SO THAT'S WHAT IT WAS LIKE

Okay, I happened to find this 'gem' buried in an ancient, ancient unpublished nautical mystery on a floppy disk (you old guys may remember those) that by dint of imagination and an ancient version of Windows was brought back to life and safely copied onto my hard drive.

People have occasionally asked just what it was like flinging myself off the pointy end of an aircraft carrier.  The following should give you an idea.  The cast of characters is:

Douglas O'Dell - a new Ensign, the lowest of the low.  Also the hero of the story.  He gets beaten up, but in the end he gets the girl.

Ellison Bainbridge - The respected elder with feet of clay and a nasty secret.

Constantine 'Connie' Pappas - The enlisted flight technician with a smile on his face, but don't look too closely at his cold eyes.

Tom and Harrell - the two pilots, about the same age as O'Dell.

The accident - Not fiction.  This is a famous incident - of course, it happened to an E-2B, so it was only famous in the E-2 community, but I still remember the photos in an aviation journal taken from an accompanying aircraft.

Enjoy

                They launched in fifteen minutes. The parachute rigger appeared with the rest of their gear and Doug and the crew struggled into their parachute harnesses - grim nylon and canvas straightjackets always a size too small. They grabbed their helmets, flight bags and a thermos of coffee and headed out into the corridor, joining the stream of people heading up the ladderways to the flight deck. They walked out of a hatch at the base of the island. They were flying number 725. The aircraft was already spotted on one of the forward catapults, wings extended, number one for the launch.
                The ship was turning into the wind and bending on full power. The five of them walked forward, leaning into the stiff breeze. Other crews emerged from the hatches and catwalks, some shambling, most striding purposefully towards the twenty other aircraft on deck. Doug and his crew soon reached 725. The hatch was port side, a third of the way down the long fuselage just below the high-mounted wing. Harrell, the pilot, stayed outside and began his preflight walkaround. The rest of them climbed onboard, exchanging the wind and salty air for the stillness and the acrid smell of nomex and warm electronics. Tom, flying copilot this mission, went forward, settling into the cockpit. Doug, Bainbridge and Connie Pappas turned aft, and walked through the radar compartment into the aircraft's Combat Information Center.
                The CIC was fifteen feet long, a miniaturized version of the Indy's own combat center. Three seats ran along the centerline, each seat made up of a metal frame, parachute and raft. The raft doubled as the seat cushion and the parachute as the back. Strapping yourself into the chair also meant strapping on the survival gear. To the left of the seats ran a wall of electronics. A radar screen faced each seat, along with three UHF and two HF radio panels, computer control knobs, and more switches, dials and circuit breakers than most people see in a lifetime. The external power was connected and the electronics hummed audibly, while dozens of small yellow, green and red lights glowed back at the crew. Doug squeezed past the Flight Tech and CICO positions dumping his flight bag on the ACO's seat, farthest aft directly in front of the 'hell-hole', the equipment compartment, which contained the radio boxes and what passed for a toilet.
                Bainbridge and Pappas took their places. The three of them strapped in, then swiveled their seats to face the blank radar screens, each going through his preflight routine, stowing the pens and pencils, checking settings, testing circuit breakers. Peterson stuck his head out of the cockpit and yelled, "Yellow gear's coming!"
                Doug pivoted his seat back to the centerline and looked out the small window to his right. The deck crew drove a small, noisy tractor up next to the starboard engine and begin uncoiling a long, corrugated tube. They connected the tube to the underside of the engine, then walked away. The tractor's turbine hummed, waiting to blow the engine into life. It was time to put on the helmets. Doug twisted a pair of foam plugs into his ears, then squeezed the hard plastic helmet down over his head. He plugged the headset into the intercom, and listened as Tom and Harrell concluded their preflight.
                "CICO, pilot, how we doing?" Tom called over the intercom.
                Bainbridge switched on. "About finished. How 'bout you, O'Dell? Pappas?"
                Connie flashed a thumbs up.
                "Locked and forward," Doug replied.
                "We're set back here, gents. What's the story up front?"
                "Hurry up and wait. There's lots of scurrying 'round outside, but - no, no, wait - okay, here we go. They're clearing the deck... blast deflectors are coming up. There's the Catapult Officer...  Looks like that Johnson character.  Okay, he's in position.  I'm getting the signal to turn 'em. Here goes the starboard."
                The turbine in the yellow tractor shifted to a deeper whine. The hose stiffened. The big four bladed propeller began turning. WHOOM. . . . . WHOOM. . . . . WHOOM. . . . WHOOM. . . WHOOM. . . WHOOM. . WHOOM. . WHOOM. WHOOM WHOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM. The port prop kicked over, adding to the din, surrounding Doug with a continuous ear-splitting roar. He watched out his window as the deck crew struggled to disengage the tractor hose and the external power line, their clothes rippling in the backwash from the propeller.
                Up front, the hatch opened and Master Chief McChesney climbed onboard. He gave the electronics one final inspection before launch, turned, gave Connie Pappas a thumbs-up, and left the aircraft, shutting the hatch, cutting the crew off from the outside. Then they were alone, waiting to be hurled into the sky.
