every three feet. Proper procedure dictated that he increase his throttle to
push the basket forward along the fuel line by two stripes, which would
position the nose of the Tomcat about ten feet behind and ten feet below the
fat-bellied Intruder tanker. A take-up reel aboard the KA-6D was supposed to
reel in the slack automatically until the basket tripped the pump system and
fuel began to flow. Tombstone guided the aircraft forward until the two
stripes had disappeared. He looked upward at the basket receptacle in the
belly of the tanker above, a circular hole which surrounded the fuel line. On
either side of the receptacle lights were mounted, one red, one green. When
the green light was lit the pumps were operating, but as Tombstone squinted
upward all he saw was the harsh red glare that told him the pumps were off.
“Darkstar, Mercury Leader. Light’s still red,” he reported.
“I copy, Mercury Leader,” the tanker pilot responded. “Try bringing her
forward another notch. Maybe that’ll do the trick.”
“Roger, Darkstar.” Tombstone eased the throttle forward a little more.
He could feel sweat trickling down his forehead. It took a lot of effort to
keep the Tomcat precisely in the groove, and the added strain of the problem
with the pumps made it that much worse. The third stripe disappeared, but the
red light continued to glow above.
“Still no green, Darkstar,” Tombstone said.
“Copy, Mercury One. Back out again and we’ll recycle.”
Once again the Tomcat dropped aft and down while the tanker crew reeled
in the hose and redeployed it again. Tombstone glanced at his instrument
panel and felt his throat tighten. Seven hundred pounds of fuel left. If
this didn’t work there was no way the Tomcat would reach the U.S.S. Thomas
Jefferson for a safe landing. Without fuel the engines would flame out and
they would have to ditch, and Magruder didn’t like the thought of a night
ejection over the rough waters of the North Atlantic this far from a carrier.
It might take hours for an SAR helicopter to find the Tomcat’s crew … if
they were ever found at all.
“What are we going to do if we can’t refuel, Mr. Magruder?” Whitman asked
suddenly over the Tomcat’s ICS intercom. He sounded scared … as scared as
Tombstone felt.
Before Tombstone could answer, the tanker pilot was back on the radio.
“Try it again, Mercury Leader. We’re ready.”
He glanced at the fuel gauge again as he applied more throttle. Six
hundred pounds now. The basket appeared out of the darkness, farther to the
right than he’d thought it would be. Tombstone eased the stick over and began
to line up.
“Mercury Leader, this is Two,” Koslosky called. “Aren’t you done tanking
yet, Tombstone?”
“Negative,” he snapped back, cursing under his breath. The younger
pilot’s call had made him over-correct. Now he had to back off or risk
brushing the basket …
“Help me watch that damned thing, kid,” he told Whitman. Even a nugget’s
eyes would be useful now. When a pilot started paying too much attention to
watching his target instead of his controls, it was easy to screw up an
approach.
“Aye, aye, sir,” Saint replied. “It’s looking good, real good now …”
The Tomcat slid forward slowly …
A solid clunk signaled a good connection, and the hose rippled in a
perfect sine wave from the contact. Tombstone increased power and pushed the
basket forward, his eyes on the two lights by the basket receptacle. The red
one was still glowing.
“Darkstar, still no green,” he said.
“Sorry about that, Mercury Leader,” the tanker pilot responded.
“Goddamned thing must be Tango Uniform.” That was maintenance slang for “tits
up”–out of order. “Look, we’re pretty far from the Big J. Back her off
while I reverse left and we can try again.”
“Negative, negative,” Tombstone responded angrily. It would take two
minutes to turn around, maybe longer, and he was down to less than four
hundred pounds of fuel. He wasn’t going to waste valuable time waiting for
the tanker to get comfortable on a heading for home … not when every minute
brought him closer to a flame-out. “Let’s recycle one more time, Darkstar.”