in the deadly long-range game of strike warfare, fragments of debris thrown
aloft by the explosion would have surely been sucked into the Tomcat’s jet
engine. FOD. A silly-sounding acronym for Foreign Object Damage, FOD was a
long-standing nightmare for some pilots. It was odd the things they came to
fear, it occurred to him. Each pilot had his or her own peculiar fixation.
Some obsessed about cold cats, the failure of steam pressure during the flight
stroke. Others worried about hydraulics leaks, or the wiring harnesses that
carried the complex electronic connections between the pilot’s instruments and
the avionics black boxes. Unlike most of his peers, Bird Dog had never had a
particular item he worried about. Coalescing in his gut, however, was a
conviction that it was not any one thing so much as a particular accidental
sequence of events that would finally get him. Something meaningless, like a
hydraulics leak. He shut his eyes and shook his head, trying to clear his
thoughts. It kept coming back to him, one persistent thought. Had Alvarez
been conscious long enough that the deadly blades would work their way up his
body to his torso, then his head? Had he had those milliseconds to know that
he was dying in one of the most horrible ways possible on an aircraft carrier?
To Bird Dog, that was the most horrendous thing he could think of–to see
death coming, and to know there was no way to avoid it. “Stop,” Tombstone
ordered. “Look at me.”
Bird Dog opened his eyes and stared at the admiral.
“There are two things you’re going to do. First, you’re going to Sick
Bay. Second, you’re going to get some sleep. If you’re going to make it
through this, it’s better that we find out immediately. Commander,” Tombstone
said, turning to the squadron CO.
“Understood, Admiral,” the commander said. “He’s back on the flight
schedule tomorrow.”
Bird Dog stared at them dully. Back on the flight schedule, back on the
flight deck. Strapped inside a jet with no way out, other than ejecting,
which was as likely to kill him as anything else. Just like Alvarez … a
little faster if he hit the canopy and snapped his neck, a little slower if
his seat launched too soon and flung him into the flaming exhaust of his RIO’s
seat.
How easy it was to die on an aircraft carrier! Somehow, that wasn’t
something that had ever really sunk in, despite numerous hours of safety
lectures and briefings. He shuddered, wondering if anyone else in the
squadron knew how dangerous it was on the flight deck.
Of course they did, he reminded himself. They’d been doing this for
years. Hell, Bird Dog had lost classmates all the way through the training
pipeline. Aircraft broke, pilots did stupid things, and aviators died.
But somehow it’d never been brought home quite as dramatically. It was
one thing to launch with another aircraft and never see the aviator again. It
was another experience altogether to have a young sailor shredded by the
blades of your jet engine. And to know that you were partially responsible.
A picture flashed in his mind, something he’d seen as he’d staggered out
of the Tomcat after the accident. What was it? it was important, he was
sure. Suddenly it came to him.
Across the flight deck from him, perched on the top of a Tomcat, had been
Airman Shaughnessy. He could almost see the jet blast and wind ruffling her
short hair, tossing it over in front of her eyes. Her hair! That was it!
Shaughnessy had been on top of the Tomcat without her cranial on, a clear
violation of every flight deck safety regulation.
Hot anger flooded him. People ignored safety rules at their own peril.
Look where it’d gotten Airman Alvarez. He’d forgotten the first rule of
flight deck survival and hadn’t kept his eyes continually scanning the area
around him.
Bird Dog might not be able to do anything about Alvarez’s death–not
now–but he might be able to keep another airman from dying through her own
stupidity. He stopped abruptly and reversed his direction. He’d put a stop
to her dangerous attitude right now. He finally tracked Chief Franklin down