Trimester Two
Having survived the first three months of Det 2 operations, April began with a flurry of double missions due to some shenanigans up north turning into more than a few 18-plus-hour days as both aircraft were flexed to their max through the mid-month. Stan worked in an opportunity to travel to Seoul for a couple of days of Rest and Relaxation (R&R), giving me some experience in the commander’s slot for 48 hours. Since he would remain in-country for the entire period, I was granted “acting commander” status as a mere captain. Had he left the peninsula, a major would have to be sent from Beale and put on commander’s orders. It didn’t matter if the major had much less experience in the program than I possessed, just that he was a major, as specified in the frag order, to command the Det. I found the additional burden of command was no less demanding than being an operations officer, but then there were no grand decisions required of me during Stan’s absence.
There were a few concerns that popped up mid-month, foremost of which was a pilot sick with the “Korean Crud.” It was respiratory congestion, sometimes lasting for weeks, that strained the flying schedule during this period of max flex of pilots and our two Ladies. I was flying missions every four to five days, which I loved, and Stan even pitched in for an extra flight. Since the Mobile was also the backup pilot, I couldn’t use a grounded pilot in any capacity other than monitoring the ops VHF radio, making me the go-to Mobile on occasion. Finally, we appealed to Beale for a couple of experienced pilots, before sending the ailing pilot home, and gratefully received Majors Jim “Kip” Kippert and Dan David, both with 500-plus hours in the “Deuce” and great guys to work with.
Soon after Kip and Dan arrived, none other than the fabled Ben Rich arrived from the Skunk Works, along with Brig Gen. Jesse Hocker from Strategic Air Command (SAC), for a chat with Stan and a “dog and pony show” of our operations, complete with formal briefings from Stan, me, and Rod on our operations. Somehow, I couldn’t help feeling Stan’s runway exit was behind this sudden interest in the Det.
Ben was Kelly Johnson’s right-hand man at Plant 42 and had taken over the reins of the stealth fighter program, codenamed Have Blue. Not only was he a brilliant aeroengineer but also a very unassuming great guy who kept us spellbound with what he could tell us about the cosmic happenings at the Skunk Works. Both VIPs enjoyed hanging out with the pilots and, for the four days of their stay, we relished their company on shopping trips and bar hopping in the “Ville” as well as dining at the “Black Cat” table followed by dollar poker and rolling some dice at the O’ Club bar.
One day after Ben’s departure to visit the “Sled” boys on Okinawa, Stan departed for Offutt Air Force Base (AFB), Nebraska, for a Det Commanders’ Conference followed by a short mid-tour leave. Since Dan David was the senior major on station, he was placed on commander’s orders, making him the figurehead boss. The first thing he did was corner me and ask for my support and guidance, as the only experience he had at Det 2 was as a pilot. While he had flying experience at all our Dets, he had never been a commander and, as a mission pilot, he had the enviable task of staying healthy enough to fly and Mobile, nothing else! Having assured him I could take orders as well as give them, we developed a close bond in order to keep each other out of trouble for the two weeks the real boss would be away. Little did we know that it would be a very busy half-month ahead.
The day after Stan’s departure, we launched General Hocker and I sensed a sigh of relief from all the Black Cats, in hopes we would return to ops-normal for a while. However, this was not to be as, without notice, a week later, the SAC Inspector General (IG) pulled up to the passenger terminal in one of SAC’s immaculate VC-135s, along with the largest entourage so far witnessed, to administer our Operational Readiness Inspection or “ORI.” In the back of my mind, I pictured them licking their chops at finding an inexperienced commander with a captain for an ops officer!
The first order of battle with the IG was receiving an itinerary that listed the timetable the inspection would follow, starting with an in-briefing from them followed by an in-briefing from Dan and me on our operational capabilities. As would be expected from such a large team as this, only three colonels (one serving as the actual IG) possessed the top-secret codeword clearances to receive our side of the briefing or even enter our vault, while Rod entertained the maintenance inspectors. Another part of the gaggle would be inspecting our admin section and facilities while looking like a pack of wolves watching television as they observed a suit up before a mission. Since this was the highest order of inspection, there would be no invitations for trips downtown, the lounge, or O’ Club for entertainment that might be misinterpreted as seeking favoritism to any degree. The IG was self-sufficient in arranging their matters wherever they traveled around the world. Eventually, the four-day inspection came to an end with ops just missing an “Outstanding” rating due to some nitpicking navigator security write up. They worked hard to justify their jobs but couldn’t argue with our 98.9-percent mission-completion record! The rest of the Det did well above average and we were all relieved to see the backside of their Boeing as they departed Osan.
