“Take These Broken Wings” (Reprise)
Bashful
I knew what he would do, because it’s exactly what I would’ve done. I also knew how the whole thing would go over with Miles. Like a goddamned fart in church, that’s how. And as glad as I was to see that D was alive, I found myself shaking my head and muttering to myself.
“Fuckin’ A, Miles…it didn’t have to be this way.” My thoughts were interrupted by Happy’s crisp, all-business radio call.
“Sandy Two, Lead will coordinate the rescue from here. Bash, rejoin on Miles, and take her home.”
“Twoop.”
Rejoining on Miles, I got a good, long look at the train wreck that was the remains of her jet. The right vertical stabilizer was completely missing, as was most of the right horizontal stabilizer. I grimaced as I thought about the conversation I was about to have with Miles. Her shit day was about to get much worse. Mindful of her dwindling fuel, I pointed us toward home.
Miles was uncharacteristically quiet on the squadron frequency, but she would have plenty to say after I told her what was on my mind. I took a deep breath and waded in.
“Miles, you’ve got a lot of damage. I’m gonna recommend that we head for the controlled bailout area and give this baby back to the taxpayers.” Every base had a designated area where a pilot could make a safe, controlled ejection from an unlandable aircraft. The words barely cleared my mouth when Miles launched her verbal assault.
“Oh, hell no, Bashful. Hell. No. Even for me, this has been a record-setting day of fuck-ups, and I’m sure as shit not gonna cost the squadron a second jet before lunch.”
I was only slightly more confused than normal when trying to reason with Miles, but it was important to stay on task. Clearly, she was planning to attempt a landing in manual reversion. A few had tried over the years, although that was never the intent of the design, and a few had even been successfully landed. But when it didn’t work out, a manual reversion landing spelled disaster.
We were burning daylight in terms of fuel, so I continued to press toward Davis-Monthan as I argued my case for controlled ejection with Miles.
“Look, Miles…” Getting through to her was a challenge on a good day, stubborn as she was. Today, it would be all but impossible. I swallowed hard.
“Charlotte.”
Nobody ever called Miles by her given name. Ever. When her brother visited a few months ago, we’d learned, to our eternal delight, that our beautiful, tough-talking, hard-as-nails Miles had a girlie name. No one had gathered the intestinal fortitude to tease her with it yet. Now it just seemed like a way to break through that impenetrable will of hers.
“You know a controlled ejection is the conservative call here. Landing a jet in this shape is a great way to get dead.” I was mad as hell at her for being so damn stubborn, but I put supreme effort into softening my voice. “The Scorpions are gonna kick my ass if something happens to you, Charlotte Christman. You’re important to us, girl.”
The frequency was quiet seemingly forever. Then Miles’s voice was much gentler.
“I have to do this, Bash; I need to try. I’ve been angry for so long…too much to prove. You’re gonna see a new Miles, starting today. Now grab the checklist and call the SOF and help me get this wounded Warthog on the ground. I’ve got work to do.”
She paused, as if able to see my slack jaw behind the oxygen mask. I swallowed and tried to recover from the shock her words had dealt. Then she spoke once more, almost as an afterthought…
“Hey, Jacob? No matter what, thanks for everything. You’ve always been one of my favorites.”
Miles
Bashful and I had a moment there, but we’d reeled it back in, and final preparations were underway for landing. Bash walked me through a controllability check, and together we’d determined that a very fast final approach speed of 190 knots would be required due to the extensive damage and lack of hydraulics.
Bashful had also communicated with the SOF to tell her the plan, declare an emergency, and request a single frequency approach. That meant that all of the key players in this emergency scenario—Bash, myself, the SOF, the tower, and the fire department would be on the same radio channel.
Now it was all up to me.
Nathan
I picked up a lazy orbit and kept Deliverance in sight and talking. Jolly was airborne from Gila Bend with two UH-60s and was inbound in less than five minutes. Good thing, too, I thought grimly. D’s voice was steadily losing strength and focus as we talked on the emergency frequency, but his trademark wit was intact.
After directing Jolly on the Scorpion squadron frequency for what seemed like an eternity, they’d arrived and begun setting up for the rescue. Jolly lead directed his number two to hold high and dry while he got eyes on the survivor and selected a landing site.
After some further maneuvering, he landed well away and downwind from Deliverance to avoid injuries from the rotor wash. The crew manning Jolly lead were traditional National Guardsmen and highly qualified for the work that awaited them today in the desert ravine. Each worked for the city of Tucson, one as a firefighter and one as a paramedic. With a couple of decades experience apiece, there wasn’t much the two of them hadn’t seen. Twice.
Despite excellent spirits, D’s injuries were serious, I was told by Jolly’s commander. He’d suffered a compound fracture to the right femur along with disconcerting blood loss, despite his efforts to quell the bleeding. There were many other contusions and additional trauma that would require attention and sutures, but those could wait for now. He was on the verge of unconsciousness.
The crewmen moved rapidly to stabilize and transport him onto a litter and into the imposing helicopter. As I watched from above, in constant radio contact with Jolly One, my weapons officer’s body, appearing all but lifeless, was skillfully removed from the desert floor and lifted into the morning sun toward home.
