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‘Fuck off,’ Freddie said. ‘You…?’
‘I bet you tossers a night out in Medicine Hat that I can hit you and you won’t even know where I am,’ I told him. ‘If you can find me and send an accurate grid reference to me before I bomb you, you win. Otherwise you buy the beers.’
‘Game on, crap-hat.’ This was intended as the ultimate insult; they knew I was an ex-Para.
They mounted up and prepared to set off. The next jet was due in twenty minutes. I put my hands over my eyes and started to count, hide-and-seek style: ‘One, two, three…’
‘Hey,’ one of them shouted, ‘we’re not ready yet!’
‘…seven, eight, nine…’
They roared off in a cloud of dust.
As promised, I gave them a twenty-minute start. Then I took off and headed south. It wasn’t long before I spotted their dust trail. I followed them with my optics from a decent stand-off range of about eight kilometres, until I saw them stop on the edge of a depression. It was a good position, but I knew they would move the minute I sent their coordinates to the T-33; we were sharing the same frequency. As soon as I opened my mouth they’d be off like rats up an aqueduct, and it’d turn into a rolling goat-fuck trying to hit the bastards on the move.
It was time to get sneaky.
FACing is a finer art than most people think. A low level jet couldn’t find its own targets. When you were a few hundred feet over enemy territory approaching Mach 1, it was nearly impossible to tell the location of the enemy and, even more importantly, of your own forces. That’s when you needed a FAC, or, as they were sometimes also referred to in-theatre, a ‘Jaytac’-a Joint Terminal Attack Controller (the same thing but theatre specific). FACs and JTACs did the same thing.
As fast jet pilots generally didn’t have any time or inclination to loiter over hostile territory in the low level environment, the FAC’s job was to identify the target, ‘buy’ the bomb and deliver it on-target as quickly as possible.
We popped up to their south and held the Gazelle in a hover so the Pathfinders could see us. Once I was sure they had us registered I dropped behind cover and got Dom to pop up every few minutes in a different position, always to the south of them to draw their eyes away from my intended OP. Our little game of cat and mouse was on…
‘If they guess our next position, you’re going halfers on the night out.’
The colour drained from Dom’s face. The Pathfinders were known for putting it away.
A few minutes later, two fresh jets turned up and checked onto the FAC frequency.
‘Any callsign, this is Starburst Two One and Two Two. How do you read?’
I was quick to get back to him. ‘Starburst Two One, this is Spindle Eight Zero. If you work with me on this frequency and get Two Two to go onto the spare frequency, another callsign will control him later.’
‘Starburst Two One, copied.’
‘Starburst Two Two, copied and changing freq.’
I called Starburst Two One and he confirmed that they were Lockheed T-33 Shooting Stars too, jets older than my father, but good enough for my purposes. I told him that his target was an SF Land Rover, but that I was struggling to find it.
I told Dom to get behind cover then move round the range to the north-west as fast as he could so the Pathfinders wouldn’t know where we were.
They would be looking for us in the south and after that call they’d assume I couldn’t see them and hopefully sit still.
I switched to the spare frequency so the Pathfinders couldn’t hear us and contacted Starburst Two Two.
Freddie fucking Mercury would be listening out on the other frequency for me to send his coordinates to Starburst Two One, not having a clue I was actually working both jets.
‘Starburst Two Two, this is Spindle Eight Zero.’ I gave him Freddie’s coordinates first. North five-zero, three-five, zero-five, decimal six-six. West one-one-zero, four-eight, four-five, decimal niner-zero.’ Then his height: ‘Seven-six-zero metres.’
I told him the target was a Special Forces Land Rover.
I’d get the T-33 to attack from over the ridge behind them. If I did it right, they wouldn’t even see it coming.
I continued into the microphone: ‘Mandatory attack heading, two-one-zero degrees magnetic. Friendly helicopter, four point three kilometres north-west.’ He now knew where I was and, after all, we didn’t want a blue-on-blue, a friendly fire incident…
I couldn’t use my laser on the target for fear of blinding them, so called ‘Negative Lima’, which signalled as much to the T-33 pilot.
‘Readback,’ I said. He read the attack back perfectly. I pictured him turning onto this attack run.