Surf’s up
Since it was Sunday, the fighter guys back at our “Happiness Hotel” were hosting their weekly “Prayer Breakfast” in their senior officers’ quarters next to Stan’s room at the end of the hall. Far from being a religious event, the very informal breakfast was prepared by off-duty single nurses from the hospital as well as other agency “bachelorettes,” along with Giny, for everyone who could crawl out of bed by 10:00 am following the previous night’s frivolities. Since the Black Cats didn’t enjoy weekends off, like most of the others on base, unless we were flying, Stan and I gladly represented the Det at these gatherings. Although coffee and tea were available, the main draw was battling the “hair of the dog” with Bloody Marys, Screwdrivers, Pineapple Mimosas, and Champagne Cocktails, served with eggs, bacon, sausage, and toast. On special occasions, such as the planned departure of a hotel neighbor, even eggs benedict was not out of the question.
During this particular breakfast, it was announced the afternoon would be filled with a “beach party” on the hilly lawn at the front of the building. Instigated and devised by a happy-go-lucky F-16 pilot, “Rat” Remol, it drew a big crowd of fighter pilots and other officers, including representatives from the medical corps (MDs and nurses), dental corps, JAGs (lawyers), and even the OSI (Office of Special Investigations), to name a few. While the ladies were very fetching in their bikinis, the real draw was the huge speakers emanating ocean-wave sounds, from Rat’s second-story windows, complete with chirping seagulls on a three-hour endless tape! The boys lowered extension cords from the second story that powered three blenders making frozen daiquiris, while a dentist roved through the sprawled bodies on beach towels spread in the grass offering clear plastic cups of iced scotch from a pitcher for those so inclined. The combination of sea sounds, bright sunlight, and adult beverages soon had everyone reliving similar days in their past until late afternoon, at which time the barbecue pit was fired up for an early evening meal. What followed was a Happiness Hotel co-ed hall party that lasted well into the night.
A day later, Stan returned from his short leave as jovial as ever and overjoyed with the ORI results, which had probably earned us a down day, allowing time to recover from the green sand dunes and sunburn! During Stan’s absence, I was glad to welcome two experienced pilots back for their second tours with the Black Cats. Both had been through the other Det gauntlets and had proven themselves to be excellent U-2 “Drivers.” Captains Dan “Bear” Kelly and Dave “Bonz” Bonsi were polar opposites in stature, with Bear over 6 feet and 220-plus pounds and “The Bonz” just squeaking past the minimum sitting height for the Lockheed ejection seat. The standing joke was that we might have to find a New York telephone book for him to sit on in order to see over the instrument panel! For once, we had a full contingent of experienced pilots which would considerably ease my concerns about preparing fledglings for their first operational mission.
On 12 May, Bear and I were briefed into the High-Altitude Sampling Program (HASP) by a civilian scientist from the Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC), based at Patrick AFB, on a rare upcoming Olympic Race mission. These sampling missions dated back many years to the C-model days when a dedicated and deployable Det known as “Crow Flight” traveled the world sampling air, both radioactive and otherwise, along with a vast array of spy missions in aircraft disguised as WU-2s. After nuclear testing went underground, NASA U-2C and, later, ER-2 aircraft would take over the vast majority of HASP flights.
While Bear had never flown the mission, the only two I flew were during my second Det 2 deployment in 1980. On 16 October of that year, China detonated what would become the last “atmospheric” hydrogen bomb test conducted on earth at Lop Nur, their nuclear test facility. The one-megaton device would push vast quantities of radioactive debris high into the stratosphere where it would slowly encircle the world before eventually returning to earth as fallout. While Det 2 was in a perfect location to intercept and collect this suspended material, our numerous Oly Race missions had been only marginally successful with the exception of “Willie” Williams returning with a large enough dose to require serious decontamination. However, during my fini-flight mission on 27 December, we struck it rich during a rather bumpy encounter with a radioactive stratus-type cloud formation that lit up the night with St. Elmo’s Fire. While collecting substantial amounts of particulate and gaseous materials during that 8.2-hour flight, “Dragon Lady” ’331 and I received more than our share of radiation, which required our decontamination upon return, while ’331 would remain hot enough to require several decontamination washdowns. The AFTAC “coneheads,” as we called them back then, were overjoyed with their hot material and would return these samples to their laboratories at Patrick and McClellan AFBs where they would virtually rebuild the bomb utilizing, among numerous other devices, a state-of-the-art electron microscope. In the end, there would be little they didn’t know about the bomb including the yield, detonating material, and even where the fissile material originated!