                This is the time of fear, of ice in the belly as you watch over your right shoulder, out the tiny, streaked porthole, as the mechanics and the catapult crew go through their final checks. You see the tops of their heads scurrying around purposefully, then suddenly they're gone, leaving you with a unobstructed view of the starboard catwalk and the ocean beyond. You can't help remembering all those accident films they showed you down in Pensacola, or how the Grumman Aircraft Corporation, in it's infinite wisdom, designed the E-2 without ejection seats. Doug tested his seat harness for perhaps the hundredth time, and tried working some saliva into his dry mouth.
                Up front the pilots went through their final pre-flight as though it were just another morning on the assembly line.
                "Ailerons?"
                "Clear. Free."
                "Rudder?"
                "Clear. Free. What's with that A-7?"
                "Beats me. Gonna launch him first, maybe. Naw, look, they're just moving him around. Flaps?"
                "Set, one third."
                "Hokie dokie. That's it. You all set back there?"
                "Let’s do it," Bainbridge replied.
                "Okay. . . everyone's in the catwalk. . . we're just waiting for the signal. . . here it comes. . . tension on the catapult!"
                Doug felt the aircraft go nose down, like a sprinter waiting for the starting gun. The pilots advanced to full power. The roar became even more deafening, the twin Allison propellers beating a cyclone across the flight deck. The aircraft shook like it was in the eye of a hurricane.  "Gages normal!" Harrell called. Doug grabbed his shoulder harnesses and closed his eyes.
                "Okay!" Tom replied. "Lets give 'em a - no, no, wait… wait… shit, something's wrong. There's the backdown signal. Dammit! Tension coming off the cat. Coming off power."
                Some snafu. The roar surrounding them lessened. Doug opened his eyes, and stared at the Mediterranean some more. They waited for two, three minutes, then Harrell got on the intercom. "Well, whatever it was, it's been cleared. There's the power signal. . . Tension on the cat."
                They went to full power again.
                "Gages fine!"
                "Roj. . . Salute the Cat O. . . He's touched the deck. . . he's pushing the button. . . here we gooooooooooooo!"
                An invisible giant reached out and smashed Doug in the chest, squishing the air out of his lungs. The aircraft hurled down the catapult. Bainbridge's oxygen mask hung straight back from his seat, brushing Doug's face. A loose pencil flew Doug’s feet. Two seconds later they were airborne, sixty-two feet above the Med, airborne at a hundred thirty-five knots.
                The aircraft dipped slightly, then began climbing to altitude. Doug breathed a sigh of relief, but he did it quietly, so not to activate the intercom - cheating death is a personal affair. Connie Pappas reached out with his foot and kicked open the hatch between the CIC and the radar compartments, giving the dark interior of the aircraft the once over before activating the radars.
                Then came a squeal.
                And a thump.  And Connie Pappas said "Christos!" over the intercom, very loud and distinct as the port propeller wrenched itself free from the engine and buzzsawed through the radar compartment. The big, four bladed monster sliced several feet into the aircraft before its momentum lifted it up and walked it over the top of the fuselage. It traveled across the right wing and flew off into the bright Mediterranean morning.
                Sunlight poured in through the jagged slit behind the cockpit. The aircraft crabbed violently to the left. The right wing raised, trying to roll. There came more sounds, like someone flinging stones against the side of the fuselage.
                "Shut 'er down!" Tom screamed. "Port side, now, 'fore it explodes!"
                His voice jarred the crew into action. Harrell punched the port engine extinguisher button. Ellison Bainbridge flipped on a radio and called out a mayday in as calm a tone as possible. Pappas fumbled for the hand-held extinguisher in case the radar compartment caught fire, and Doug reached up and yanked out the overhead escape hatch, flooding the CIC compartment with sunlight. He stowed the hatch in the space under his radar console, then braced himself for the inevitable wing-over and ditching.
                Only they didn't flip. The propeller hadn't sliced the main hydraulics. Tom and Harrell stood on the rudders, manhandling the aircraft out of the sideslip. The right wing came down. Despite a full load of fuel there wasn't a fire. The crew was going to live for a few minutes more. Harrell began dumping fuel. Tom coaxed the nose up and slowly pulled the aircraft away from the water. It flew upwards in a broad left-handed spiral, greasy black smoke trailing from the ruined port engine.
                Harrell leveled out at 5000 feet. Commander Skomanski was suddenly on the radio. Bainbridge talked to him. There was a lot of reassuring dialogue, a joke, too-hearty laughter. Bainbridge and the Skipper talked alternatives. There was the air facility at Naples, or Sigonella on Sicily - both good long fields. Tom got on the radio. No dice, he said. They were in a slight, but permanent left-hand turn.
                Skomanski asked what kind of control they had. Tom and Harrell began testing. The aircraft had full elevators and ailerons. The flaps were frozen at one third. They could live with that. Rudders were the problem. Two pair of feet jammed down hard on the pedals gave them nearly level flight, but if either of the pilots let up, the Hummer crabbed badly.
                Their options were to bail out, ditch, or try to recover. They were at a good altitude to bail out. It was a maneuver they'd practiced often enough back at Norfolk. About once a month the Parachute Rigger would get a couple padded mats from the base gym and lay them on the hangar floor alongside the entrance hatch of the handiest aircraft. The officers would assemble, then separate into groups of five. The first group would go inside the plane, strap themselves in and wait for the Rigger's whistle.
