Lonely Pilot Bob

(Submitted by Rat)

We had a class graduating this one Friday evening. The featured speaker was a general of some description stationed at Maxwell AFB, AL. The squadron had been tasked to launch a T-38 to fetch him. The weather was fine, the jet was just out of the paint shop and looking good, and the DO had issued a waiver for the IP waiver to land on a 7,000′ runway vs. our normal 8,000 foot runway requirement. On the surface it appeared to be a routine, ‘vanilla’ operation. What could go wrong?

Seems like it was about a noon departure with a scheduled return about 1500’ish.  About 1400 the SOF (Supervisor of Flying) gets a call from Lt. Col XYZ who inquires about the whereabouts of the T-38 scheduled to pick up his boss (the general) to bring him to the event. The SOF tells him the jet is on the ramp and the pilot is probably in Base Ops getting his weather brief and filing his flight plan to RTB (return to base). (The pilot had called upon landing, as required, and had just told the Dispatcher he was on the ground and that the jet was still good. (The Dispatcher assumed the jet was at Maxwell) The general’s exec tells the SOF that he and his general are both standing in Base Ops, they are both pilots and there is no T-38 on the ramp. Mr. SOF now becomes concerned and has the dispatchers put out an APB (all points bulletin) for the missing jet – and tells the generals horse-holder he’ll get right back to him.

As the search for the missing jet is just getting underway, the dispatcher receives a call, “Hey, Sgt. ABC – this is Capt. P.. let me speak to the SOF?”

The SOF gets on the phone and it goes something like, “Are you OK and just where the hell are you?”.

” Well, Sir, I’m fine, thanks. I’ve been down here at Keesler AFB, MS now for about an hour and a half and there is no sign of the general I’m supposed to pick up. The weather is getting worse ( turns out he’d landed on a 6,000′ runway in a TRW ) and I think I need to get out of here fairly soon.

“KEESLER? –  KEESLER?!” the SOF exclaimed, “WHAT THE &%$& ARE YOU DOING AT KEESLER!! THE GENERAL IS AT MAXWELL.!!” And then things kinda went South for Capt. P. from there.

We then had to launch two more jets: one to Maxwell to get the general, and another to Keesler to fetch fly original jet and Capt. P. I can just imagine the cockpit conversations in both jets on the return trips!  

(Submitted by Rat)

The saga began with 8 IPs from an unnamed UPT base located in NE Mississippi hitting the road for the weekend on a T -38 four ship continuation training cross country. They launched out on a Friday afternoon . Seven of the eight were all out of Stan/Eval, Chec Section, and Wing Scheduling. The other was a line IP and my BIP. Everything was going great fine until Sunday afternoon when the 4 ship of Talons arrived on initial arrived at Patrick AFB, FL.

Seems they were on initial line abreast – a formation we didn’t ever fly in ATC. Then they pitch out, in opposite directions! Lead and 4 together followed in 8 seconds by 2 and 3. ‘The plan’ was to then fly opposite direction final turns, rejoining on final for formation landings.

So, Lead extends his perch just a little to give them a bit more time on final to stabilize and 2 delays his turn even further. Their subsequent turns and rejoin on final worked as briefed. Not so much for the second element, 2 and 3.

2 delays his turn to final for spacing on the first element. Then 3 extends even further – too far actually. As a consequence 3 rolls out ‘significantly’ behind 2. Wanting the formation to “look good,” he taps burner to gain airspeed for closure, and picks up way too much “smash” (airspeed). Instead of going around, he overshoots 3 on short final and lands long and Hot! When he gets on the brakes, he blows with tires and grinds down the wheels, closing the runway. It was at this very moment he picked ups he callsign, “Tires!”

Obviously, the chain if command didn’t see any humor in all this and they all the pilots lost their jobs. However , most recovered and went on to good follow-on assignments.

(Of Note: At the time, I was a T-38 Flight Safety Officer at HQ/ATC. The unnamed UPT base in NE Mississippi was one of my bases of responsibility to monitor. So I took the Incident Report when it came in. It took a couple cups of coffee to understand everything – What happened? How did it happen? Why would anyone do that? In their statements one of the 8 mentioned that he could not understand how it happened – he said the maneuver had worked perfectly the day before at another base! You just shake your head, and get another cup of coffee…)

(Submitted by Rat)

Then there was the time I took a couple weeks leave and Capt.S, our Assistant Flight Commander was left at the helm. AT the time we had a student on Special Monitoring Status we were watching. Our DO (Director of Operations) had laid out a handwritten, personalized training directive in the SMS trainee’s grade book. I had carefully reviewed it with Asst Flt CC the day I’d signed out on leave, explaining to him this was “no-shitter” guidance. AT the time, he seemed to understand.

Upon returning from leave I discovered my understudy had taken it upon himself to “John Wayne” the DO’s explicit plan, because he had a better idea what the trainee needed.

My ass got a little tender over that one. The DOs normally glowing sense of humor didn’t quite shine thru in that particular instance. And my Assistant Flight Commander never quite made it to Flight Commander…