Flight Of The Old Dog

OVER THE ARCTIC OCEAN NORTH OF BARROW, ALASKA

"Disconnect, seven-seven.

The boom operator hit a trigger on his control stick, and the KC-10

Extender's refueling boom popped out of the nozzle of the jet fuel vapor the receptacle, a small white cloud of JP A B Excalibur below.

streaming away in the slipstream of the B The boomer pulled on the stick, and the boom moved quickly away from the black shape hovering below his panoramic window beneath his toes. He hit another switch, and the boom motored up and automatically stowed itself under the modified McDonnell-Douglas DC-10's tail.

"Clear One-Three to the wing," the pilot aboard the B-1 requested.

The lead B-1 replied.

"Clear to the right wing, One-Three," The B-1 that had just completed its refueling slowed, dipped its right wing, and slid out of view of the KC-10 boom operator.

Just as he cruised out of view, the boom operator got another glimpse of the pylon full of missiles slung under the Excalibur's wings.

"Refueling complete," the boom operator radioed to the co-pilot. He swiveled his headphone microphone away from his lips and wiped sweat from his face and neck. Refueling a B-1 was always hard-even though they were steady platforms, their dark NATO camouflage made it hard to find their open receptacles, even during the daytime.

But these two B-1s were different-very different. Their dark gray coloring was gone, replaced by dull jet-black surfaces. Even with the electrofluorescent aiming grid on the D Excalibur's nose, the boomer had been very reluctant to extend the nozzle into that dark, shapeless void. He knew he had only about a six-foot margin for error before he stuck the nozzle into the bomber's radome-or, worse, through its windscreen.

Even though he had been a boom operator for fifteen years and six feet was a lot of free space to work with, there was always the possibility of error. Two planes flying twelve feet away from each other, traveling at almost three hundred and eighty miles an hour-well, it was easy to screw up.

The co-pilot was giving the off load report to the two bombers: "Kelly One-Two flight, you received a total of one hundred and seventy thousand pounds, about equally divided.

Clear to tactical frequency Clear us for a right climbing turn. "The lead B-1 aircraft commander, Colonel Bruce Canady, checked his left window. "See One-Three out there, Bill?"

Canady's co-pilot checked his right window. At that moment, the second B-1 slipped into fingertip position about twenty feet from his leader's right wingtip, its position lights and anticollision beacon popping on.

"Got him. He's in fingertip."

"Gascap flight, clear for a right climbing turn. Thanks for.

the gas."

"Gascap flight copies. Good luck, you guys. "Canady watched as the huge KC-10 tankers banked to the right and flew above and out of sight of the B-1s.

"Kelly flight, post-refueling checks," Canady radioed to his wingman.

"Two," came the reply.

"Ed, got the Post-refueling message ready?" Canadyaasked his offensive systems operator. The radar navigator had just finished composing the coded message for transmission via AFSATCOM, notifying the Joint Chiefs of Staff that they had received their last scheduled refueling before approaching the continent of Asia.

"Ready to go."

"Send it. Did we get our hourly 'go' message?"

"Received the last one five minutes ago," the navigator replied. "I'm expecting the first fail-safe message any minute.

Just then his Air Force Satellite Communications printer clattered to life. The navigator transcribed the phonetically coded message into a code book, then passed it to the defensive systems operator, the DSO, across the narrow aisle from him.

Together, the officers carefully decoded the message, then rechecked it.

— We got it," the navigator asked. "Cleared to proceed on course to the second fail-safe point. We can expect the 'strike'

message within the hour."

"Confirmed," the defensive systems officer added.

Canady didn't reply. He did a quick station check of his instrument panel, then was silent.

,I'm still betting we get terminated," the co-pilot said.

"I'm hoping so," Canady said. He switched to interplane radio.

"One-two flight, cleared to route formation when postAR checks are complete.

Ex" Post-all checks complete, moving to route. "The second calibur banked slightly right, moving out to approximately a half-mile beside his leader. It was much less strenuous on the pilot to move away from the leader than stay in close formation for long periods of time.

"Confirm receipt of Golf, Tango, Sierra, Oscar, Pappa," the navigator radioed to the wingman's nav, checking to be sure the other aircraft had received and decoded the same 'go' message.

