early. I certainly didn’t get enough sleep. My G-suit is laid neatly across the port side drop tank and I pause to don and zip it up. My chief hands me my harness that I buckle around my legs and chest. I am breathing hard, struggling to catch my breath after the sprint. Adrenaline is coursing through my veins as I quickly move up the ladder to the cockpit. Right foot over the seat, left foot off the ladder and the ladder disappears below me with the crew chief rushing to stow it out of the way.

I built my nest in the Viper the day before. My helmet is plugged in to the O2 and comm cord, and is draped over the right side canopy rail. The belts are laid neatly off to the side. My kneeboard is on the left panel and my gloves are tucked into the HUD.

Master switch on. Helmet on. The radio crackles.

“Chief, clear for start?”

“Clear to start Sir.”

As the General Electric spins over, the canopy starts to come down. I fasten my belts and unpin the ejection seat as the Viper roars to life. Over the years, in their rush, pilots have forgotten to strap in and found themselves pinned against the canopy during a bunt. It would be an awful way to go, ejecting, and watching your seat under the drogue parachute as you fell to earth, realizing you skipped strapping it on. STS. Time is paramount but you absolutely cannot skip any steps. Slow down to go fast. EGI, the embedded GPS/INS was hot cocked the day before during my meticulous preflight and takes very little time to come to life.

“Hands clear, clear to arm.”

Pins are pulled and my missiles are live. This is real. The epitome of the Fog of War and I am launching directly into the heart of it.

The Air Force lately, with live full motion video and developed intel of the entire battlespace, is paralyzed when making a decision without all the facts. Launching off alert is exactly the opposite. Launch first, figure it out on the way and as a last resort, figure it out when you get there. Alert fighters met Payne Stewart’s jet when it failed to check in and found the windows fogged over and the passengers passed out due to an oxygen malfunction. 9/11 is the other extreme and that is usually on the mind during a scramble.

I have the jet running and out of the chocks as fast as a NASCAR pit stop. A well oiled machine, I am off to the races. I do my takeoff checks while on the taxi, roll onto the runway and jam the throttle past the stop and into full afterburner. The tower would normally hold all traffic for us but no sane people fly at this time of night and the field is ours. The silent moonlit sky is shattered by the thunder of my burner and all those who live close by are shaken awake by the violence of swift action. The sound of freedom.

“Vipers, cleared supersonic.”

Eff me. They want us there in a hurry. Not good.

I start setting my radar up for the intercept using the HOTAS on the throttle and realize that two of my fingers are in immense pain from smashing into the wall earlier. Suck it up and catch up. My nugget is finally starting to catch up to the actions of my body and play an active role in the flight. I now know where I am but still have no idea where I am going. I am operating on several frequencies, coordinating with local air traffic control, the command post and other agencies to maneuver my jet without conflicting with other aircraft and find out what is going on.

Intel starts to come into play and they start to fill us in on the situation. An overseas airliner has missed several check in points on their way to the states and is not answering the calls of ATC. Best case, they are asleep at the wheel. The worst case is what we train for. George W Bush talked about the fighter aircraft role in his book Decision Points. A fighter pilot himself in the F-102, he trained to intercept the Russians and many a Polaroid picture is around the squadron of Vipers flying in close formation with Russian Bears during the cold war. Not today, that would be too easy and a dream come true to protect the mainland from a hoard of enemy fighters set on attacking the Base Exchange. Protect us from an airliner….. a different story.

From his book Decision Points on 9/11/2001.

President Bush - “We needed to clarify the rules of engagement. I told Dick Chaney that our pilots should contact suspicious planes and try to get them to land peacefully. If that failed, they had my authority to shoot them down. Hijacked planes were weapons of war. Despite the agonizing costs, taking one out could save countless lives on the ground. I had just made my first decision as a wartime commander in chief.”

He later goes on to say – “I cannot imagine what it would be like to receive this order.”

I can.

Fighter pilots that were flying during the chaos of 9/11 have interesting recounts of that day documented in several books. Since then, we have honed our alert facilities, our tactics and procedures and I have thought exactly what it would be like to receive this order. I’ll say this. In my time in the military, I have seen a lot of enemy KIA and I never delayed a second with hesitation. When faced with shooting down an airliner, I would hesitate for exactly one second. To say a prayer for those that may still be alive and unable to fight.

And then I would shoot it down.

Conscientious objection is not in the alert pilots vocabulary. The fact is this. If a plane is hijacked in the USA, people like Todd Beamer on United Flight 93 will sacrifice their lives to prevent another attack on US soil. If they regain control, at least they would have a chance with me on their wing to talk them down. If they can’t gain control, they know their fate. With that said, while I think of the enemy lain down at my hand only sporadically, I’m positive that downing an airliner would weigh heavily in hindsight. However, the thought of the afterthoughts over a beer with the bros does little to influence the current action as my Viper punches through the sound barrier.

Rolling on an intercept, in full afterburner screaming above the mach towards a hijacked passenger airliner with live missiles on board, one can only hope that it is full of Todd Beamer’s yelling “Lets Roll!” and taking back the plane. Any other scenario is gut wrenching.

In the string of airliners crossing the ocean, our target is now just minutes away and we still don’t fully know the situation.

A few minutes later and a hundred miles out we are called off. The aircraft is back in communication with Air Traffic Control due to an improper frequency given earlier. They were out of range of the previous tower and likely had to fumble through charts buried in their flight cases to find someone to talk to. A false alarm, and we are sent back to home plate. Better to launch and not be needed than to be needed and not launched, but I am extremely happy with the result. Like wearing a parachute or having a shotgun for home defense, I never want to have to use one but will do so if called upon.

