I can't believe the massive majority of this base that is here solely to support the flying operations. It seems from the moment we wake up until the moment we go to bed, we're surrounded by other people who are also deployed, who are working 12 hour days, who are away from their families, and who are doing everything but flying.
At 4:00 hours to take off we get a phone call from the step desk, telling us our callsign, flight duration, and whether or not we're going fishing. At 3:15 hours to takeoff, a van driven by an airman shows up at the front door to our dorm. At 3:10 we arrive at Aircrew Flight Equipment and an airman issues us our helmets, survival radios, and any other fishing gear we need. At 3:00 we arrive at the squadron and start paperwork. At 2:30 we go into the vault and get our intel brief, by an airman. At 2:15 a sergeant gives us more classified fishing gear, and explains how to use it if it's something we're not used to. At 2:05 I say CYA to Curlee (he's the one who called us an hour ago) and we do our secret handshake. At 2:00 another airman driving a van shows up out front and we load up. At 1:55 we stop at the flight kitchen and pick up our meals. At 1:40 we clear security onto the flightline, and an airman with a gun checks our badges.
1:30 we arrive at the jet; Traver starts getting the brief from the crew chiefs, who are airmen, and I head upstairs to start doing what I do. At 0:30 we start engines. Once we're started up and on time, we're within twenty minutes to takeoff; the crew chiefs give us one last look over, unplug their headsets from the nosegear, and one walks about 75 yards in front of the jet and stands at parade rest. I grab a quick taxi clearance, confirm the door light is out, ring the crew bell, and call the checklist complete.
"Ready to go?"
"Ready."
I flash the taxi light. The crew chief moves from parade rest to attention, and then starts marshaling forward. Traver juices the power to about 50% (we're heavy), I stick my head out the window to make sure we won't flip any trucks, we move forward and turn out of park. When the plane hits 45 degrees through the turn, the crew chief snaps back to attention, and salutes. I stop everything I'm doing and focus on nothing but the crew chief; I salute back, and hold it for a second. Then it's on to the next checklist. "Hydraulic pressure brakes and steering."
At about that time the crew chief drops his salute and starts walking off, fading from view. And that signifies one complete cycle of hundreds of people working 12 hour shifts on the ground to get one plane in the air.
When I was a freshman in college our detachment commander was telling us about flying one day. He gave the exact same elaborate speech that I just gave, step by step, and ended it with the salute. This really fired me up as a teenager. I know this because I wrote about it on January 28th, 2012.
The speech was about respect and how when you're a pilot you get saluted by an enlisted airman who is partially responsible for the success of your plane getting off the ground. The process goes like this... He walks up to the edge of the line after you get your engines started. Once pretaxi checklist is complete, your marashaller will stand at attention and salute you. From the cockpit, you salute back. The marshaller drops his salute, moves to parade rest, and gives you an enthusiastic thumbs up. This essentially means, "Sir, have a great flight."
And now, it's every day.
I had an IFE (inflight emergency) yesterday. This was my third time declaring an emergency, and first time squawking 7700 (we usually don't but Kuwait told us to). We were doing a pretty standard mission, and had just rendezvoused with an E-3.
A full bird Colonel was on the flight; they never get to fly anymore (that's not our fault, we all make choices) so once every couple of months they get lucky and can clear their schedules and get added to a line. It's really a huge pain in the ass for whatever crew get's unlucky enough to get stuck with him. The common analogy is flying with a 7-year-old in the right seat; they just wanna touch everything and feel like they're a part of it, but they don't have any legitimate flying experience in the past ten years and have no fucking idea what they're doing. I can't believe with all of the safety reforms and "no-rank-in-the-cockpit" briefings we get, this is still considered a "managed" risk and somehow worthwhile (they had their chance to go airline! They chose the Pentagon and a parking spot in front of the commissary!) Just get a guy who never flies but has more confidence than anyone on the entire base, and put him in the seat of an extremely difficult aircraft for a combat mission; all because he wants to.
Anyway, sorry for the rant (but really they wouldn't put a 55 year old ex-special-forces-guy back onto a Seal Team mission just for old times' sake). The Col who flew with us was actually pretty cool, probably best case scenario. He flew C-130's back in the day and recognized that he has no business at the controls, but he still wanted to go flying so he sat jump. Some crews get nervous and start fucking things up when an O-6 is watching them, kind of like being star-struck. Traver and I are not one of those crews. We were on our fucking A-game. Traver and I play varsity, and we like keeping it that way.
Later on, I was flying the rendezvous with the E-3 about 5 miles back and closing. Traver had ownership of the fuel panel and was moving product around in the tanks.
"Hey close the K/T switch, I think we have a stuck valve in 2," he said. I closed it, and started looking at the fuel panel to back him up. He continued messing with it. "Shit I think we just lost 3,000 pounds."
"Python, Whistler. Hey it looks like you guys are venting fuel, that's not intentional is it?" The receivers asked.
If they say it's coming from the left wing, we're done with this mission and our day just got a lot harder. "Whistler Python, no it's not. We were moving fuel but now we're trying to work it," I said. "Can you tell where it's coming from?"
"Oh yeah. It's definitely number 2."
Fuck. So went from suspected fuel leak to a confirmed fuel leak. And it's in the wing, which means it's a structural issue of the wing (we typically try to fly with no cracks in the wing), and it's right above a jet engine burning at 600 degrees Celsius. So this is what we in the industry call a problem.
The checklist for a main tank fuel leak is not something you want to read if you're aiming for peace of mind. "Slow to 255KIAS or lower, this prevents the wing from falling off"..."Limit bank angle and wing loading, this prevents the wing from falling off"..."Land as soon as possible. Remember? Because of the wing?"
We declared emergency and whipped up a clearance back to base. I did a very gradual 180, niiiiiiiice and eeeeeaaaassssyyyy. I think it's the closest I'll ever get to experiencing what defusing a bomb feels like. ("You either do it exactly right, or suddenly it's not your problem anymore.")
We had to land with the flaps at half mast, and at 300,000lbs things like runway length and braking factors come into play. So we dumped fuel. But you never say "dump fuel" over the radio, because the activists who listen to LiveATC.net will start making a bunch of noise when they realize how common it is, and then the media will run with it and grossly misrepresent an entire industry and it's just easier in the long run if you say "adjust gross weight". Everyone knows what it means. It is the epitome of aviation euphemism.
Then we shut down an engine, because of the whole flammable jet fuel pooling and vaporizing God-knows-where you don't want it. All of those systems and EP sims come in handy when you're no-shit trying to fly as smoothly as Godly possible with two throttles at 90%, one at idle, and one cutoff.
But the wing stayed on, and we landed to a parade of fire trucks and fanfare. The Colonel, the group commander, my squadron commander, and the D.O. all shook Traver's hand along with mine, with a sincere "Great job, we had 100% confidence in you guys."
There's a Game of Thrones quote that's really good and poetic. But depending on the circumstances it's more tongue-in-cheek than anything. It's usually thrown around jokingly in the modern age of "warfighting" in the Air Force.
"There is only one god, and his name is Death. And there is only one thing we say to Death: not today."
Some days it's funny. Some days it's not.
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