"Copied and confirmed," from the second nav.

"Status, One-Three?"

"One-Three is in the green," from the second Excalibur.

"One-Two is in the green too," Canady replied- Both bombers were one hundred percent ready-no malfunctions, no abnormal readings, no fuel shortages- The mission would be canceled if either bomber had a serious malfunction.

" copy. "To the crew Canady said: — Two good bombers, guys. So far we're a go- Nav, I'm ready to do a TFR check whenever you ARE."He handed his checklist to the INFLIGHT "Rog. "The nav opened sySTEM CHECK TERRAIN-FOLLOWING RADAR S g autopilot selftest navigation, running the automatic terrain-following test.

As the two pilots and the navigator began the systems check, the defensive systems operator began another electronic countermeasures equipment check while listening to the highfrequency radio. As he flipped through transmitters and receivers, running self-tests on the mostly automatic equipment, an "S" symbol blinked on at the top of his computer generated threat receiver scope.

The intermittent signal caught his eye, but he ignored it-the symbol did not return, and it wasn't accompanied by an audio warning tone, probably a glitch or a stray signal from the second B-1. He continued his checks.

A few minutes later the "S" reappeared-this time with a fast, high-pitched warning warble. The defensive systems officer put away his checklist and took all of his electronic gear out of their "self-test" modes back into STANDBY "Pilot," the DSO called over the interphone, "where's the wingman?" i The pilots were beginning to check the second TFR channel.

I "On our wing," the co-pilot answered irritably. "We're doing a A, TFR check. Can it-" The DSO flipped over to the interplane frequency on his radio panel.

"One-Three, say your position."

"Route," came the terse reply.

"Behind us?"

"That's where 'route' usually is."

"Do you have us in sight?" asked the DSO, his voice betraying excitement. He hesitated, then switched all of his transmitters from STANDBY to TRANSMIT "Affirmative," the pilot of the second B-1 replied.

"I see him too, Jeff. "That was from the second Excalibur's DSO.

Something was out there…

"Pilot, defense has search radar, twelve o'clock, extreme range but closing slowly."

"Roger. "Canady wasn't too concerned. The nearest land at twelve o'clock, other than pack ice, was six hundred miles away. "Probably a glitch. Did you say closing, Jeff?"

"His signal is getting stronger," the DSO reported. "I can count a twelve-second antenna sweep now. Moving just to the left of the nose.

" "Moving?Jeff, recycle your equipment and see if it-" "The other DSO sees it, too, Colonel. Either we both got the same glitch, or it's a-" At that instant the computer verified the signal, changing the symbol on the threat scope from " S " to a batwing-like symbol "Airborne early warning aircraft," the DSO asked. "Right off our nose."with a circle inside it.

"A what?" e airborne surveillance."

"A radar plane. Long-rang "Well, what the hell is it doing up over the goddamned North Pole?" the co-pilot asked. "We're thousands of miles from any military base-" "It's locked onto us," came from the DSO.

"He's got us."

"Maybe it's one of ours," the co-pilot asked. "It can't be Russian-we're only a hundred miles north of Barrow. Maybe we should cruise toward him and take a look, or try to raise him on-" "Like hell. "Canady reached down to the center contro console and flicked the running lights on and off, signaling his wingman to rejoin him without using the radios. His co-pilot watched his signal, then searched the sky out of his right window. A moment later the second Excalibur bomber appeared out of the semi-darkness and rejoined on Canady's right wingtip, tucVed in so close the co-pilot was sure their wingtips were overlapping.

,Two's in the co-pilot said.

"Jeff, could he have seen both planes?"

"Probably. Depends on his range, but I'd say yes."

"Those S.O.B-s found us. Out here a thousand miles north of nowhere, we run smack into a surveillance plane…

well, we don't have to let him get a visual identification on us.

he'd the throttle up. The Canady pushed his stick right and inc co-pilot immediately checked that their wingman was turning with them.

'd be turning the co-pilot said.

"He must've anticipated you "He's right with us."the "The signal's turning left toward us. "Canady moved throttles up to full military power.the co-pilot. "Wing "Approaching Mach One," from ndle aft, and the sweep. "Canady pulled the wingsweep handle. Excalibur's long, graceful wings disappeared from view, sweeping back until they nearly merged with the B-1's dark, sleek fuselage..