We touch down just as the sun is rising. I finally know what time it is. 5AM and I’ve been up for hours. There is no chance of going back to sleep and there is work to be done to ready the jets for the next unplanned scramble. I know the crew chiefs breathe a sigh of relief seeing that all the missiles are still on our jets. America is safe for another day. I fold my gloves and put them back on the HUD. My helmet is placed on the right canopy rail, still plugged in. My kneeboard goes back on the left console. I climb out of the jet and lay the seatbelts neatly to the sides then rest my G-suit and harness on the left drop tank. I tie my boots, in case we get called again and take a deep breath to come off the adrenaline rush I have been running on all night.

Calm.

Sleep safe knowing that we are there. Always on the watch. Always ready. Hopefully never needed, but willing and able if need be. God help us and those who wish to do us harm.

Edited May 23, 2013 by GreasySideUp

[Spur38]

Get this to a publisher Greasy! I lost a couple of hours of work today....ten minutes to read and 1.8 of daydreaming! Really great stuff! Thanks!

[Day Man]

damn...I'm glad I never have to make that decision

[Toro]

Fuck yeah. Great story, once again.

[HossHarris]

A still have occasional klaxon "nightmares" (if you can call them that) .... Wake up for no reason with full adrenaline ... Awful way to start the day

[pitts2112]

I check this forum every day, just to see if Greasy's thread has bumped to the top with another stellar story. The novels or memoirs you could write after a career as a fighter pilot. I'll wait impatiently while you finish your 20.

[pitts2112]

Yeah, there's just not that much good stuff to read out there these days...

[GreasySideUp]

Gentlemen, you have been chosen for the unique abilities you have acquired thus far in your careers and will bring to this platform and to air dominance in the 21^st century. Our tactics are still evolving as we find out every day what the envelope of this jet truly is. There is combat experience in this room, test pilots, Weapons School graduates and thousands of hours of experience in the Eagle, Mud Hen and Fighting Falcon, and we are going to rely on you to translate that experience and know this jet inside and out. We need you to work to expand our knowledge of what it is capable of in combat. Everything you have heard about Raptor is true. It is the baddest mother effer on this planet, and by moving it across the ocean we move US policy with it. Our mere presence will deter wars, because there is not an enemy pilot on this earth who remotely stands a chance against us in the air. Our own fighters don’t stand a chance against Raptor. You have seen recent reports of 100 to 0 kill to loss ratios in exercises. That is simply because we don’t have any more red air to put against it. If we could put up more jets, we would shoot them down too. Those of you who have fought it, hate it. We kill indiscriminately and at will, often times without anyone knowing we were even there. If you find yourself with an enemy fighter at your 6 o’clock and a mile – he only thinks he has the offensive advantage. You will water his eyes with the bat turn this jet can make, and then you will kill him between his tears. Stealth is real, and over the next several months we will teach you how to use it, how to lurk in the shadows and strike on our schedule. You will do things you never thought possible in a fighter aircraft and make other nations loathe our great American engineering prowess.

This is not a gentleman’s course. We expect you to work long days and show up prepared. It is extremely expensive to operate this jet and we do not have the sorties or tax payer dollars to waste if you put in any less than 100%. Your work will be rewarded with sorties that you could have never imagined against numbers only dreamed about. Take what you know already, and file it away. Don’t bury it, but understand we do things differently in Raptor. Your tactics would still work in this jet but they do nothing to take advantage of our speed, supercruise and our stealth. Embrace what we are teaching here, give it an honest shot and you will come to love how we employ this aircraft.

Make no mistake, Raptor is a high visibility program. Do not Eff off in my jets, period dot. These birds are still rolling off the line, you will pick them up off the factory floor brand new. There are a handful of pilots in the Airforce today that have flown a brand new jet, our average fighter age is in the 30’s. You are very fortunate to be here. Do not ever forget this. Raptor makes you look good, not the other way around. A little humility will go a long way. They are single seat but imagine me in your cockpit every sortie, and if you even think of shining your ass, think seriously first if you ever want to fly again. There is no room for mistakes, showboating or shenanigans. If there is any doubt as to what you are about to do is a good idea – don’t do it. You are already flying the most expensive jet on the planet, it doesn’t get any cooler by holding it in ground effect during takeoff or doing an impromptu airshow for your buddy on the lake. We taxi on the centerline at 300’ spacing. This is the closest you should get to another jet all day long unless you are down to the gun. And we will train you to use the gun. This is the only warning.

Gentlemen, if we go to war tomorrow – make no mistake – you will be the ones knocking the door down. Raptor was not built for Iraq, it was built for the next shooting war with no kidding threats that can do damage to our legacy fighters. You will employ against, and inside these SAM rings, paving the way for the bomb trucks on Day 2. Of the people going through the course right now, someone will have an aerial victory in this jet. A good day may yield you 6. Pay attention and we’ll show you how.

Welcome to Raptor.

[Azimuth]

[GreasySideUp]

The Llama!

Say it isn't so. Trust me brother, there are some entertaining stories buried in here. Acquisitions, F-35/F22 program interaction, No Comm Day VFR navigation, Staff, Morale Patches, SARC briefings, maybe a story or two about flying - It has to start somewhere.

Disclaimer standard.

[Swanee]

We taxi on the centerline at 300’ spacing. This is the closest you should get to another jet all day long unless you are down to the gun.

So uh, no flying a nice tight parade while coming in for the shit hot break?