Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 10 (31 page)

 
          
Suddenly a female voice from the threat
warning receiver spoke: “Caution, search radar in acquisition mode,
nine o'clock
,
thirty-seven miles, Patriot SAM."

           
“The Egyptian Patriot got us,”
Lindsey said. “If the Libyans detect the Patriot system fired up, they’ll fire
up their own radars.”

           
“Stepping down,” Franken said. He
hit the voice command button on his control stick: “Set clearance plane to one
thousand.”

 
          
“Clearance plane set one thousand feet,
pitch mode auto TF," the flight control computer responded. Just then the
computer reported, “Warning, Patriot SAM tracking,
nine o'clock
,
thirty-six miles. . . Patriot SAM acquisition mode... warning, Patriot SAM
tracking, nine o 'clock, thirty-five miles...”

           
“Dam it, he got us, he locked on,”
Lindsey reported. “Let’s step it down to five hundred feet.”

 
          
“Caution, Patriot SAM acquisition mode...”
But that brief lock-on, just three or four seconds, was all it took for the
Libyan air defense sites to be alerted. “Caution, SA-10 SAM at
ten o'clock
,
thirty miles, acquisition mode... warning, SA-10 SAM height-finder at
ten o'clock
,
thirty miles...”

           
“Trackbreakers active,” Lindsey
verified. “Let’s take it down to two hundred.”

 
          
“I
didn’t expect to be flying hard TF so far out,” Franken said. “Here we go.” He
issued commands, and the big bomber rumbled down until it was two hundred feet
above the
Mediterranean
Sea
.

 
          
“SA-10 SAM in acquisition mode," the
computer reported.

           
“He knows we’re out here, but he
can’t find us ... yet,” Franken said. “Linds, where are those fighters you saw
earlier?”

 
          
Reeves
activated the laser radar for a few seconds. “They’re on their way now,” she
said. ‘Three aircraft headed our way at six hundred thirty knots, twenty-nine
thousand feet. Less than six minutes out. No identification yet.”

 
          
“Not
exactly burning up the program here, are we?” Franken deadpanned. “So much for
the stealthy approach. We might end up fighting our way in.” There was no response
from Lindsey—and when Franken turned to find out why, he noticed Lindsey
vomiting into her barf bag. He reached across and grasped her shoulder. “You
okay, Linds?”

 
          
Her
eyes were wet with tears—obvious even in the dim red glow of the EB-52’s
cockpit. “I... I don’t know,” she said weakly. “I’m ...”

 
          
“I
need you, Linds. I can’t do this without you.”

 
          
“I’m
so scared,” she cried. “My stomach... I don’t know if I can do this.”

 
          
“Lindsey...”
He waited a few moments while she retched in her bag again; her trembling
fingers dropped the bag somewhere on the center console. She was so rattled
that she couldn’t refasten her oxygen mask. “Lindsey, listen to me—”

 
          
“Warning! airborne search radar in
acquisition three o’clocky forty-seven miles,
MiG-25” the threat
computer reported.

           
“I... I can’t do this,” Lindsey
sobbed. “I’m sorry, I can’t—”

 
          
“Listen
to me, Lindsey—listen to me!” Franken shouted. “If we turn around, the Libyans
will chase us all the way across the
Mediterranean Sea
. When we run out of missiles, they’ll shoot us down. We might make it
out—but our guys on the ground probably won’t. We have to keep going. Do you
understand?”

 
          
“I
don’t know if I can.”

 
          
“You
have to!” Franken said. “There are three guys on the ground who won’t stand a
chance unless we help. But I can’t do this alone, not even with the computers.”
He grasped her shoulder tightly and shook it. “You’ve got to hang in there,
Linds. Just think of this as a simulator ride— a very, very intense simulator
ride. Okay?”

 
          
It
didn’t look good at all. Lindsey’s head lolled back and forth, slowly at first,
then faster, as if she was looking for something. She started to pull off her
left flying glove. “Here,” Franken said. “Go to town—and then let’s get to
work.” He pulled off his right glove and passed it to her. She barely got it up
to her face before the torrent quickly filled the black Nomex glove. Franken
couldn’t believe that tiny little stomach of hers still had anything left in it
to regurgitate.

 
          
Reeves
was hunched down, her head almost between her knees, her hands holding on to the
eyebrow panel for support, as if she was going to puke right on the deck—
Franken thought she might pass out. But to his relief, Lindsey pulled her
oxygen mask up to her face, fumbled and finally snapped the bayonet clip in
place, then took several deep breaths of pure oxygen. Her right hand
disappeared onto the right console, and soon her supercockpit display started
dancing as the displays changed with ever- increasing speed.

 
          
“Scorpions
are ready,” Lindsey reported weakly.

 
          
“How
about you, kiddo?”

 
          
“I’m
hungry,” she said. “Let’s do our thing so we can go home and get a couple
burgers.”

 
          
“Warning, airborne search radar tracking,
three o’clock
,
thirty miles, MiG-25,” the computer reported.

           
“The weapons pylons are making our
radar crosssection as big as a friggin’ barn,” Franken said. “Looks like we’re
going to pop some Scorpions after all.” The AIM- 120C Scorpion air-to-air
missile was the Megafortress’s main defensive weapon—a radar-guided supersonic
missile capable of hitting enemy fighters as far as thirty miles away. The
EB-52 carried four on each wing, mounted on launch rails attached to the sides
of the weapon pylons.

