The Day I Flew the F-16

On September 9, 1997, I received a letter from the Department of the Air Force,Headquarters 388th Fighter Wing, Hill AFB:

I decided to write this account of my F-16 ride so that I could remember some of thedetails while they were still fresh, since it is one of my most interesting militaryflights and probably the last.

I wish I’d done the same after the F-4 flight when I went Mach 2; and after the F-105air refueling training flight where my wingman pulled the hose out of the tanker, suckedit into his engine, flamed out and bailed out. There were a couple of others I wish I’dwritten about too: the time when the gun stuck "on" as I pulled off a strafingpass on Cuddyback range in California, and an earlier flight in the F-102 when I came backwithout my wingman Don Hugdall.

Well, I’m not going to make the same mistake this time.

Happy 50th, USAF!

Thursday 18 Sept 1997 was the Air Force’s 50th Anniversary. It has been a year filledwith memorable events. On this day the secretary of the Air Force, President Clinton, theAir Force Academy Cadet choir gathered in Washington and there was a birthday cake. InUtah, the 388th Fighter Wing welcomed Dick Nourse of KSL-TV and remembered POW/MIA’s bywelcoming a returned Vietnam POW (me) to their wing. The BX at Hill AFB treated theirstaff to short remarks from a former Vietnam POW, a pilot from the Air Force Reserves anda WW II pilot who flew missions over Ploesti.

Dick Nourse and I were treated to an hour-and-15-minute ride in the F-16 over the UtahTest and Training Range. At the 4th and 34th Fighter Squadrons and on the flight line, wemet some of the impressive men and women in the Air Force today. It was fitting thatKSL-TV signed off their evening news broadcast by paying tribute to the pilot who flew Mr.Nourse, playing "Off we go, into the wild blue yonder," and showing the take offcombined with video through the heads up display.

Check-In

I checked into the 34th Fighter Squadron at 0730. They had a VIP reserved parking signout front. It didn’t occur to me that that meant me, but it did. An acquaintance waswaiting out front for me. Inside I was welcomed by the commander.

First order of business was to see if I was held together well enough to fly in theF-16. The Flight Surgeon from the 4th Fighter Squadron listened to my heart and lungs andchecked my blood pressure. He looked in my eyes and then ears and asked me to hold my noseand blow to see if the ear drums popped. A clerk guided me through two pages of"have-you-ever questions," then asked me to sign it. Then the flight surgeonsigned it and said, "You can go."

Next I went to Personal Equipment. I was fitted with a flight helmet and then a flightsuit that was too tight around the stomach. This one was made for the athletic type but itboosted my ego when I held my stomach in. A size 11 flight boot seemed okay but I couldn’tget rid of an uncomfortable fold that the tongue made. They brightened things up next withthe Air Combat Command patch, the 34th Fighter Squadron patch with a fire breathing ram’sface in white, red eyes, black background, a red on black name tag, a squadron scarf andsome rank. The oxygen mask fitting was next. It didn’t leak. It seemed to be so tight thatI had difficulty getting air through my nose and it took some effort to get air in and outof it. Flight gloves were last and they were stuffed into a helmet bag with the helmet andmask. I was dressed for the flight.

The was a program at the BX at 0900. We got there about 0850. They had a dozen or sochairs set up in the entrance for the expected audience of BX workers. But my wife came,along with some colleagues from her office, and a few more came in from the squadron. Itwas just a little 50th anniversary event.

There was also an activity at the museum that would have been fun to go to. I listenedto part of the report from an AF Reserve Pilot. I would like to have heard Colonel Stewartwho flew over Ploesti during WWII. But there wasn’t time for that.

Getting In…And Out

Dick Nourse and I were given a checkout in the F-16 egress simulator and hung in theparachute harness and got the necessary safety procedure briefing. The most helpful partof this training was practicing getting in and out of the airplane. If you have big feet,you have a problem.