‘Call when ready,’ I said.
A moment later, he signalled he was.
I flipped frequency back to the one the Pathfinders were on for a few seconds to put them off the scent that I was working Starburst Two Two on another frequency. I called Starburst Two One, letting him know that I had found the Land Rover to my north, but needed a few more minutes to get the exact coordinates. Without the correct coordinates they’d be too cool to run just yet.
I flipped the frequency back.
All being well, the Pathfinders would still be looking south just as we were arriving in the north-west.
‘Starburst Two Two, running in…’
Dom pulled us into our new OP. I could see the Land Rover to the east-south-east of us-4.3 klicks away. Perfect.
A quick glance to the left and I saw the T-33 a couple of hundred feet off the deck. It could do 570 but had throttled back to about 400 knots-which still looked fast.
‘Your target is an SF Land Rover,’ I said. ‘Twelve o’clock, four miles is a depression, a wadi, running right-left. Call when visual.’
A momentary pause, then: ‘My target is a Land Rover. Visual with wadi, sir.’
I kept talking. ‘Short of the wadi is a scar on the ground. Long of the wadi is a track running away from it.’
‘I have a white scar short and can see an online track dropping into the wadi,’ Starburst Two Two said. He was homing in nicely. The Pathfinders, meanwhile, would still be waiting for me to give their coordinates to Starburst Two One on the other frequency.
I continued the talk-on, drawing the pilot’s eyes ever closer to the target. ‘Twelve o’clock, two miles, track. Target Land Rover is on that track, blind to you. Your side of the wadi. Caution late acquisition.’ I was warning him that he would acquire the Land Rover late because it would be blind to him on a reverse slope.
‘Got the track dropping into the wadi, possible late acquisition,’ he acknowledged.
‘The target Land Rover has started moving south-west.’
The Pathfinders had cottoned on and were making a break for it. They must have heard the aircraft.
The T-33 began to climb.
I gave Starburst Two Two another steer. ‘Twelve o’clock, one mile, dust trail.’
He replied almost instantly. ‘Tally target, one vehicle heading south-west.’
He had the target and began to dive directly at it.
The final confirmation I needed was unique and swift: ‘Target crossing the bridge now.’
I waited until I was 100 per cent sure he was pointing at the Pathfinders. ‘Starburst Two Two, you are clear dry on that target.’ ‘Dry’ was the command to practise a bomb-drop but not to release any actual munitions.
‘Clear dry, sir.’
As he passed over the top we heard the distinctive beep of him simulating a bomb drop off the rails.
‘Starburst Two Two, this is Spindle Eight Zero. That’s a Delta Hotel. You are cleared back onto the original frequency.’
‘Starburst Two Two, good control, changing freq…’
I took over the controls of the Gazelle, changed back onto the original frequency and flew directly at the Pathfinders. I keyed the microphone. ‘See you guys in Medicine Hat. Looks like you’re buying…’
They gave me the two-fingered salute as we passed overhead.
FACING TOMMO (#ulink_f52f8466-3f46-5b9e-9e8b-cd647c5252e8)
I only had one place left to look. I told Andy that the tanks had to be hiding behind the small hillock in the dry wadi bed.
‘Easier said than done…’
Andy wasn’t wrong. We’d been up here training with Striker armoured fighting vehicles a couple of days before and the terrain was distinctly unfriendly: a network of narrow valleys cutting through steep-sided hills. The Strikers had fired their wire-guided anti-tank missiles from the ridgelines as we brought in fast jets. It was like a giant game of splat-the-rat. If we got pinged, we’d have to come to a hover, spot turn and fly back the way we’d come.
‘If we get caught here, the tanks will kill us. Keep it low and slow and use the pedals to boot us round if you see anything.’
‘Pedals? While we’re still flying?’
I’d forgotten Andy Wawn was a brand spanking new pilot.
‘I’ll follow you through on the controls and take over if we get caught with our pants down. If I shout “I have control” I want you to cut away faster than lightning because we won’t have time to hand over properly.’
I made a mental note to teach him how pedals could assist a turn. It was a tricky manoeuvre that wasn’t officially in the manual-and with good reason. The nose drops and tail rotor authority teeters on out-of-control; get it wrong and the tail breaks away. You’d end up spinning out of control and smashing into terra firma.