                When it came they'd pull a special handle on the seats which freed the chute and raft and the little oxygen bottle that was supposed to keep them conscious as they fell to earth. The crewmen would waddle into the radar compartment with the parachute on their backs and the raft tucked under their butts. Someone would throw the lever that 'blew' the hatch away from the aircraft and then they'd jump down three feet onto the mats. It was always good for a few laughs. They always scheduled the bail-out drill late in the afternoon, then adjourned to the Officer's Club. The group that took the longest to exit the aircraft bought the beers.
                Bailing out was a known. It would save the back-end crew, but given 725's condition they needed two pair of feet on the rudders to keep from going into a fatal sideslip. Neither of the pilots could make the jump. Ditching was another alternative. Water landing an E-2 was unpleasant work, and fatal the few times it had been tried, the aircraft having the tendency to snap in two with both halves exhibiting all the buoyancy of concrete. After several minutes of discussion it boiled down to Tom and Harrell trying to get them back on deck. Tom offered to let the three of them in the back end bail out beforehand. Bainbridge declined.
                In the meantime, the flight deck had been cleared - no easy task when you've got nineteen other aircraft manned and ready to launch. Once the decision to recover had been made, the deck crew erected the barricade. The barricade was an over sized tennis net of high-strength steel cable twenty feet high and a hundred fifty long that stretched across the flight deck, strong enough to snare and stop any aircraft that flew into it.
                The pilots motored around in circles for another fifteen minutes, burning down fuel. The backend crew took the time to stow all the loose gear, and fumble through the emergency procedure cards, really reading them this time. Doug kept the overhead hatch out. The warm sun beat down on the top of his helmet. It could have been a day at the beach. He leaned over and looked out his small round window. The Independence was far below, a brown postage stamp on an endless blue tabletop. Doug put his right thumb onto the glass. It covered the ship right up.
                Tom began the slow, circling descent. There was nothing to do in the CIC compartment but sit back and enjoy the ride. The radar dome's shadow passed over Doug's head four, five, six times. The postage stamp below him got larger and larger. Doug could make out rollers, and soon, individual waves. The Independence's wake lengthened as she took on speed, her captain trying to give the aircraft the maximum wind across the deck. Doug caught the glint of sunlight reflecting off the rotors of the rescue helicopters as they took station behind and to the right of the carrier.
                They continued spiraling down. Bainbridge began calling off the altitude - 2000, 1500, 1000 feet. Tom leveled off at 600 feet a mile-and-a-half astern and approached the Independence from the rear, going for a flyby before committing to the landing. First the choppers, then the ship's bridge flashed across Doug's window. Commander Skomanski was on the radio. The gear was down and locked. They were cleared to land.
                Tom paralleled the ship's course for half-a-mile, then eased into a left turn. Harrell called off the last of the pre-landing checklist as they flew abeam the ship. Tom slowed to landing speed and raised the nose as the aircraft banked for the final turn. The controller passed them off to the Landing Signal Officer. They caught their inbound bearing a mile-and-a-quarter behind the ship. Tom spotted the 'meatball', the freznel lens of the landing system and made the standard report "Seven two five, ball, fuel state six-oh".
                "Roj,” the LSO called. “Lower your hook, babes. Bring 'er home."
                The LSO began talking them down. They were at 500 feet a mile out, 400 at three-quarters of a mile. The Hummer overflew the plane-guard destroyer laboring in the Independence's wake. The choppers blew past Doug's window at a half-mile, level with him at 300 feet. The sea was awfully damn close. The surface air was choppy. Up front, the pilots struggled to retain control. The wings rocked viciously as they hit 'the bubble' - the turbulence created by the ship's island. Doug saw a grey-brown mass in the corner of the window. He sucked in his breath, leaned into his shoulder straps and closed his eyes.
                The aircraft pounded onto the deck. It was a good approach, but they were above the flight path. The Hummer missed the arresting wires and slammed into the barricade at a hundred-twenty knots.
                It stopped them the way a kitchen floor stops a falling egg. Movement ceased, except in Doug's inner ear. The cilia went crazy. He was tumbling end over end over end, falling into the sea, drowning, blind, nauseated-
                "Mister O'Dell! Mister O'Dell!"
                "Whaa?" He opened his eyes.
                Doug looked up. Chief Nagroki was framed in the open hatch above his head. There were white clouds in the painful blue sky behind Nagroki. Both the Chief and the clouds were swirling around in rachetty little circles. Doug closed his eyes, counted to ten, then opened them again. Nagroki and the clouds were steadier this time. "You okay there, Mister O'Dell?" he asked.
                Doug raised his hand in affirmation. His other senses were returning. The engine noise had ceased. He could hear anxious voices outside, and in the background, the ocean. Ahead of him, Bainbridge and Connie Pappas were beginning to stir. Tom was suddenly on the intercom. "Jesus H. Christ," he said in a high voice.
                Harrell joined in. "Doesn't seem to be much point in the shutdown checklist, the barricade did a number on the starboard prop. Look, there's the Skipper, up on the bridge. Guess he'll be wanting to talk to us."
                Bainbridge reached over and flipped on his intercom. "Skomanski will have to wait."
                "What for?"
                "Don’t know about you guys," he said, "but I gotta change my shorts."