 
          
“Let’s
step it down to COLA,” Lindsey suggested. “Maybe he won’t want to come down
that low.”

 
          
“Roger.
He we go. Hold on to your lunch.”

 
          
“My
lunch is long gone,” Lindsey shot back. Franken shoved the throttles to full
military power and ordered the computer to COLA mode. COLA, or
computer-generated lowest altitude, used both the terrain and cultural data in
the terrain-following computer and combined it with occasional bursts from the
laser radar and air data information to compute the absolute lowest altitude
the EB-52 bomber could fly, depending on airspeed, terrain, obstructions, and
flight performance. The faster the bomber flew, the more aggressively the
autopilot would hug the ground—literally flying at treetop level if it could.
Over water, the computer could take the bomber right down to fifty feet above
the surface of the water—only a very tall sailboat mast could stop them.

 
          
“Threat
report,” Lindsey asked.

 
          
“MiG-25 tracking four o'clock, twenty miles,
altitude ten thousand feet” the computer reported.

           
“They’re trying to get on our tail,”
Franken said. “Let’s do it, Linds. Ready?”

 
          
Reeves
froze for a few long moments, then looked over at Franken. “Let’s do it,” she
repeated. She pressed the voice command button. “Attack MiG-25,” she spoke.

 
          
“Attack MiG-25, stop attack
the computer
responded, offering her the command that would stop the attack. When she did
not respond within three seconds, the computer said,
“Launch commit Scorpion right pylon”
There was a slight rumble from
the right wing and then a streak of light from Lindsey’s windscreen. The
AIM-120 Scorpion missile flew an “over-the-shoulder” launch profile, arcing
over the EB-52, then back toward the Libyan MiGs. The laser radar array
automatically activated for two seconds, updating the Scorpion’s autopilot with
the fighters’ flight path. The missile climbed above the MiGs, then descended
rapidly toward the spot where the missile predicted the MiGs would be at
impact. Ten seconds before impact, the LADAR flashed on again, updating the
missile’s autopilot for the last time. Five seconds before impact, the
Scorpion’s own radar activated and locked onto the lead MiG-25 fighter.

 
          
That
was the first indication—an immediate “MISSILE LOCK” warning—the Libyan pilots
got that they were under attack.

 
          
The
wingmen did exactly what they were supposed to do, executing a textbook
formation breakaway, climbing and turning away from each other and giving their
leader room to maneuver. But the lead pilot—concentrating on the attack, just
moments away from firing his first radar- guided missiles—didn’t react fast
enough, or didn’t believe the indication, or chose to ignore it, hoping for a
lucky break, the two-in-three chance that the attack was against one of his
wingmen.

 
          
The
thirty-seven-pound shaped warhead detonated like a shotgun blast a fraction of
a second before the missile hit the MiG right above and to the left of the starboard
engine nacelle. The MiG-25’s heavy steel hull, reinforced with titanium—the
MiG-25 was designed to fly at nearly three times the speed of sound—deflected
most of the energy of the blast. But the missile still had enough punch to
crack the fuselage, rip open the fuselage fuel tank, and smack the starboard
engine. Running at one hundred percent power, the engines didn’t need much of a
hit. The engine’s turbine blades, knocked out of their precisely engineered
highspeed orbits, shot through the engine case like atomic particles flying
into space after a nuclear explosion; the extreme heat from the engines ignited
the fuel from the ruptured fuel tank, causing a fire. The MiG-25 pilot had only
seconds to react—but again, he was concentrating too hard on his quarry to pay
attention to the warning lights, telling him he had only a few heartbeats to
punch out—before the MiG blew itself into a ball of fire and spun into the
Mediterranean Sea.

 
          
“Good
going, kiddo,” Franken said flatly—killing someone was never cause for
celebration, even if it meant saving your own skin. “You got him.”

 
          
“Thanks,”
Lindsey said—then promptly whipped off her oxygen mask, lowered her head
between her knees, and vomited on the deck.

 
          
The
two remaining MiGs spent several minutes rejoining—they were obviously spooked
by the unexpected threat warning and having to do an evasive maneuver so low to
the ground at night—and then several more minutes trying to locate their
leader. By the time they resumed the search for the EB-52, it had changed
headings and proceeded on course to its target area.

 
          
Within
a few minutes, the picture had changed considerably. Where before it was
relatively quiet, now it seemed every air defense radar in both
Libya
and
Egypt
was up and operating. Lindsey kept busy
steering the Megafortress around a variety of antiaircraft weapon systems, and
every few minutes a fighter radar would sweep past them. They were forced to
stay at low altitude to avoid all the threats.

 
          
“Headbanger,
this is Stalker One, say status,” Patrick McLanahan radioed.

           
“We’re sixty seconds to initial
point, Stalker,” Franken responded on the secure satellite command channel.
Thankfully Lindsey was feeling all right now, because Franken had now run out
of flying gloves—he hoped he wouldn’t have to eject now. “We were chased by
Libyan MiGs a while ago, but we’re clear. Unfortunately every air defense site
in eastern Libya and western Egypt is looking for us, and both sides are on
full alert. We had to go low and stay low, so our time in the box will be much
less. I estimate only twelve minutes until we bingo. Sorry, Stalker.”

           
“No sweat, Headbanger,” Patrick
replied. “I don’t plan on staying very long anyway. We’re in position and ready
for some fireworks. We’re glad you’re here.”