Andy flew us up the valley, just below the skyline, fifty feet off the deck and high enough to spin us round and drop the nose without crashing. I held the controls lightly; the light wind from behind us made them slightly sloppy and unresponsive. We both looked anxiously at the bend 500 metres ahead.
We were both expecting the worst. The enemy tanks could be just behind the bend. We’d be so bloody sharp that the boss had refused to come in with us. He was waiting at the mouth of the valley to bring in artillery and fast jets should we get zapped. We’d know if we’d been shot down because the BATUS Asset Tracking System (BATS) box in the back would register a hit and we’d have to land.
With 400 metres to go I craned my neck to the right to see that extra foot around the bend.
I caught a splinter of light to my left, at the periphery of my vision. No sooner had I picked it up than it was gone again.
With 300 metres to go I heard a very light swishing sound. I glanced at Andy. He made more weird noises through his microphone than Darth Vader; it was one of his party tricks.
He glanced back. ‘What?’
‘Look where you’re goi—’
Before I had time to finish the swishing sound turned into a high-pitched screech. By the time I’d turned to see what it was, it had become a blood-curdling banshee wail. I could hear it over the sound of the Gazelle’s whining gearbox and engine, and my helmet’s hearing protection. Whatever it was, it was less than a foot away from me. It was as if the devil himself was running his fingernails down the world’s biggest blackboard…
‘I HAVE CONTROL,’ I yelled, and flicked my head forward again, fast enough to rattle my eyeballs.
I knew then that what was trying to kill us had us so firmly in its grasp that there really was no escape.
We were at thirty knots, with the valley walls pressing in on both sides. The ground was strewn with boulders fifty feet below.
Hundreds of white strands were suspended in the air in front of us, and more were joining them with every passing nanosecond. We were caught in a giant web. The homing aerials on the Gazelle’s nose had been bent back until they were touching the windscreen.
‘SWINGFIRE WIRE,’ I bellowed.
The Armoured Fighting Vehicles (AFVs) on the ridge must have fired a wire-guided missile. As these things shoot down range they spew out a thin but incredibly strong metal wire; this one had been left draped across the valley in front of us. Our blades had picked it up and spun it around the Gazelle, winching us in towards the hillside.
I flicked on the radio. ‘Mayday…Mayday…Mayday…’
As I fought to cut back our speed the screeching intensified then was punctuated by a series of high-pitched pings as the tension in the wire increased. I prayed we wouldn’t lose control of the main rotor.
I was barely keeping us airborne. First we’d been netted; now we were being reeled in. It was only a matter of time before the wires would tighten on the exposed tail rotor drive shaft as it spun at over 5,000 rpm; we were about to be garrotted.
I snatched a glance to our right. The hilltop was too far away; I pointed the nose towards the slope, using a rock as a marker, and shoved the cyclic forward.
Prairie grass ten feet in front of us filled the bubble cockpit. We were going in, head on.
Andy went into Pantomime Dame Mode: ‘I’m too young to die…’
‘Shut the fuck up,’ I screamed back.
With an almighty yank back on the cyclic the nose came up forty-five degrees to match the rake of the slope. I kicked us left a little and dumped the collective lever halfway down. The skids hit the hillside hard and for a moment it looked like we’d stuck solid.
Then we began to slide backwards.
‘Nooo…’ Andy yodelled, but before he could draw breath we shuddered to a halt again.
The rock I’d been aiming to use as a chock was stuck behind the left skid and holding us fast.
My right hand shot up to the fuel cut off lever. The engine whine stopped instantly and the screeching began to fade. I pulled the collective up to slow the blades before pulling on the rotor brake.
Silence.
Andy gave me the biggest grin I’d ever seen.
‘Do you have any fucking idea how hard I was working?’ I said. ‘And how close we just came to dying?’
He just kept smiling like a halfwit.
‘Have you got anything to say?’
‘As a matter of fact I have.’ His expression became instantly serious. ‘Can I have a fag in here? Cos my door’s wired closed and I’m gasping…’
He wasn’t wrong. We were trussed like a turkey.