 

Crotchety Old Rant - Part 2

Well, it seems the Iran war fever has broken for a little bit, our Republican brethren having turned their attention to explaining how Mittens could simultaneously be the CEO and the Not CEO of Bain Capital, and also why The Mitster will only deign to release two years of tax returns.  Contrast that to his father, the late, lamented, George Romney, former Michigan governor and 1968 Republican presidential candidate - yeah that one, the one who came back from Vietnam and said he'd been brainwashed by the military (i.e.: they thought we were winning) - who released 20 years of tax returns without even being asked.  As they say, 'now there was a man.' 

But I digress.

The issue here is The Draft, conscription, whatever you want to call it.  Once in the early '80's I was a computer lab partner with a twenty-something kid in grad school who called it slavery.  This, of course, after I'd served my six and a half years theoretically protecting his lily white ass from the Great Commie Menace.  I nearly decked him, except that he wouldn't have understood why.  And besides, he was bigger than me.

There were a lot of guys in the Navy bigger than me.  And lots of guys smaller.  From different parts of the country.  Different colored.  Different religioned (for lack of a better word).  I served with black guys from the inner city, fishermen from Louisiana, and 18 year old hillbillies who came from so far back in the hollers that they had barely any teeth in their heads.  I once listened to a petty officer first from northern Maine taking orders from a lieutenant (jg) from south Texas and neither of them - or anybody else in the vicinity for that matter - had the slightest idea what the other one was saying.

And this was a good thing - a very good thing.

The draft forced middle class northern college boys like me to work with the sons of southern dirt farmers, New York deli owners, Midwest foundry rats, and the occasional rich brat from Marin County who arrived in Pensacola for flight school driving a brand new Datsun 240-Z (yeah, you know who you are.)   As cliched as it sounds, we were forced to deal with / put up with / rely on each other, to know who you could trust and who you couldn't, who would bend and who would break, who could lead, and who couldn't find his way out of a paper bag.  Sometimes the star was white, sometimes black, sometimes catholic, sometimes a jew, sometimes rich, sometimes poor, sometimes his teeth were perfect, and sometimes he had no teeth at all.

The draft forced young Americans of different classes, races, and religions to work together in an environment of real physical risk - as opposed to, say, an office, where the greatest physical risk is choking to death on your chateau briand at lunch (big shout out right here to Tom Wolfe and The Right Stuff).   Anyhow, you get my drift.   This crotchety old man thinks there'd be a little more respect and understanding between Americans of different classes and political persuasions if they had been forced to spend a couple years working with each other in the military.  And who knows, maybe some Americans would think twice before they talk about shipping our children off to war.