This one-time mission would not be so harrowing as we were told it was laid on to obtain a simple “background sample to aid in future investigation.” We were briefed on all the additional equipment that would be sandwiched into the tight cockpit to detect radioactivity and capture the particulate materials on five separate filter papers, as well as the five gaseous specimens in small spherical containers called bulbs. The external hardware was encased in a pod mounted to the left side of the Q-bay hatch, just below the cockpit, where the filters would be cycled through, and internally within the Q-bay, containing the bulbs that would be filled, while the radioactive detection equipment would reside in the nose. What ensued was a slide presentation on the activation sequence of each piece of the control heads as we followed along with the Oly Race checklist, followed by troubleshooting any malfunctions. Lastly, we were told the cockpit would be sealed internally, to prevent all external atmosphere from entering during flight, and a full decontamination crew for the pilot and aircraft would follow all the protocols after the landing. At this revelation, Bear and I glanced at each other with raised eyebrows before I interjected into the briefing by questioning the reason behind a decon crew for what was supposedly only a “background check.” The conehead was caught a little off guard but responded that it was purely to exercise the crew while breaking in two new technicians and, unlike hunting the Chinese radioactive debris years earlier, we wouldn’t even have dosimeters attached to our suits. This revelation elevated our suspicion even more and I suggested that, if they hadn’t brought dosimeters with them, they get to work overnighting them from Patrick; they magically appeared six hours before launch!
Since Bear had not experienced this mission, I suggested he fly it with me as his Mobile and he happily agreed. However, as luck would have it, when I picked him up for breakfast the next day, his head was about to explode with Korean pollen, not an unusual occurrence with new arrivals. Therefore, I suited up and, after running several test cycles on the sensitive equipment following engine start, taxied to the runway end and blasted off.
Immediately after raising the landing gear, the automatic air conditioning (A/C) decided to go to full cold, a very undesirable condition to endure at altitude, where the outside air temperature could plummet to -75° C or less! Attempting manual control, as per the emergency checklist, reversed the situation, pumping blazing-hot temperature into the suit, and cockpit, where no matter what I did in manual or auto control, it remained. Shutting off my suit A/C controller only partially eliminated the intense heat emanating from the engine bleed air and, after closing two bypass switches without relief, the checklist called for a complete depressurization of the cockpit, which ended the mission as I dumped fuel in order to get back to terra firma as fast as possible. I touched down in the “flying sauna” after 48 minutes in the air, at least a couple of pounds lighter, with cotton long johns soaked through and a sizable puddle of sweat that flowed all the way down to my boots! Of course, the “Cones” were worried their precious cockpit control heads had suffered damage from the temperatures exceeding 140 degrees with no regard as to how I managed to get their equipment back on the ground in one piece, but the next day a healthy Bear managed to execute his first HASP mission, decontamination drill and all.
About this time, Dan David, having survived a very critical IG inspection as the commander and flown numerous flawless missions, was to interject a little excitement into his rational world back at the Black Cat Lounge. Seems Dan was a bit too chivalrous in attempting to break up a lovers’ brawl between two maintenance techs who had way too much to drink during their afternoon off. When Dan (145 pounds) succeeded in bearhugging the male (220 pounds) antagonist from behind, allowing the female to flee, he became a mere lightweight trailer attachment to the boyfriend, then chasing his true love, at professional linebacker speed, across the cinder driveway and into the street. Hanging on for dear life, he was dragged some 50 feet before the assailant realized he not only had a field-grade officer in tow but a fellow Black Cat as well! Poor Dan finally let go and managed to get the situation under control when he noticed that the big fella had some severe scratches on his face and what looked like a dislocated nose, while the damsel in distress was only sporting the beginning of a black eye. She had apparently scored more style points in the match, thus declaring her the winner in his mind, and, after another 10 minutes, they were well into making up for the night. To his chagrin, the reward for his gallantry was two toeless custom-made snakeskin “Dallas Cowboys” boots, his favorite football team. These high-ticket items had been dragged toes-down for the entire distance of the aborted chase and were now air conditioned!
