Flying the Line

Jay Lacklen is a retired Air Force reserve pilot with 12,000 military flying hours. He grew up in Arlington, VA, and graduated from the University of North Carolina-Chapel in 1969. He entered service in 1970 and retired in 2004 as a Lt Col with 12,500 flying hours. Lacklen taught Air Force T-1 pilot training simulators at Columbus AFB, Mississippi from 2005-2014. He grew up in Arlington, VA and graduated from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill in 1969. In addition to pilot training aircraft, he flew 330 hours in the C-7 Caribou, 2000 hours in the B-52 bomber, and 9,500 hours in the C-5 Galaxy transport.

He flew in all major military actions from Vietnam to the Iraq War. Lacklen lives in northern Virginia and is married with four adult daughters and two granddaughters.

Lacklen is also the author of three books, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Two: Military Airlift Command and Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Three: Air Mobility Command. The following story comes the last book of the trilogy.

C-7 Caribou landing on Austere Field Over Hilltop

“Caribou Ops, 1971

The Central Highlands could present challenges. The often austere fields lay between ridge lines or, in one case, sat on a planed-off hilltop that sloped away in all directions.

I once watched my aircraft commander make three attempts to land on one. The steeply sloping terrain made judging the landing difficult. All normal visual cues told the brain you were still far above the field, and yet, suddenly there it was, immediately below you, leaving the plane too high to land. Finally, on the third frustrating try, the pilot, although still too high, decided to put it down anyway. I couldn’t believe he would try it, but I had no control over the situation except, perhaps, to scream.

The pilot dove the aircraft at the 1,500-foot runway, then yanked back hard on the yoke just above it. Unfortunately, the dive had increased our airspeed, so the plane floated, possibly catastrophically, down the short runway.

Metal runway

We touched down with about seven hundred feet remaining on the slippery PSP metal runway before the terrain dropped steeply into the jungle. The pilot slammed on the brakes and yanked the engines into reverse. The plane skidded and rotated slowly sideways as the reversed props threw up a huge dust cloud that enveloped us. Even though I couldn’t see the precipice through the dust, I knew it was approaching and we’d be lucky not to roll off the end and down the steep slope.

We stopped, blessedly, on level ground. The pilot took the throttles out of reverse, and the dust cloud slowly dissipated as we both sat gasping and speechless. Looking forward, I could not see level ground, only the jungle a hundred feet below. We had stopped with just enough runway overrun remaining to turn sharply to taxi back to the cargo ramp area. Another five feet and we’d have been bouncing down the slope into the jungle, and infamy.”

Photo credit: U.S. Air Force

Flying the Line

Jay Lacklen is a retired Air Force reserve pilot with 12,000 military flying hours. He grew up in Arlington, VA, and graduated from the University of North Carolina-Chapel in 1969. He entered service in 1970 and retired in 2004 as a Lt Col with 12,500 flying hours. Lacklen taught Air Force T-1 pilot training simulators at Columbus AFB, Mississippi from 2005-2014. He grew up in Arlington, VA and graduated from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill in 1969. In addition to pilot training aircraft, he flew 330 hours in the C-7 Caribou, 2000 hours in the B-52 bomber, and 9,500 hours in the C-5 Galaxy transport.

He flew in all major military actions from Vietnam to the Iraq War. Lacklen lives in northern Virginia and is married with four adult daughters and two granddaughters.

Lacklen is also the author of three books, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey, Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Two: Military Airlift Command and Flying the Line: An Air Force Pilot’s Journey Volume Three: Air Mobility Command. The following story comes the last book of the trilogy.

B-52 Arc Light mission

At the end of May, the B-52 Arc Light mission ended as the final three-ship cell, with our crew in the lead, departed U-Tapao. For many years, SAC crew members had joked about “putting out the Arc Light for good,” and here we were about to do just that. I had only flown two actual Arc Light bombing missions in 1973, and the rest of the crew had flown none, but we got to put out the “Light” for the thousands of crewmen who had flown the tens of thousands of hours over the previous ten years. They had done the heavy lifting; we had done little for the time we were at U-Tapao, but we got to take it home for good.

We would fly in cell formation until we reached the coast of California, then “two” and “three” would leave the formation to land at March AFB, CA, and we would continue on as a single ship to Carswell AFB, TX, a sixteen-hour mission.

Indignity

We had an indignity to suffer before takeoff, however. The staff told us to report an hour early so we could string up a room full of rattan furniture in the bomb bay to deliver to the deputy commander for operations at Carswell. This did not sit well. We faced a tortuously long mission without any extra duties, and this was an absolutely unnecessary task. No doubt one of the commanders at U-Tapao garnered a significant kudo for shipping the colonel’s furniture for free, but we were the ones providing the service. We hoped to be required to cycle the bomb bay doors en route over the Pacific, one final rattan bomb run.

(On a similar mission during Gulf War 1 in 1990, I had to personally deliver two live lobsters sent by General Colin Powell from Massachusetts to General Norman Schwarzkopf in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Getting them there alive was my assigned mission. I await my grandkids asking what I did during the war. Why, I babysat two lobsters!)

When the time came, the three B-52s sat behind the runway hold line awaiting permission for the final B-52 takeoff from U-Tapao. Then tower cleared us for takeoff. On interplane frequency, I said, “OK, guys, let’s take our Buffs and go home,” and with that we took off. As we climbed out the Gulf of Siam, U-Tapao fell silent for the first time in a decade and would largely remain that way.

Interesting things

At cruise over the Philippine Sea at 42,000 feet, two interesting things happened. First, a jet contrail passed over us. This was unusual because we were already at our max altitude over eight miles high, and the other contrail was so far above us I couldn’t see the aircraft. I decided it must be a U-2 or SR-71 spy plane because I didn’t expect to encounter any aircraft higher than we were, much less so far above us I would be unable to see it.

Next, a U.S. Navy ship broadcast on guard channel asking if any American military aircraft were in the area. We answered that we were, and he asked if we could go “cipher” mode, or the scrambled, secret mode on one of our radios. The ship said they had an unknown target apparently shadow them and asked if we could drop down and take a look. I said I’d have to get permission to do so because I couldn’t make my destination if I used the extra gas to chase a shadow.

Shortly thereafter, the ship said they had resolved the issue and we wouldn’t be needed. I thought, briefly, we might find an excuse to cycle the bomb bay doors to rain rattan on the mysterious shadow, but it was not to be. The Carswell colonel would get his damn furniture. As the final indignity, neither colonel met us at either end to thank us for our efforts.

Photo credit: U.S. Navy