Story on flying the F-4E
Danny Deger
--
Danny Deger
NASA offered me $15,000 to take down my web site. Take a look and see why.
www.dannydeger.net
Replacement Training Unit, RTU, Graduation
RTU was fairly straight forward. Lots of academics on aircraft systems and
combat maneuvering - both air-to-air and air-to-ground. It turned out I had
a good sense of geometry that served me well in the cockpit. I did well in
dropping bombs and flying air-to-air combat.
I must confess something at this point. I am not by nature a violent
person. I have only been in two fights in my life and in both I was
attacked by the other person. I was forced to defend myself. I was raised
going to church on Sunday and I read the bible. I thought the teaching of
non-violence made sense and I tried my best to follow this rule. Becoming a
warrior in the form of a fighter pilot was really against my nature, but it
was a necessary step to becoming an astronaut. I also realized I didn't
want the world to fall to communism and if I had to shoot down a couple of
airplanes or drop a few bombs to help stop communism I would do that. I
didn't realize what I was getting into until it was too late. The primary
mission of F-4s in the Air Force at that time was nuclear strike! If the
big war broke out in Europe, I wouldn't be shooting down another airplane,
or dropping a few bombs on enemy ground forces, I would be in the middle of
general nuclear combat that would end the world as we knew it.
My introduction to nuclear combat came in the form of an instructor that
loved his job. This guy was really kind of scary. He liked nukes. He
thought if a war was started, nukes were the way to go. "Don't mess around
with those little firecrackers if you want to kill something. Go for the
big bang. With one of these babies a single F-4 can single handily win the
war." He didn't bother to mention the Russians had their fair share of
nukes and would also use them to win the war.
I was told anything and everything about how to drop a nuke was classified.
I must respect this and say nothing about it -- even though a lot of
information is available in open literature. I will make this one
statement -- the checks and controls on the release of nuclear weapons is as
close to fool proof as it can be. The chances of an accidental or
unauthorized release is close to zero.
After learning how to drop nuclear bombs as well as conventional bombs, it
was time for our final flight at RTU. This was a final exam and a flight
that for the first time exercised a large number of aircraft hitting the
target in a coordinated fashion. I remember the flight well. I was number
2 of a 2 ship formation and we were in the middle of the strike package. We
flew a low level training route to the range with other aircraft flying
different low level routes to the same range. Spacing was done with timing.
My lead was responsible for timing between our flight and the other flights.
I just flew formation off of him. We flew tactical spread - I stayed line
abreast of him separated by about a mile. This is the standard formation
used today by combat aircraft. There is enough room for independent
maneuvering and each aircraft can watch the other's tail for an attacking
aircraft coming from behind. The problem is turning the formation. After
the turn, both aircraft need to end back up line abreast again. The Air
Force has developed a set of check turns and weaving to do this.
The battle plan was for my lead to attack the target first. We were only
dropping 25 pound practice bombs that put out a little smoke. But, they
simulated regular bombs that generate a large amount of fragmentation. I
needed to pass over the target after lead's bombs fragments had time to get
below my altitude. To get this spacing I turned hard into lead and crossed
behind him at a 90 degree angle. I flew about a mile to the other side and
made a hard turn to parallel his path, but now well behind him. We both
used a standard popup attack. At about 5 miles from the target I made a
hard 30 degree turn away from the target and pulled the nose up 30 degrees -
then I looked toward the target area to find the target. I saw it, but the
angles were wrong. Climb to 4,000 feet and pull into the target. The
angles were getting worse. I couldn't roll out and be on final.
Intuitively I realized I needed to do a small and quick barrel roll to line
up on the target. This was not the way it is supposed to work. I had never
done a roll in the middle of a bomb pass. Without much thought I did it. I
had enough sense to tell my back seat instructor, "Rolling onto final."
Without this call I was afraid he might think I was out of control and
bailout on me.
The roll worked great. It occurred to me the instructor might find my roll
as unsafe and bust me on the ride, but I ended up on final and dropped my
string of practice bombs. I found out later I hit the target. Then it was
time to egress and get back into formation. I turned to the egress heading
and advanced the throttles to military power. The plan was for lead to do
two 90 degree turns to fall back and get us back into formation. I saw lead
and watched his turns. Not enough - I was still way back. Time for more
speed. I moved the throttles past the military power detent and took them
to full afterburner. I felt the comforting push back in the seat. I was
still way back but had lots of fuel for the afterburners. I left the
throttles parked full forward. I was supposed to be line abreast with lead
and I hated being out of formation.
The planned altitude was 500 feet. Looking outside it looked about like 500
feet, but I checked my altimeter. It read 1,500 feet. I didn't think I was
that high but altimeters don't lie - I started a slow decent. The ground
was starting to look pretty close so I checked the altimeter again - 1,300
feet. I was starting to think something was wrong with the altimeter
because if I went any lower I would be below the trees. One more glance at
the altimeter. I saw it bouncing between 100 feet and 1,300 feet. I
suddenly realized what was wrong. I was right at Mach 1 and the shock wave
was bouncing around the altimeter's static port on the nose of the plane. A
little bit faster and the shockwave would have move in front of the plane
and clean up the static port. I was supersonic on the deck at about 100
feet!!!
About this time I realized I was leaving the range and starting to head down
the Kissimmee river back to Homestead AFB. I saw a lock on the canal.
There were 4 cars in a parking lot and several chairs with people fishing.
I was going so fast I barely take it in before going straight over the top
of them. I had a good idea of what those poor fisherman went through -- the
word "loud" doesn't even come close. I had heard F-4s in the traffic
pattern at 1,500 feet and at a modest power setting. This was so loud you
can't carry on a normal conversation. Supersonic at 100 feet in full burner
had to be really, really bad on the old eardrums. One thing I knew for
sure, they didn't hear me coming. I was going faster than the speed of
sound.
My efforts to catch lead finally paid off. Lead slowed down some and I
finally caught up. We did a short low level to egress the target area and
made a landing back at Homestead without incident. I was concerned about
busting the ride for one of many reasons - rolling on final, being out of
formation, and going supersonic off the range. None of this was a problem.
The instructor passed me and I was soon off to the 'baker fields of North
Carolina.
milo...@gmail.com
WaltBJ
with the 307th as an attached IP and heading up QC then.
Walt BJ
Danny Deger
news:1182997940....@n60g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
> Cool. When was this mission? I retired from HST in 1980. I was flying
> with the 307th as an attached IP and heading up QC then.
> Walt BJ
>
This would have been in late 1980.
Danny Deger
Lynn Coffelt
> Carolina.
>
(grin)
Old Chief Lynn
George Z. Bush
"Lynn Coffelt" <coff...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:yPadnWrAN94o0x7b...@comcast.com...
IP's Mama didn't raise no ijut!!!
(^v^)))))))
George Z.