, Are we putting any distance between him and us"" Canady asked. "He's got the cutoff on us."

"No," the DSO said.' reported. There was no difference "Mach one," the co-pilot n the feet of the plane; only the airspeed and Mach indicator tapes told them they were flying faster than the speed of sound.

Canady's co-pilot checked for the wingman out his window.

"One-Three's moved out a little to get out of the shock barrier," he said, "but he's still with us."

"Signal is moving to ten o'clock," the DSO asked. "We're getting some space between us, but he's heading perpendicular to our course. He'll get a solid visual on us."

"Mach one point five."

"If he didn't know who we were before, he can take a good guess now," Canady said.

"One-Three's still with us.

"Signal almost abeam us now."

Canady looked out his left cockpit window. There, about ten miles off their left side, was a large white transport-like aircraft with a big disk-like radome mounted on top of its fuselage.

"I can see it. Ten o'clock," Canady asked. "It looks like an E-3

AWACS.Can it be one of ours?"

"Look at the tail," the DSO asked. "T-tail or conventional?"

Canady had to strain to see it as the Excalibur whisked past.

"T-tail," he asked. "And… escorts. He's got escorts, two fighters on his wings."

"Russian Mainstay surveillance plane," the DSO said, his voice cracking. "Looks like a C-141 with a radome on top, right?It's the Russian version of our AWACS.It pulls doubleduty as a tanker, too.

"He's going to pull his double-duty right on our ass," Canady said.

"Nav, cleartext a message over SATCOM.Tell them we have a Russian AWACS and two fighter escorts behind us. Give our position and flight data and ask for instructions.

"Already sent.

"We can't keep this up for long, Colonel," the co-pilot put in. "We're behind on the fuel curve and we don't have authorization to cross the second fail-safe point. If we start a second orbit, that Mainstay will catch up to us with its fighters. "Canady unbuckled his oxygen mask and pounded his instrument panel in frustration.-DSO, can you see those fighters behind us?"

"No. All I see is the AWACS-but the fighters won't need to turn on their radars to find us. If the AWACS can see us it can vector in the fighters better than the fighter pilots."

"Can you jam that AWACS' radar?"

"At this range, yes, barely."he follow us?"

"If we ducked down to low altitude, could "The Mainstay has good look-down capability," the DSO asked. "We might lose him if we combine jamming and a hard, fast descent "But then what?" the co-pilot interrupted, "We're still an hour from landfall and we're still not authorized to cross the second fail-safe point. He's got two fighters to look for us.and the fighters have plenty of fuel. We're behind the fuel curve as it is."

"To hell with the fuel and the second fail-safe point," Canady said.

"I won't risk being caught or shot up by those fighters. I'll keep it at Mach one point five until we reach land, then throttle back and hide in the terrain radar ground clutter.

II "Or we can engage those fighters and the AWACS, — the radar nav said.

Everyone else grew quiet. He had voiced the unthinkable-attempt a dogfight with the Russian fighters. The Excaliburs were the first American strategic bombers to be fitted with air-to-air missiles@the attack would be completely unexpected.

"If we have to, we will," Ca nady asked. "Arm the Scorpion missiles, DSO.Let's have them ready Canady looked out his left cockpit window.

Illuminated by the faint glow of the sun just below the horizon was a Russian fighter, cruising directly cockpit-to-cockpit across from Canady, so close to the Excalibur that the Russian pilot and his back-seat weapons officer could clearly be seen. Canady noted the red star on the MiG-31 Foxhound's vertical stabilizer and the four air-to-air missiles slung under its wing. Even traveling over a thousand miles per hour, the massive Russian fighter kept up easily with the Excalibur, flying in perfect side-by-side formation.

"A MiG-31," the co-pilot asked. "Right beside us. "He turned and looked out his right-side window. "The other one is off One-Three's right wing."

"Nav…"

"I'm sending it now," the radar navigator said, typing in a new uncoded emergency message into the satellite communications terminal.

"They got us," Canady said quietly. Silence from the crew, which felt naked, vulnerable. Nowhere to hide, nowhere to run. Their protective camouflage, their weaponry, their terrainfollowing capability, even their speed was useless.