In great despair, the next day Dan was escorted to the Ville and the custom shirt shop of Mr. Lim whose brother-in-law, Mr. Chun, was a master cobbler who owned a custom shoe shop in Seoul. Dan was reluctant to part with his prized boots, but Lim was a well-trusted merchant used exclusively by officers for their uniform shirts and guaranteed his boots would travel to the big city and back within 24 hours and be repaired to “Numba-Wone Condition.” Dan decided that, since they were ruined anyway, he had little to lose, and accompanied the boys down the street to ease his concerns at Miss Penny’s “Honeymoon Club” for a few drinks.
To make a short story even shorter, the next afternoon Dan returned to Lim’s where he spotted his flawlessly repaired cowboy boots residing in the display window as a lure to sell shirts. The snakeskin pattern was perfectly matched, although probably eel skin or synthetic, with the repair so expertly done as to make the boots seemingly unblemished. Dan was overjoyed and surprised to hear Lim had earlier turned down a $250 offer for the boots, about half of what Dan paid for them. The next surprise was that Lim apologized for the excessive repair bill of $30, including transportation to Seoul and back! Dan gratefully handed him a “fifty” and later wore his “boots with a story” to every Det where he was often ribbed about a lightweight major’s gallant effort at trying to stop a freight train dragging a caboose!
The Bonz
About this time, Bonz was coming up for the first mission of his second tour with the Black Cats, with Bear inching him out by a day due to his Race fiasco. Both pilots had over one hundred U-2 hours in Korea, and were approaching 400 operational hours in the Lady from their other deployments, so it was just a matter of shaking the jet lag from their journey over, brushing up on the frag order while reviewing the routes and departures before they were ready to go. On 20 May, Bonz blasted off into a clear sky and headed for his orbit with Bear as his Mobile and backup pilot. I observed his taxi-out and departure along with Bear’s duties, as I had with every previous take-off since my arrival, making sure everything progressed smoothly for our all-important on-time departure. As he disappeared in a spiraling departure above the field, we headed back to the Det, where either Bear or I would monitor the mission for the next nine hours. About 45 minutes later, I was sitting at my desk in the vault, with Bear in the Physiological Support Division (PSD) recliner reading the Stars and Stripes newspaper, when Bonz transmitted over the UHF with the most embarrassing call a “Deuce Driver” could ever make. He stated he was aborting after joining the most exclusive, yet humiliating, club in the program, the “Strato-Shitters”. His name would now travel around the world, explaining the reason for an abort of a top-secret nationally tasked recon mission as a “Physiological Incident,” usually the codeword for high flyers pooping themselves, although there were certainly other occasions caused by hardware problems. Unfortunately, those with a “need to know” would request the details of the incident so there was no hiding from the big brass. Furthermore, Bonz’s name would be emblazoned on a brass plate where the date and location of the download would be chronicled, before being mounted on the Strato-Shitters Plaque, along with the previous dozen or so proud recipients, where it could be admired by all entering the 99th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron back at Beale.
But for now, it was all hands on deck to save the mission as the recovery team was interrupted during their breakfast to report back at the Det pronto, while Bear headed for PSD to suit up and I took over his Mobile duties. Twenty minutes later, Bonz showed up on final approach and executed a flawless heavy-weight landing, which would reduce the amount of fuel that was needed to be pumped before the relaunch. Red-faced and very apologetic, he deplaned and was escorted to PSD where he was extracted from the suit before gladly reporting to the showers. Doc Hammer, our dedicated flight surgeon, gave him a quick physical before reminding him to adhere to strict dietary requirements the day before the flight and to especially avoid the “Yaki Mondu” vendors downtown. In the meantime, Bear was prebreathing 100-percent oxygen and, as soon as PSD and I set up ’333’s cockpit, he was escorted to the Lady, strapped in, and launched with exactly one hour on oxygen at lift off to complete 100 percent of the mission, thus saving the day and the Black Cats’ near-flawless mission completion record!
