Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 01 (60 page)

 
          
“The
chances of navigators surviving a downward ejection at less than two thousand
feet is fifty percent. If we go below one thousand feet . . . never mind what
the book says . . . our chances are about zero.”

 
          
“But—”

 
          
“Dave
doesn’t have an ejection seat,” McLanahan told them. “After the decision was
made to get a second navigator I requested that another ejection seat be
installed. But there was so much pressure to complete the testing that it
somehow got overlooked.” He tried a smile and flunked. “I’ll make sure the
cross-hairs are on the runway so that the bombing computers help the pilots
land the Dog, get Dave strapped in, then come back upstairs and strap in right
here. I’ll see to it that you two get out if it’s necessary to eject—”

 
          
“Patrick,
you can’t—”

           
“Can and will. End of discussion—”

 
          
“Pat,
we’re fifty miles from
Anadyr
,”
Luger reported. He waited a few moments. “Pat?”

 
          
Wendy
was shaking her head. He figured he should say something else but the words
wouldn’t come. He groped for the interphone wafer switch. “What?”

 
          
“Fifty
miles,” Luger said. “You okay?”

 
          
“Great.”

 
          
“Strap
in,” Elliott called back. “Everyone back on watch.”

 
          
McLanahan
made his way slowly down the ladder, leaned over Luger’s shoulder. Luger was
now in the left-hand radar navigator’s ejection seat, studying the ten-inch
radar scope.

 
          
“See
it yet, buddy?” McLanahan asked. Luger had switched the radar scope to
fifty-mile terrain-mapping display and was adjusting the video and receiver
gain controls near his left knee, tuning the terrain returns on the scope in
and out to search for the runway.

 
          
“Nope,”
he said, moving his uncovered left eye closer to the scope. “Nothing under the
crosshairs. I get a blank scope when I tune out terrain.”

 
          
“Assume
the computers are bad. You should be able to break out a runway within thirty
miles. Just keep tuning.” He stopped down, checked Luger’s straps and
harnesses. “All snug?”

 
          
“I
still don’t want to do this,” Luger said.

 
          
“It’s
my fault you’re even on this plane,” McLanahan said quickly. “It’s my fault you
got hurt. At least I want you to have a chance to get out of it if something
goes wrong.”

 
          
“Thanks,
buddy, but I’d like to think my so-called professionalism helped get me a
ticket on this ride. I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. Well, almost
anything.”

 
          
“Check.
I’ll buy you a beer back at my place,” McLanahan said. “Or a vodka. I guess
that would be more appropriate.”

 
          
McLanahan
thumped his long-time partner on the back, grabbed Luger’s tactical chart and
made his way upstairs, where he strapped himself into a spare parachute and
fastened his seatbelt.

 
          
“Forty
miles,” Luger announced. “Clear of terrain for fifty miles.”

 
          
“We’ll
have enough gas for one low approach,” Ormack said. “We’ve got fuel
low-pressure lights on all four mains. One pass clean, then a left turn into a
visual overhead for landing.”

 
          
“Crew,
listen up,” Elliott said. “If we pick up ground fire we’ll break out of the
pattern and climb out as fast as we can. We’ll level off at fifteen thousand
and go straight ahead until we flame out. Jump out on my command, but if you
see the red light don’t wait for my command. After you land use your survival
radios on the discrete channel and we’ll try to locate everyone and form up.”

 
          
“Thirty
miles,” Luger reported. “High terrain at
two o’clock
. Shouldn’t be a factor. Looks reasonably
clear for a left-hand traffic pattern.”

 
          
“We’re
setting up on a sort of extended base leg, Luger,” Ormack said. “That airfield
will be moving off to your left.”

 
          
“Rog.”

 
          
“Descent
and penetration checklist, crew,” Ormack called out. “We’ve got twenty thousand
pounds of fuel, nav. Approach speed and emergency landing data?”

 
          
Luger
called up the landing data on a computer terminal in the downstairs
compartment. “Two engines out on one side—approach speed is less than minimum
maneuvering speed, so min maneuvering speed takes precedence,” Luger read. “Min
maneuvering speed is one-twenty-eight with full flaps, plus twenty-five with
less than full rudder authority. One hundred and fifty-eight knots. Go-around
EPR setting, three point zero, military power on symmetric engines only.
Touchdown speed one-forty- eight. Brake energy limited one-fifty to the bottom
of the danger zone, one-thirty to the bottom of the caution zone. Max drag
chute speed one-thirty-five.”

 
          
“There
may not be a go-around,” Ormack said, checking the fuel gauges. He continued
the lengthy series of checklists, letting the Old Dog’s on-board computer
display each checklist on Ormack’s display in the cockpit. It seemed the Old
Dog was one huge emergency procedure. Ormack reviewed checklists for fuel leaks
on landing, double engine-out, engine fire, drag chute failure, hydraulic
failure, overrunning the runway, landing on ice and snow, strange field
procedures, ejection and emergency aircraft evacuation. When he finished, Luger
announced that they were less than twenty miles from the Anadyr Far East
Fighter-Inceptor Airbase.