Getting into the fighter is a little tricky, too. You kind of put this airplane onrather than walk into it. The way we were encouraged to do this was to sit on the canopyrail with feet over the side. Reach across to the other rail with the right hand. Liftyourself up a little and work your right foot into the slot and then the left foot. Don’tstep on the seat. Then you connect to the survival kit on both sides, fasten the seatbelt, connect the parachute to your harness, put on your helmet and connect the radio andthe oxygen. You arm the ejection seat when you get to the runway. To eject, you pull thehandle between your legs.

The flight control is on the right and the throttle is on the left. You control mosthigh tech things with your fingers kind of like playing the piano. There are a lot ofbuttons and switches on the throttle and stick.

Flight Briefing

At the lounge in the 4th Squadron they had lunch for us. Then we had the flightbriefing. It was about 1130? My pilot was Capt. Gordon "Grog" Niebergall. DickNourse’s pilot was Capt. Thompson, who gave the briefing.

Our call sign was "Abuse". Take Off was 1330. Our route was west from Hill tothe Utah Test and Training range then north to the end of the Lake, west nearly to Nevada,south to Wendover and then back east, kind of a square "Round Robin" pattern andthen back to Brigham City, Ogden and land to the south at Hill. We would fly fighting wingformation, separate, and do some rolls and hard turns and pull some G’s. Take off andlanding was 20-second spacing.

After the flight briefing, Capt. Niebergall took me to the next room for our briefingwhich clarified things a bit. When he is flying he would say, "I have it." Whenhe lets me fly he will say, "You have it." my response is, "I haveit."

Some members of my family and Dick Nourse’s met us at the 4th Squadron after thepreflight briefing and we went out to the flight line in separate vehicles, observers inone, those flying in another. KSL had programmed live coverage for the noon news. At 1230we were on the edge of the flight line with the F-16 in the background. The KSL van hadits satellite antennas raised high and a long cable to get to us. It was raining lightly.The newscast caught the excitement Dick and I felt about being able to fly. Dick said itwas the Air Force’s 50th birthday but he was getting the present. He talked with Capt.Thompson about the flight and with me about Vietnam and what I have been doing since. Thenwe went to the planes.

A real priority was given to these flights. We had a backup aircraft, which wasfortunate because some equipment had been changed on our primary but it hadn’t beenchecked properly. So we wound up switching to the backup plane. With all this, the flightlead moved the take off back 15 minutes. I followed Capt. Niebergall through the preflightinspection. He helped me get strapped in. Start up was uneventful but it does get noisy.They fly with ear plugs in.

Taxiing Out

Lead taxied out and we followed. We were followed by the van with our families. On ascreen in the back set of the airplane, I could see the lines painted on the runway andthe plane in front of us. I thought it was pretty good radar, but the picture actuallycomes from a TV camera in the front cockpit which looks out the front windscreen throughthe Heads-Up Display. That way, the Guy-In-Back has a HUD which is actually a"heads-down display" because you must look in the cockpit to see what isdirectly in front of you. From my back seat, I could barely see the wings if I lookedback. You can’t see them at all from the front seat…Grog said it feels like you aresitting on the end of a pole.

We pulled up next to lead in the arming area at the end of the runway. The ground crewplugged in so they could talk to us as they did the final checks and pulled the safetypins. Everything was okay. I armed my seat and we followed lead onto runway 14 and linedup on his wing. He signaled us to run up. The engines checked out okay.

Takeoff…Wow!

The take-off was impressive. Acceleration without the afterburner was more than I haveever experienced (and I remember my feet tending to slide back off the rudder pedals inthe F-4). When the afterburner was lit, I found myself pushed back against the seat andfeeling as if someone was sitting on me. Liftoff was at 150 knots, but I think we wereapproaching 400 knots by the time we reached the end of the runway. Then it was out ofafterburner and a right turn to join up.

We joined lead over Syracuse and headed for the north end of Antelope Island. Weclimbed to 10,000 feet. The cloud bases varied between 12,000 and 18,000. It was a gray,cloudy, rainy day. The visibility was at least 10 miles.