The next day, Bonz dropped off a case of beer for the PSD troops that had to clean his suit and learned it had been carefully wrapped in plastic for shipment back to David Clark for possible refurbishing, but most likely incineration! While they certainly weren’t looking forward to receiving that shipment, a new backup suit built to his dimensions was on the way from Beale. He then walked the ramp and apologized to everyone he could find for making them work twice as hard to complete his aborted mission. They all understood and gave him some good-natured ribbing about being trapped in a spacesuit with the “Hershey Squirts.” For his first mission, The Bonz certainly experienced a touch of bad luck and enough embarrassment for a lifetime in his particular line of work, but he would soon have his chance to resume his affair with “Triple 3” in a couple of days.
The following day, after certifying to Doc Hammer that he had a full gastric recovery, Bonz would become my Mobile/backup pilot for a normal nine-hour mission. His launch and recovery performance was flawless and I had no qualms about scheduling him the following day, 22 May, for the normal mission, as well as a SYERS (Senior Year Electro-Optical Reconnaissance System, or EO) photo track. The Bonz went directly into crew rest after dinner, popped two 15-mg Dalmane tablets, and was off to a dreamless “La-La-Land” for nine hours of restful sleep, never imagining what twist of destiny awaited him.
I woke at 5:15 am that Tuesday, but Bonz and his Mobile, Kip, had eaten breakfast of steak and eggs, in a deserted mess hall, an hour before that in preparation for a 7:00 am take-off. By the time I arrived at the Det, he had just completed his physical and was donning his long johns in preparation for the suit up. Doc Hammer stopped into ops to let me know all went well with the physical and Bonz was fully alert and raring to go. Nevertheless, I stopped into PSD during his prebreathing and had a short chat with him over the intercom as he rested in the red recliner. This was not unusual, as I frequently checked in on the boys, like an old mother hen, before their first sorties and, since Bonz hadn’t completed one yet, this was his second farewell. I was informed several times that the Drivers enjoyed the handshake and thumbs-up prior to their first go.
The normal startup and launch sequence went smoothly as he taxied to the end of the runway for a normal take-off to the west. As the “priority aircraft,” he was cleared for take-off before taking the runway, so no other transmissions were necessary. As he brought up the power to 80 percent prior to brake release, both Kip in his mobile and I, in my vehicle, watched him release the brakes and firewall the throttle, making our windshield wipers dance from her thrust as we followed, some 100 yards behind. He lifted off the runway normally and retracted the landing gear in sequence while rotating to the prescribed nose-high attitude. All was well until 2,000 feet when a huge ball of flame exited the tail of Lady ’333, taking her entire empennage with it! Immediately both the Mobile and I were on the radio, probably blanking each other out, screaming “BAIL OUT, BAIL OUT, BAIL OUT.” Bonz did not need any additional hints since, after the tail departed, he was handling a control yoke that was a limp noodle that controlled nothing as the Lady rolled to the left while heading almost vertically for the earth as she entered a steep spiral. He reverted to his ingrained training and pulled the ejection ring, instantly catapulting the 100-percent reliable Lockheed rocket seat out of the cockpit. This marvelous escape device not only cleared him from the cockpit but corrected his horizontal exiting trajectory to the vertical, away from the earth below, while separating him from the seat and deploying his ’chute, all within a few seconds. Fortunately, both he and the wreckage of Triple 3 ended up in a Korean farmer’s rice paddy, with Bonz sufficiently separated from the burning hulk being fed by 3,000 gallons of JPTS. Luckily, the wreckage fell just short of a small village, although four villagers were wounded by flying debris.
The air force was supposed to provide search-and-rescue (SAR) helicopter support for all our missions, but they were sound asleep at this hour and couldn’t possibly scramble to Bonz’s aid. Once again, Lady Luck was on our side as there was an aging army UH-1H helo just cranking up on the ramp for a trip to Camp Humphreys; I called to the tower to hold them in place until I arrived in the mobile. That particular morning, I had brought along my 35-mm Nikon and grabbed it as I ran towards the Huey, rotor blades in motion in ground-idle. With a short introduction to both pilots, the Aircraft Commander brought the main rotor up to speed and we were airborne within thirty seconds and on our way to the crash site. It didn’t take long as the rice paddy was less than two miles from the end of the runway and black smoke from the burning wreckage was plainly visible from the base! Of course, everyone’s fear of a low-altitude ejection was the possibility of the pilot parachuting into the actual crash site.