Miles
I took a deep breath, willing my skittering thoughts to calm, and called the final controller on the single frequency as directed.
“Deliverance Two, emergency aircraft, five thousand feet.”
The air traffic controller’s voice came back, direct and confident. “Deliverance Two, D-M. Radar Contact, ten south of Davis-Monthan, plan runway three-zero. Say your request, ma’am.”
“Deliverance Two, request vectors for an extended visual, three-zero, at least twenty miles.”
I had already logged more time flying a Warthog in manual reversion than virtually any other A-10 pilot, I thought with a wry grin. Surely there was a patch for that? Maybe, in my case, the dumbass patch, I concluded. The very first time a new Hawg driver went through the Schoolhouse, there was one opportunity to fly in manual reversion—at a safe altitude and certainly without attempting a landing. It was unspoken, but everyone knew risking a manual reversion landing when another option existed was foolhardy. The jet was heavy and sluggish, and small errors in pitch or power quickly exacerbated control difficulties. Only a handful of pilots had successfully attempted a landing while in manual reversion with a badly damaged jet. The crackle of the radio snapped me back to the present.
“Roger, Deliverance Two. Fly heading one-two-zero. Advise ready to turn base. The fire department is on frequency and standing by. You are number one to the runway.”
The plan as we’d reviewed it with the SOF was to fly a long, straight approach, giving me plenty of time to extend the landing gear to slow my very rapid 190-knot approach speed as well as to get a feel for the handling characteristics. Bashful would remain close by, chasing me all the way to the runway. He would offer snippets of input without distracting, much like a boxer’s cornerman.
The loss of hydraulics meant no landing flaps, an emergency extension of the landing gear, limited emergency braking after touchdown, and no nose wheel steering. And…well. Let’s be honest, that’s only if I even made it that far. Which was a relatively long shot. My landing would close the base’s only runway, and—if that wasn’t enough—I had fuel for one attempt.
Only. One. Attempt.
If that attempt was unsuccessful, my only option was to fly immediately to the controlled ejection area and punch out. Bash had been successful in convincing me of that, or rather the amount of fuel remaining in my tank had convinced me. I called the tower.
“Deliverance Two, ready for base turn.” My navigation system indicated about twenty miles from the runway. Go time.
The reassuring voice of the controller returned through my radio. “Deliverance Two, D-M final. Turn left heading zero-three-zero. Speed and altitude your discretion. Advise the runway in sight.”
I breathed in and out once hard. “Deliverance Two. Field in sight.”
“Deliverance Two. You are cleared for the approach; cleared to land. Good luck, ma’am.”
I rolled out onto final as I had done dozens, maybe hundreds, of times before, and thanked God for the unlimited desert visibility. Complicating this day with bad weather would’ve made the difference in very difficult and fucking impossible.
A quick glance at Bash confirmed his presence on my wing. I gave him the visual signal to lower the gear. He cheated a little further outboard, neither of us knowing what the jet might do. I lowered the gear handle, added a bit of power, then released and pulled the alternate gear extension lever. I held my breath a little for the umpteenth time that day, treading into uncharted waters, and listened attentively.
I sensed in my gut, rather than heard something happening. A seemingly interminable delay, and then…three gloriously green lights on my control panel indicated three safe landing gears in place and ready for me to attempt landing. One more battle won.
Time to start the descent. The book called for a shallow, power-on approach, but my initial efforts were ham-fisted, resulting in dramatic pitching of the nose. The stick was heavy and challenging to control. Fuck…adding power, recovering the nose. Now…too high and too fast.
One shot, Miles.
Bash’s voice came through the radio, as calm as if we were in the huddle at the intramural flag football game. “Miles. You got this. Small corrections. Focus on the pitch and accept some airspeed deviations to avoid the big power changes.”
I double-clicked the mic switch to acknowledge.
My final approach continued like a drunken sailor reeling down a Manila sidewalk. Bashful hung right with me, calmly calling parameters, as I approached a mile.
Now…less than thirty seconds to go. I only heard Bashful’s calm guidance in my ear as I crossed the threshold of the runway; I struggled to make only small corrections. Almost there.
Too high. Power back.
Pitch back…
Power on and…a hard BAM…oooff. An incredibly hard three-point touchdown knocked the air from my lungs like I’d been punched in the gut. I immediately glanced at my speed. Fuck, I was fast. Now release and pull the emergency brake lever. I had only five brake applications available. Better make ‘em count.
Steering with my feet, I applied the brakes as smoothly as possible, making every effort to avoid a skid.
God, still so fucking fast.
Bash was in my periphery, a scant twenty feet off the ground, right on my wing as I tore through two-plus miles of D-M’s runway far too rapidly. It wasn’t until the fourth application, as I clearly had the end of the runway in sight that I could relax slightly. The speed was bleeding off. My wounded Hawg creaked and came to a stop, at last.
A parade of emergency vehicles and fire trucks converged from the opposite end of the runway just as the shadow of Bash’s jet momentarily obscured the Tucson sun warming my cockpit. On the squadron frequency, he sent a parting shot.
“Shit hot, Charlotte.”
On the tower frequency, Bashful’s every day, dead-calm fighter pilot voice was back. “D-M Tower, Sandy Two request tower to tower to Tucson International, emergency fuel.”