A Close Call

It was a day like any other on the flight line. Jammers jamming loads under the wings, fuel trucks fueling and crew chiefs crew chiefing, all under the hot Thai sun.

We got the missions off as usual and while they were gone we tended to other stuff like helping out on the grounded birds, policing up the revetments or just screwing off. When the word came down that the birds were coming home we got ready to recover them.

I had my routine down pretty good. Since 786 wasn’t parked in a revetment sometimes I could marshal it in by taxiing across the adjacent spot and do a sharp 120° turn. I usually got her pretty close to straight. If the other spot was occupied then we would nose it in and spin it around with the Coleman.

As I said this particular day was like any other but it really wasn’t. I was under the fuselage putting the locks on the gear when I noticed a hole in the engine bay panel, the big one just below the afterburner.

The hole was about two or three inches around and looked like small arms damage. It just missed the missile that was hanging there by less than a foot. I showed the crew and within a few minutes we had the panel open.

The engine bay door is really a double layer affair. What looked like small arms damage was a 57mm explosive shell that penetrated the outer panel and detonated before penetrating the inner layer. All of the afterburner pigtails on the bottom of the engine were shredded as well as other damage. The pilot didn’t flinch. He just said, “it’s a good thing I didn’t need the AB, huh?”