It didn’t take long to spot The Bonz, perched atop a piece of strewed wreckage, his gold suit glimmering in the sunlight. While he had survived the ejection with flying colors, his calmness belied the state of shock that showed in his eyes as the Huey crew chief and I helped him onto the helicopter floor for the short ride back to Osan. There, a waiting ambulance and Doc Hammer, along with PSD, raced him to the hospital to be undressed and thoroughly checked over. Thanks to the army aviators, the rescue lasted minutes instead of an extended period in activating our “first responders.” My efforts to change our SAR protocol fell on deaf ears, for the time being, but I wasn’t about to give up on demanding instant response times for all take-offs.
The most critical concern after the crash was locating anything highly classified that hadn’t burned upon impact. It was suspected the ejection sequence at 2,000 feet emptied everything out of the cockpit that wasn’t tied down. This meant the highly classified green card, orbit and photo-run charts, checklists, defensive systems, cameras, and subsystems could have been scattered over a large area and had to be recovered at all costs!
The Security Police scrambled to secure the crash site, but the Koreans were great scavengers and the site was within sprinting distance of the small village. They had to chase a crowd off the smoldering site as they arrived and whatever items of interest that could be hauled off with bare hands had disappeared by the time of their arrival. The mega-million-dollar EO system was installed in the nose but was thankfully destroyed beyond recognition and the top-secret software was not a big draw to the scavengers. Meanwhile, the fighter wing ground pounders swung into action, starting with Public Affairs sending loudspeaker-equipped vehicles into the village and surrounding countryside offering cash rewards for anything from the “Dragon Ship” that fell from the sky. Many made a year’s income with one return. The OSI chipped in with a few enlisted spooks to canvass the area for possible local spies seeking information on anything available from the crash while investigating sabotage possibilities. All personnel available at the Det walked the countryside for days looking for anything valuable. In the end, an eight-year-old Korean boy handed over the green card, orbit chart, and a complete checklist. His reward kept his family for many years to come in Korean “high cotton” and saved the U.S. multi-millions, not to mention the international embarrassment of our activities. The H-Camera chart was never recovered; I often wondered whether it perished in the crash or was on its way north, not that they could do anything about the mission in either case but would certainly give away our areas of interest.
Everyone agreed Bonz was off to a crappy (pun intended) start during this TDY (temporary duty assignment) but he came through with flying colors and we were all relieved he was fully recovered physically, and apparently mentally, after 48 hours of very attractive nurses fussing over him.
Once again, the dreaded Accident Investigation Board was on the way, headed by a one-star, and things would heat up for another month, as what was left of the Lady was delivered to a vacant hangar and then spread out on the floor for their scrutiny. Even with my “half-empty glass” as opposed to half-full outlook on life, I presumed things could only get better for the Det after this AIB was over. Little did I know I should have stuck with my half-empty philosophy a little longer since, as Ernest K. Gann once wrote, “Fate is the Hunter!”
As it turned out, the AIB found everyone remotely involved with the crash of Triple 3 inculpable, even the pilot who was always the prime suspect in any aviation mishap. There was nothing Bonz could have done to blow the tail off the Lady, even if he had tried. Only a malfunctioning fuel control could have caused an over-temp and/or overspeed, sending compressor blades out the side and destroying the engine. Since the Board determined the turbine blades were intact and spinning on impact with Mother Earth, it became very evident the tailpipe had separated from the hot section of the turbine, where it was instantly crumbled by the full power of the exhaust, thereby taking the tail section with it. Case closed (see Appendix 5).
The unique ritual, that I intended to perform only once in my life, was to celebrate Bonz’s survival with his very own “Bailout Cape” during an informal ceremony and party at an outside pavilion on base. The cape was black and showed Oscar’s logo suspended under a parachute with an arch above the ’chute emblazoned with “HAPPINESS IS AN OPEN CHUTE!” Now, only two U-2 pilots sported capes! I was sure Bonz wouldn’t want his cape attached to his suit for his walk-out and return from each mission, which I had religiously done since it was presented to me by the maintainers back in 1979. It had been signed by everyone who cared to over the years and became a personal tradition, even worn above 70,000 feet, until PSD worried it might interfere with the ejection sequence.
After the lengthy AIB was through with her, what was left of Dragon Lady ’333 would be buried unceremoniously at a classified gravesite, just as any black-world spy would prefer. She had been one of Kelly Johnson’s most reliable aircraft and, although one of her countless components would occasionally fail, she very rarely was the cause of an aborted mission. I kept some of her pieces for posterity and to be presented later during retirement ceremonies to those who gave their all to the U-2 Program.
