Fly Past

26 FLYPAST May 2018

the full sun, nose in the air, before

falling off into the steep glide of

the dive bombing run. I began the

litany made second nature by long

practice, calling off the altitude as

my pilot concentrated on the aiming

point.”

ONE IN FOUR

“A stuttering white flame spat out of

a grove of trees to the left of us, and

a string of seven bright orange balls

rose slowly up

to meet us

• soon

streaking past us, past our wings, past

our canopy. I swear they hissed as they

shot past us, close enough to touch.

Another burst followed a second later,

and then another, tracers streaking by

as we held into our dive path.

“A small but certain lurch a bit to

the left and now we’re pointing at the

cloud of gun smoke in the trees. ‘I’m

on the guns - give me everything,’

[pilot] Ken said, concentrating on his

aim point. ‘This is gonna be ‘one pass

• haul ass’.’
  “I reached for the arming panel and
  pulled down the switches that would

drop our full load of bombs. We were

committed to the dive.

“Only one in four shells was a tracer,

they said. One in four. Still the strings

of bright balls snaked straight at us,

sliding by us, between canopy and

wingtips.

“‘Pickle and pull; pickle and pull!’

The airplane gave a shudder as the

bombs dropped away in rapid order.

Ken pulled hard on the stick and we

knotted our guts against the sudden

VIETNAM WAR GRUMMAN INTRUDER

“Radio contact and 20 minutes of

flying brought us to a rendezvous

28,000ft above a featureless spot in

the jungle south of the abandoned

town of Tchepone. Our airborne

Forward Air Controller flew above

us in wide circles, waiting for our

arrival. He was Blind Bat 22, a

converted transport equipped with

infrared spotting gear. We were his

last sortie before he could head back

to base in Thailand.

“It had been a long night for Blind

Bat, and he was impatient to be

heading home. ‘Okay, we’ve got

some trucks,’ he radioed, when we

were still minutes away: ‘Trucks and

supplies in the open.’ It sounded

almost too good to be true. There

were seldom any clear targets on the

Trail, especially in daylight.

“‘Any guns in the area?’ we asked as

we caught sight of Blind Bat circling

well to the west of the target area.

[He] had seen none since arriving in

the area, and nothing came up as we

got in position for a dive. We took

another turn around the target area

before rolling in.

“The Intruder hung briefly in

To p “Radio contact and 20 minutes of

A-6E 157013 of VA-35 in

June 1978. AUTHOR

Above

A-6E 160424 assigned

to VA-34 in 1978.

AUTHOR

Right

An A-6E takes to the

skies - note the large

fl ap area. KEY