 
          
Elliott
and Ormack began a gradual descent to fifteen hundred feet above the field’s
elevation.

 
          
“Clear
of terrain for thirty miles,” Luger said. “Still nothing on radar.”

 
          
McLanahan
had already double-checked that Angelina and Wendy were secure in their
ejection seats. Now he made his way forward to the cockpit and slipped into the
steel instructor-pilot’s jumpseat. “Need an extra set of eyes?” he asked
Elliott.

 
          
“What
the hell are you doing up here?”

 
          
“Dave’s
got the left seat downstairs. I’ll help you look for the runway, then I’ll go
aft and help Wendy and Angelina with their seats in case . . .”

           
“Patrick, that’s suicide. Get your
butt back to your seat.”

 
          
“Dave
doesn’t have an ejection seat, sir,” McLanahan said quietly. “One of the
details we never got around to.”

 
          
“I
didn’t know . . .”

 
          
“Forget
it. Dave’s as good on the radar as I am. If something goes wrong I’ll try to
make sure Wendy and Angelina get out. Meanwhile I’ll help find that runway.”

 
          
“This
whole deal is still crazy ...” Ormack muttered.

 
          
“Maintain
the element of surprise,” McLanahan said. “We’ve kept the whole Russian air
force off our backs by confusing ’em. This is just the next step.” And over the
interphone he asked, “Dave? Anything?”

 
          
“It
all looks the same,” Luger told him, increasingly frustrated.

 
          
“Keep
tuning, you’ll find it. Remember, we’re setting up for a base-leg, not a
straight-in. Don’t just rely on the nav computers—check shorter ranges.”

 
          
“Rog,”
Luger said, retuning the scope once more.

 
          
“We’ll
stay unconfigured at two hundred and fifty knots until we see the runway,”
Elliott said. “We’ll turn final and check the runway and base and make a
decision to land. Then we’ll turn onto the downwind, configure and—”

 
          
“I’ve
got
it,” Luger suddenly announced.
“Six miles,
eleven o’clock
.”

 
          
“Six
miles?” Ormack said.

 
          
“The
navigation computer must be way off,” McLanahan told him. All three heads in
the cockpit swung to the left. Elliott found it immediately. “Got it,” he said.
“We’re right on top of it. . . we’ll never get configured fast enough. Let’s go
on straight ahead, check out the base from the end of the runway, then make a
turn into a right downwind for landing.”

 
          
“Roger,”
Ormack said. “I’ve got the airplane. You check out the base.” He turned the
cockpit lights down to bare minimum to make it easier to see the runway.

 
          
Elliott
muttered unhappily as the runway moved to his left window. “That runway looks
like the rest of the tundra. Some of those snow drifts out there must be ten
feet high.”

 
          
“No
signals,” Wendy reported. “Still a clear threat-scope. Not even any radio
transmissions.”

 
          
It
was a small, almost obscure base in a mountain valley that reminded McLanahan
of Hill Air Force Base in
Utah
, with snowy mountain peaks peering down from the sky. The most
noticeable feature of the base was the “Christmas tree”-alert parking area at
the end of the runway—two rows of six parking areas for Russian fighters, staggered
on each side so that all twelve fighters could move at once and line up on the
runway. Fortunately the parking areas were empty—more than empty, they appeared
not to have been plowed out for quite a while. Some of the Quonset hut fighter
shelters were partially dismantled, with snow piled in deep drifts everywhere.

 
          
A
big problem was the tiny village nearby, which McLanahan could see out Ormack’s
right cockpit window. It was about ten miles from the base, but a B-52 made a
lot of racket and would attract attention. What the villagers would do about
the noise was another question. Did people in
Russia
complain about military planes waking them
up at night? McLanahan prayed they didn’t.

 
          
“The
base isn’t completely deserted,” Elliott said as the runway moved out of view.
“I saw some trucks parked out in front of a building near the main taxi way.
They looked military.”

 
          
The
crew was suddenly quiet. Ormack started a slow, wide turn to the right to
parallel the runway.

 
          
Wendy
said, “If it’s not deserted, they could have troops there . . .”

 
          
“Fifteen
minutes of fuel left,” Ormack said. “I guess we can make it back above ten
thousand feet for ejection, but that’s all.”

 
          
“If
they had a military force there, there’d be more than just a couple of trucks,”
McLanahan said, liking his logic but not altogether believing it.

 
          
“Agreed,”
Elliott said quickly. “Besides, the runway looked closed and the buildings
looked deserted.
And,
we don’t have
any choice.” He turned to Ormack. “Let’s do it. I’ll take the airplane. Run the
landing checklists.”

 
          
McLanahan
patted Elliott on the shoulder. “Good luck, see you guys in
Russia
,” he said, and made his way back to the
defense instructor’s seat and strapped in. “Next stop, ladies, beautiful
downtown
Anadyr
.”

 
          
“Can
they land the plane on all that snow?” Angelina asked McLanahan cross-cockpit.

 
          
“Not
recommended, but this is a tough bird and those are two tough pilots ...” Big
brave talk, he told himself.