Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 26, 1993 TAG: 9309260228
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: D-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Ed Shamy
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Much of the lore is passed from mouth to ear as fact, polished and passed again.
But what's the truth about those jets, their missions and their pilots?
The Air Force pilots and bombardiers who fly the mountain routes listened to the recurring themes from the mountains and responded:
1.) The jet was so close I could see the pilot, and he was waving.
Capt. Bruno Millonig, at the Seymour Johnson Air Force Base: "If you were wearing fluorescent orange, in the middle of a meadow, jumping up and down, waving your arms, I might see you. But you see me? The inside of the cockpit is dark. My helmet is dark. My gloves are dark. That's for a reason. If he can see me, all I can say is: `Man, that guy's got some eyeballs.' "
Col. Ron Hindmarsh, at Seymour Johnson: "Waving? I very much doubt it. Especially on a low-level [flight], a pilot would have very little time to wave."
2.) Those jets use the dams at Claytor Lake and Smith Mountain Lake as targets. They bear right in on them and then pull up at the last second.
The Geneva Treaty prohibits warring nations from bombing dams because of the potential toll on civilians. The hydroelectric plants often found alongside dams, though, are fair game.
Three low-level military flight paths converge over Smith Mountain Lake; one passes directly over Claytor Lake.
But, said Maj. Larry Coleman at Seymour Johnson, both lakes are avoidance points for pilots, designated as sensitive noise areas.
To think that pilots need to closely approach their targets is an old-fashioned belief.
The F-15E Strike Eagles that were the workhorses of the Persian Gulf War, and that fly occasionally through our mountains, can strike a target from 80 miles away using laser-guided missiles.
"We don't have to overfly the target, and really don't want to," said Capt. Brain Killough, a bombardier in an Air Force jet, who has flown the mountain routes over Southwestern Virginia. "If I get within a mile of target, anybody with a deer rifle can hit me."
3.) They swoop down on a hay barn out in a back pasture at my neighbor's.
OK, OK, it could be true, but not because they're practicing dropping a bomb on the tin roof.
"Dams, bridges, road intersections, even groves of trees make good targets or turning points for us," Killough said. "We'll run in low for the element of surprise to one of those landmarks and climb real quick for a loft-type delivery to a target that's still far away."
If you see a military-type jet pulling up fast directly over a factory in Pulaski County, he may have pretend-fired a missile at downtown Floyd.
There's also an element of optical illusion here. In our hilly terrain, the sight of a diving or climbing jet can be deceptive. Are you on a mountaintop, watching it from above? On a valley floor, watching from below? Has the pilot just reacted to a terrain feature out of your view, or is he preparing to climb to clear a radio tower atop the next ridge? While you may associate his sudden climb with the hay barn, the two may be unrelated.
4.) Those are kids barnstorming around in those planes.
Four years of college, a year or two of training, half a year more in a simulator - it would be extraordinary to find a low-level military pilot from any branch of the service younger than 26 years old. Most are in their late 20s and their 30s. Some continue to fly into their 40s. "These are not teeny-boppers," said Air Force Col. Ron Hindmarsh.
Traditionally, all have been men. That's changing.
5.) They're not even flying those jets. They fly themselves.
The F-15E can fly itself pretty well over flat terrain, but when you see a low-level flyer cutting through the valley in daylight, somebody's flying it - steering, adjusting altitude and speed.
They're assisted by on-board radar and a terrain map on a screen in front of them that shows the jet relative to the terrain and compass direction below.
One of the most difficult things for a military pilot is to keep his hands off when the jet is on auto-pilot. "I don't know anybody who doesn't keep their hands ready," Millonig said.
From the time a pilot in a computer-guided jet realizes there's a problem to the time he's dead "is a matter of four or five heartbeats," Maj. Larry Coleman said. Nobody's flying with his hands behind his head, his feet up on the dashboard.
6.) I've seen military jets fly under bridges and under power lines.
It would be silly to say it absolutely, positively doesn't happen. Hey, it happens.
Chief Scott Mohr, Norfolk Naval Air Station: "Those things may have happened, but I know the rules on these things have been tightened because they can lose their license to fly for doing that. . . . I'm not aware of anybody doing anything like that."
And Col. Ron Hindmarsh at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base says pilots there, too, have specific rules about where and how they can fly - and they don't include beneath any bridges or lines. But: "Hey, we're human. Sometimes the adrenaline gets pumping."
7.) They fly so fast, they break the sound barrier.
The sound barrier - the speed of sound - changes with the air temperature. As the temperature rises, so does the speed at which sound travels.
For argument's sake, when the air is 32 degrees, sound travels at about 741 miles per hour.
Most of the military jets that skim Southwestern Virginia are capable of flying faster than that - some 2 1/2 times faster.
"If we flew that fast, that low, we'd blow a lot of houses off their foundations," Maj. Larry Coleman said.
8.) I could see the bombs underneath them.
Wrong. The jets carry no live ammunition. They may have external fuel tanks, or lasers to guide the bombs, or other cylindrical bomb look-alikes, but no bombs.
by CNB