A post over at Lagniappe’s Lair got me to reminiscing about
a friend. Learned a lot from Ras during
flight briefings and debriefings, and in the air. Some of the most important things I learned
from him, I learned in the Bar. After he
PCS’d to Fort Carson for his last assignment as an ALO, I lost touch with him
and didn’t reconnect with him until I saw his book “When Thunder Rolled” on
Amazon. Bought it immediately, and
started reading. It was like being in
the Bar again; I’d heard most of those stories.
A little later, I was reading a blog post somewhere and noticed a
comment made by someone named “Ras”, with a link. Clicked the link and voila’ back in contact. Had a lot of internet and email contact, and
even attended a reunion with him and his Thud squadron buddies.
But the post really triggered a memory of one flight he and
I had together while at Holloman.
Basic Fighter Maneuvers (BFM) are exactly what the name implies, at the most
basic level how do you maneuver a fighter so as to kill another fighter and/or
avoid being killed yourself. It’s not
just pull on the pole as hard as you can.
It’s using your energy wisely, regaining it when you can, using gravity
to enhance the effect. Most of the Lead
In Fighter Training program consisted of BFM rides, and throughout the flying
portion of my career, a sizeable portion of the rides were BFM also, whether I
was in an Air to Air Squadron or an Air to Ground Squadron. BFM skills are critical and very
perishable.
BFM rides involved two aircraft, a 1 v 1, and typically
there were two types of setups. In the
first setup, one jet takes a position 30 to 45 degrees off the tail of the
other and 6000-9000’ away. In a real
world fight, this is a very dangerous position for the person in front to be
in. Once participants are ready, the
fight is started with a “Fight’s on” call and maneuvering commences. The fight typically continues until a kill
shot is taken by one or the other fighter, a fighter manages to disengage
successfully, the desired learning point has been achieved, or a safety factor
is encountered. (Over G, going through
minimum altitude, min fuel etc).
The second type of setup is a neutral setup, typically
called a “Butterfly”. The two jets start
in tactical formation about 6-9K’ apart and the flight lead calls for a turn
away from each other of 45 degrees. At
some point the flight lead calls for the turn in and both aircraft turn back
towards each other for a head on pass.
The flight lead will call fight’s on at some point, typically immediately prior to the pass so
that maneuvering can begin.
This now leads to a decision on the part of both fighter
pilots. Do I want a two circle fight or
a one circle fight? There’s an excellent
discussion of this here ,
but basically, if your turn radius is better than the other jets, try for a one
circle.
 |
| Back in the day, I used to be able to draw a fight diagram much better. My apologies. |
If your turn rate is better than
the other, try for a two circle fight.
I say “try”, because the other guy also gets a vote in the fight. He has to turn in the direction you expect him to otherwise .... I was about to learn how to make that happen.
So, There I was………….* Ras and I were scheduled for a 1 v 1 BFM ride
in Beak Charlie, the closest air to air area to Holloman. Basically Cloudcroft NM was the Western Boundary Roswell the Eastern and Ruidoso the Northern. That
proximity meant we’d have maximum gas for fighting. Typically, when these rides went on the
schedule, they were immediately filled by students riding in the back seats,
however, this time it was just Ras and I.
(He had told the Duty Officer not to allow any students).
Briefing was short and sweet, here’s the frequencies, joker
and bingo fuel levels and a discussion of which BFM setup we were going to use
(Butterfly). We had flown together enough as
IPs that not much else was needed. We
step to the jets, crank up, formation takeoff and we’re in the area. A couple of G awareness turns . (The AT-38B
was getting old and we needed to “tune” our bodies to what the mandated G limit
was, so that we didn’t overstress the aircraft and reduce its lifespan. Must have worked, this story occurred about
30 years ago, and the airplanes are still flying.)
Everything’s ready to go, a quick fuel check from Ras and he
calls for the turn away. I check 45 away
and rollout, snap my head around so as to keep sight of Ras. Got him, we continue on heading for a bit and
he calls turn in. I’m pulling right on
the g-limit, get pointed at him and unload the aircraft to get some speed
back. We’re about a mile out now and I’m
planning for a two circle fight, since I’m a little above him, I plan to slice
down to the left leading the turn as much as I can.
At that point, Ras calls fight’s on
and pulls up and takes a head on gun shot.
At the time, the safety rules prohibited any gun shots with
in 45 degrees either side of head on, so I’d never seen a head on shot. Also, since the guns on most fighters are
boresighted with the aircraft, where the gun is pointed is where the aircraft
is pointed. If Ras has taken a gunshot, the gun is pointed at me and so is his aircraft. Ras passes close
aboard. This has left me somewhat
startled and there’s a pause before I start to maneuver. I roll left and start the pull, expecting Ras
to have done the same which should put him somewhere above my tail pointed
away. I can’t see him and call blind
(another safety thing, if he calls blind also, we knock it off and get altitude
separation). He calls “continue” . I’m in big trouble, he sees me! I’m still frantically searching for him
looking over my left (down) shoulder, when something catches the corner of my
eye. I crank around to the right, just in
time to see Ras swooping down on the back side of his vertical circle. He's gone for a one circle fight, using the vertical and by virtue of being below me and pulling up for the shot, he's lead turned me. When he got to the top of his loop, he was slow and inverted, so gravity helped him turn much faster.
Fortunately, he’s not in guns range yet, but
he’s closing fast. I break back right
and up, trying to force his nose into lag
(pointed behind me), but I’m running out of airspeed and he’s not. I see his nose slide out in front of me and I start
to make out the intakes on the side of his jet (with my eyesight at the time,
that was my indication that he was about 2500’ away, AKA guns range. With my eyesight now, I think he'd be in my back seat before I saw intakes). I roll the aircraft till the canopy is about
45 degrees below the horizon and plant the stick in my lap. I’m jinking…Hard. Roll the aircraft again, push the stick forward. Again,
and Again and Again, but Ras is still back there, he hasn’t called any
shots, but I ain’t getting away either.
I’m expecting a knock it off for lesson learned, but no. I’m jinking for about a month and a half
until we get to bingo. Knock it off and
head home.
Back in the debrief,
Ras walks in with a couple of beers, hands one to me and says “Juvat, there
are no safety ROE in combat, and there’s no knock it off”. The he took a couple of sips of beer as he
let me ponder that. He then followed
with “Best Jinking I’ve ever seen, I never got a shot. Let’s talk about how you did that, I want to learn
how.”
I miss him.
*What’s the difference between a fairy tale and a war story? A fairy tale starts with “Once upon a time” and a war story starts with “So there I was”.
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