After the AIB lifted our one-week grounding, normal ops continued on Memorial Day with Bonz flying ’339, turning in a flawless flight, followed by another the following day with me at the controls. The old girl was regaining her reliable personality and was worked hard while we were notified a replacement was soon to arrive. Known as a Busy Relay, it was the coordinated effort by several agencies in ferrying a U-2 across vast spans of ocean. The transit required either C-130 or KC-135 aircraft to be prepositioned along the route to perform “Duck Butt” SAR duty in the event of an ejection or ditching. Sure enough, on 3 June, Capt. John Petersen showed up with ’338, third from the last of the original U-2Rs from the Skunk Works (’340 being the last off the assembly line in 1968). She may have been around the block a few times, but she looked spectacular in her flat-black paint scheme with only minimal red lettering and the maintainers couldn’t wait to apply our Oscar Black Cat logo to her tail. The cockpit had fully refurbished instrument panels and even a new black leather roll and pleated ejection seat cushion! She looked like she just rolled off the assembly line while poor old ’339 was getting more ragged by the day and appeared as if she had been “ridden hard and put out wet!”
With the six-month anniversary of my tour arriving in just 30 days, I came to the realization it had been a fairly bumpy ride for the normally smooth-running Det. Therefore, I searched my conscience wondering if any blame was due to my actions as Director of Operations (DO) and concluded none of us was responsible for our run of bad luck. It was also my determination that “Fate” was indeed the hunter over the preceding days and perhaps it wasn’t done with us just yet. With that suspicion in mind, I adopted the philosophy gleaned from the Brits at Mildenhall and Cyprus concerning “stiff upper lips and sallying forth.”
The Bonz was “snake-bit!” This aviation vernacular commonly refers to a pilot who survives a string of bad luck in the air and lives to talk about it. The bugaboo with ’339’s uncontrollable air conditioning, that had existed intermittently since Stan’s excursion into the weeds, struck Bonz right after take-off on 8 June, when it went full hot with any manual correction impossible, and he landed after only 1.3 hours aloft and a few pounds lighter. His Mobile, Dan David, launched in old-reliable ’338 to save the mission for that day. There was little doubt Bonz was having a very rough tour, which was finally confirmed when he came down with the Crud and was grounded. Since it was close to the end of his 70-day tour, I decided he should call it a day at Osan and return to some California “normality” back at Beale; I sensed he was grateful for the break. As none of us ever ejected out of a terminal dive on our first mission, or any other for that matter, and went on to fly under the stress of follow-on operational missions, we had to praise his fortitude. I had asked him, after the accident, if he wanted to go home to take a breather and he vehemently resisted the notion. Despite his slight stature, he was a pit bull at heart which we all had to admire.
Even with the departure of The Bonz, we still had an additional pilot thanks to the Busy Relay and none of the pilots were ever eager to leave any Det, where they could expect to accrue anywhere from 9 to 12 hours of operational experience on each flight. While most of the air force was practicing for future conflict, the high flyers were conducting daily real-world reconnaissance of hostile countries with risk enough to earn an Air Medal for every 100 hours logged.
It was finally time for my R&R and, just before Giny and I departed for Hong Kong, Dick Panzica, known by all as “The Godfather,” arrived as one of our mission planners. He was replacing one of our staff navigators who had some recent problems getting to work on time, even delaying a launch, which did not sit well with the Commander in Chief of SAC (CINCSAC). This major would be returning to his fate at Beale with our bets that he’d never see a promotion again.
Our one-week vacation in Hong Kong was highlighted by a typhoon that hung around for most of our stay. Luckily, our very luxurious hotel was adjoined to other hotels, shopping plazas, and restaurants by suspended glass-walled walkways from which we could observe the deluge outside in air-conditioned comfort. Happily, two days before our return to Seoul, the storm broke long enough to experience all the tourist traps, where we blew considerable cash on two beautiful Chinese carpets, jewelry, and photo equipment. Later, we would have a legal battle on our hands trying to recover our shipment of “communist carpets” in Seoul but eventually prevailed by convincing officials that we were shipping them directly to America.
We were somehow grateful to be back in Osan, where our Happiness Hotel friends received us warmly with Bloody Marys and Screwdrivers at the Sunday prayer breakfast, and the next day we were happily back to work, somewhat refreshed and eager to get on with our oriental odyssey.