Not As Easy As It Looks

I was impressed with the F-16’s stability…until I took the controls. Then it wobbledall over the place. The side stick moves about 1/4 of an inch and is outside of your rightleg on the console. There is a plate to keep your leg from hitting the stick when you pullG’s. Some accidents have been caused before they did this.

The response to the throttle makes formation flying much easierthan either the F-4 or F-105. The F-4 moved too much with the slightest movement of onethrottle. The F-105 wouldn’t move at all whether you went full throttle or to idle. Welooked at lots of air to ground ranges in the training area, did some intercepts, and flewsome formation changing leads.

Grog asked what I wanted to do. I tried a plain old roll. As soon as we got upside downwe started loosing altitude. The object is to keep the roll rate constant and stay level.I didn’t.

He then asked if I was up to pulling some G’s. He went into a steep bank and pulledback on the stick until I felt like I would break a rib staining to keep from beingcrushed. The G-suit was tighter than any I had felt before. I have grayed out (vision dim)at 5 G’s in other airplanes, but we pulled 8.5 G’s in the F-16 with no vision problems.

These hard turns did make me feel sick to the stomach. I had my plastic motion sicknessbag tucked in my glove just in case I needed it. The instructions read:

"For use during moments of stomach upset). If an upset stomach is anticipated,remove bag from this container and keep ready for use. Do not be embarrassed by thisprecaution as even veteran travelers are subject to occasional motion sickness."

I brought the bag back empty. The F-16 can pull 9 G’s but we had stuff hanging on thewings that limited us to 8.5.

When we got to Wendover I got a good look at the airfield where they trained aircrewsduring WW II (including the Enola Gay crew that bombed Hiroshima) and the racing area onthe salt flats. (They used a similar salt flat in Nevada to set a new land speed record of714 mph a week later.)

Are We Having Fun Yet?

We came to an area with some openings in the clouds. Grog showed me an Immelman: firsthalf of a loop then roll upright on top. We only gained 2000 ft. Airplanes of my day wouldtake 5000 ft. to complete the maneuver. Then he did a split-S: roll upside down andcomplete the loop. That only took 2000 ft., too. In my day we would start at 10,000 ft andhope we didn’t hit the ground.

I tried to follow his example and did an Immelman. I rolled out way nose high and hadto push the nose over to level off. That took some negative G’s and I probably made Grogfeel groggy. The split-S went okay but it always worries me when the nose is pointedstraight down at the ground. I kept pulling on the stick and the nose came throughquickly.

Then I tried a barrel roll: keep the nose 30 degrees off the roll point and have thewings level going through the horizon and vertical at the top and bottom. I didn’t comevery close to doing that.

Time to Go Home

I kept the controls when we left the range area south of the highway between Wendoverand Salt Lake and flew on Dick Nourse’s wing to north of Brigham City. Before enteringinitial approach, lead dipped his wing asking us to cross over to the other side. When wepassed over Ogden, Grog took over for landing. That had been the best part of the flightfor me. The landing was fun too. We pulled some G’s in the pitch out and turn to final.

Final approach was an astonishingly slow 135 knots. (I used 180 in the Thud.) I wassurprised that the F-16’s short wings would give enough lift to fly so slow. Touch downwas at 120 knots and smooth. Getting stopped seemed easy without a lot of brakes andreverse thrust like you feel on an airliner, but we did go to the end of the 10,000 ftrunway and pulled into the de-arming area where the pins were put back in.

When we got back to the ramp and parked, the crowd was larger. Lots of family members.Everyoneone was smiles. It was a fun time. I expected to look like an old man trying toget my feet out of the cockpit and climbing down the ladder. I did it all very carefully.It was a time for hugs and talk. A photographer broke us up to take some pictures. Weshook hands with the ground crew and thanked them.

It was a great experience. With 50 years worth of people to choose from, I considermyself very fortunate to be the one that flew that day. Now I have a picture of me alldecked out in flight gear in front of the F-16 Fighting Falcon. Then there are someaccessories like F-16 scarf, pins, key chain and shoulder patches. I kept the flight planand maps also. They did the presentations back in the 34th squadron lounge. Grog and theF-16 program director signed my certificate, which reads: