Fallout

2

TOPGUN, Fallon, Nevada: 0830, 3 March 2002

Lieutenant Luke Henry—Stick, as he was known—kept his desert-camouflage F/A-18 pointed straight up. He pushed the throttles into afterburner to sustain his climb. As he reached twenty-five thousand feet, he pulled the engines out of afterburner and pulled back on the stick, flipping his jet onto its back, flying straight and level but upside down. He looked up through his canopy at the earth. There were airplanes everywhere. F/A-18s, F-14s, and F-5s. The camouflaged F-14s and F/A-18s were being flown by TOPGUN instructors like Luke and were simulating Russian fighters. It was the graduation strike, where the TOPGUN student class led a strike on a target east of Fallon, Nevada, that was defended by TOPGUN instructors and actual Russian SAM sites.

Luke checked his fuel and pulled down toward a student F-14 that was tearing in supersonic. Luke waited until the F-14 passed directly underneath him, pulled down hard, and quickly locked up the F-14 with his radar. The F-14 knew it immediately.

The F-14 came out of afterburner and turned hard to meet the threat which the two men in the F-14 thought would be directly behind them. He waited for the right moment, then saddled in on the Tomcat from directly above. “Archer, Archer on the F-14 turning left at fifteen thousand feet,” Luke transmitted on the radio. The controller conveyed the bad news to the F-14 on the students’ radio frequency. Luke watched the F-14 hesitate for a moment, then perform a slow aileron roll, an “I’m dead” roll, and exit north.

No students had reached the target. They had failed utterly in their mission, which wasn’t uncommon in the graduation strike. It was a hard target to get to when defended aggressively by instructors who weren’t holding anything back.

Luke checked the clock. He transmitted, “Knock it off, knock it off.”

All the airplanes in the fight rolled wings-level, slowed to a reasonable speed, and headed for Fallon Naval Air Station fifty miles away. They joined up in sections of two or flights of four, depending on who was around and who had enough fuel to wait for others.

Luke turned his F/A-18 toward Fallon, and one of the student F/A-18s quickly joined on his right. Luke glanced over and recognized the airplane and helmet of Mink, Lieutenant Rob Stoller. Good student. Aggressive, eager, and capable. In spite of the fact that Mink had gotten killed in the graduation strike, Luke thought he’d done a good job in the school. Luke nodded to him.

Stoller transmitted to him on the secondary radio, “Stick, you up?”

“Yeah, Mink.”

“How about a photo op?”

“What would you like?” Luke asked as he checked his heading and fuel.

“I want me and your airplane, with those purple mountains in the background,” Mink said, pointing to their right with his head. “I’ve got a wide-angle lens.”

Luke looked past Mink to the mountains and nodded. He tapped his forehead and pointed to Stoller, indicating he had the lead. Mink nodded, tapped his forehead, then his chest, taking the lead.

Luke pulled back on his throttle and crossed under Stoller’s plane. He came up on the right side and flew a close wing formation on him. Stoller dug his expensive camera out of the map case in his cockpit. He held up the camera and pointed it at his face covered with a mirrored visor and oxygen mask, and tried to get just the right angle to ensure that Luke’s airplane and the mountains would be in the background. “Almost got it,” Stoller said, but he was right-handed and he was trying to take the picture with his left hand to get the perfect angle, to achieve the kind of picture you might see in Aviation Week & Space Technology. He couldn’t even get his finger on the right button and hold the camera.

He took his hand off the stick and held it with his legs as he adjusted the camera and removed his gloves. He set the camera on autofocus and finally was ready to take the picture. He had taken his eye off the horizon and had inadvertently commenced a slow left roll.

Luke watched with annoyance as Stoller continued to roll to his left. He had rolled nearly forty-five degrees before Luke alerted him. “Watch your roll,” he transmitted.

Stoller looked ahead and suddenly saw he was rolling over to his left. He quickly grabbed the stick and threw it to the right to level out. But his movement wasn’t as smooth as it should have been. His right wing swung down rapidly.

“Level out!” Luke warned as he saw the wing coming and tried to bank quickly to his right to avoid it. By rolling right he threw his left wing up to meet Stoller’s dropping right wing. Their wings collided, with Stoller’s right wing hitting hard on the missile rail on the outside of Luke’s left wing. Stoller’s right wing crumpled and folded in half, causing his airplane to roll sharply right, into the dead wing.

“Shit!” Luke yelled inside his Hornet as he pushed the nose of his airplane down hard and right and tried to get out of the way. As soon as he was clear of Stoller’s falling airplane, he pulled up to get on top of him and began a gentle left turn to stay near him. Luke looked over at his left wing with terror in his heart. “Mink! You got it?”

Mink’s voice was strained and high. “Negative. I’m missing half a wing! I can’t stop the rolls!”

Luke could tell that he wasn’t going to recover. Luke was at ten thousand feet above the desert, and Mink was passing through seven thousand feet. “Eject! Eject!” Luke yelled.

Mink heard him and tried to read his altimeter. Then he realized it didn’t really matter how high he was. He had no chance of recovering control of an F/A-18 with half a wing bent up. He reached between his legs and pulled the ejection handle.

Luke watched as the canopy came off the falling Hornet and silently drifted away from the jet. The rocket motor on the seat fired, and Mink came hurtling out of the cockpit into the dry desert air. The Hornet spiraled downward and slammed into the desert floor.