These vignettes are real. Many will be about my time in the Air Force, 1965–69. This is one of my favorites.
Class Act
It was early 1967 and I was an E-3 Communications Tech (Radio Fixer), at the Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards AFB, when our Shop Chief called everyone together to share a little story with us. This was not usual, so it had to be good. It was in my mind typical Edwards. The Chief related to us about an incident the morning before. Airman Russel H had gone out on another early morning 05:00 job to the NASA X-15 hanging under the right wing of our B-52 #008 (Balls Eight) Mothership. He was probably assuming the preflight checkouts he faced would be the usual confirmation that all the B-52 and X-15 communications were good, then a slow drive back to the shop, a quiet cup of coffee, and home in the early afternoon (my version of his day): Nope.
Russ got the Mothership checked out and on its way, but before he could scamper out, he was informed about a UHF Command Radio problem on the other Mothership, #003 (Balls Three). Not the best news: Those two were the oldest B-52’s in existence, the first ones made. Just getting to and working with their antiquated electronics was guaranteed to change one’s attitude, and perhaps longer-term mental state as well.
The installation of the bulky WW II-era ARC-27 receiver-transmitter was a hassle and the aircraft had none of the improvements for accessibility of the production birds. These two B-52’s were legendary for being terrible places to work. And when combined with the desert heat, memorable experiences were likely.
It took several hours and three frustrating installations of ARC-27s before Russ could get one that worked, and by then, his Attitude Temperature was as high as the skin of that aluminum tube he was in. Roasting in the ample solar radiance, it converted all available wavelengths to infrared emissions of heat impinging from all directions and the air itself. These are kind in moderation, . . . but solar moderation is unavailable in the High Desert. Without airflow in those tubes it feels as though your ears are filling up with sweat, and a problem is keeping it out of your eyes so you can still see.
In this case, the mild-mannered Gentle Airman Russell H had lost it. Cooked by the heat, tortured by the physical insults of the Mothership, blinded by sweat, hurting from repeated installations, Russ was by now short of social graces. At first, everything looked good with the last unit we had in stock, good tuning, good sidetone, . . . but nobody would respond on its primary channel.
Calling NASA 1 repeatedly, his anger grew until it overcame everything, and the stream of perfectly-modulated omni-directionally-transmitted obscenities filled the frequency used for sending communications to the X-15. Doing what he could, and leaving much, much later than expected, Russ wrote up the situation on the forms and went home.
Alerted to an early meeting of the maintenance personnel that supported the X-15 missions, Russ was there the next day at the ridiculous time of 04:30 or 05:00, as they went through necessary items. At the end of it, an unexpected person at the meeting stood up in back to speak: It was Pete Knight, X-15 pilot and holder of world records.
It was unusual for a busy pilot to waste his time in maintenance meetings, but Pete stepped up to explain that he came to offer a personal apology to Russ for not responding to his repeated, and repeated, and repeated calls for a radio check the day before. It seems Pete was “a little busy at the time”, right then piloting that rocket-powered projectile through Mach Six, over 4,000 miles per hour, faster than anyone had ever flown, . . . while Russ was shouting in his ear, jamming the channel.
Pete came in to tell him: “Loud and clear, Russ.”
Instead of a Court Martial, or even a rebuke for Russ, Major Pete Knight had the class to show up at some ridiculous time in the alleged morning to give an elbow in the ribs to Russ, a three-stripe radio fixer. That flight established a world record, to be broken later in Pete Knight’s last flight, when he flew into space at Mach 6.7 or 4,520 MPH, in an airplane, brought it back and landed it dead-stick, a record which still stands.
But in my eyes, he never exceeded that Act of Class.
