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Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 01
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Editorial Reviews From Publishers Weekly
It is not the Reagan Administration that has secretly been developing a Strategic Defense Initiative in this first book by retired USAF Captain Brown, but the Soviets, and as soon as the system comes on line, the Russians flagrantly attack American intelligence and military craft with their laser weapon. The President and his advisors appeal to the UN Security Council; they even dispatch sophisticated B-1 bombers and a new, armed space satellite, but both are thwarted, and the U.S. is left dangerously incapable of detecting a missile launch from the eastern U.S.S.R. Desperate, they decide to send a souped-up veteran B-52 bomber, the Old Dog, and its expert navigator Patrick McLanahan on a crucial mission into Siberia to neutralize the death ray. Brown knows his airborne and naval high-tech equipment and the cockpit bantering of crews, and can tell a basically interesting story. He does not, however, examine the frightening political consequences of the superpowers trading shots. The novel's excitement is essentially that of a boy's adventure fantasy rather than the well-realized suspense of a credible thriller. 75,000 first printing; $75,000 ad/promo; Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club selections; Military Book Club selection; author tour.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Book Description
Newly repackaged, here is the runaway bestseller that launched Dale Brown's phenomenal career.
"A superbly crafted adventure.” (W.E.B. Griffin)
"Suspenseful and spellbinding." (Clive Cussler) --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.
Spotlight Reviews
***** An all-time great, September 14, 2001 Revie wer:
If there is a series of books out there that will make you feel like you are actually in it, then its the Flight of The Old Dog series. This debuet book for Dale Brown is by far the greatest story I've ever read. It will keep on the edge of your seat the whole time. not one slow section in the book. In the wake of the World Trade Center terrorist attack, it makes me wonder what the Old Dog crew would do. If the were real of course! --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.
***** Great work, this is a book I want to see in theaters., June 4, 1998 Reviewer:
I have read this book a number of times, Dale Brown's technical know-how and imagination kept me on the edge. I was actually sorry that I had finished it. I recommend it to anyone. The characters, the scenarios, the timing, is all spot on. I will keep reading his books as long as he keeps writing them. --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.
Synopsis:
The Soviets have developed the world’s most powerful laser installation.
They have already killed an American satellite and a rc-135 aircraft and now they’re after the space shuttle. General Brad Elliott, head of a super-secret installation called “Dreamland’ has the responsibility of stopping them. He puts together an intrepid crew and a specially modified B-52 bomber to do the job. Modern military fiction at its pageturning best.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
DALE BROWN, a former United States Air Force Captain, served as a navigator from 1978 to 1986, logging thousands of hours aboard both B-52s and FB-111 bombers. During his service, he participated in numerous strategic combat exercises designed to simulate an actual strategic war. He is the recipient of the Air Force Commendation Medal, the Air Force Achievement Medal and the Combat Crew Award, among others.
BERKLEY BOOKS, NEW YORK
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or publisher.
This Berkley book contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition.
It has been completely reset in a typeface designed for easy reading and was printed from new film.
FLIGHT OF THE OLD DOG
A NOVEL BY DALE BROWN
FLIGHT OF THE OLD DOG
DALE BROWN
DONALD I. FINE, INC. NEW YORK
Copyright © 1987 by Dale Brown
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole
or in part in any form. Published in the United States of America
by Donald I. Fine, Inc. and in Canada by General Publishing Company Limited.
Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 86-46388
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brown, Dale, 1956- Flight of the old dog.
' PS3552.R68543F5 1987 > 813'.54 86-46388
ISBN: 1-55611-034-0
Manufactured in the United States of America 10 987654321
This book is printed on acid free paper. The paper in this book
meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on
Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or publisher.
This book is dedicated to the thousands of men and women of the United States Air Force Strategic Air Command who assure the quality of our nation’s strategic deterrent force. I was proud to serve in SAC for seven years, and I know it is a thankless, lonely, sometimes frustrating job. They work in old alert shelters, underground launch centers, dark command posts, and cold hangars—and they are the nation’s best. More than any high-tech machine, it is the dedication and professionalism of these men and women that insure the peace and security of the United States.
To all the bomber pukes, tanker toads, missile weenies, sky cops, knuckle-busters, and BB stackers of the Strategic Air Command—this one’s for you.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to extend my gratitude to George Wieser and Donald I. Fine, who took a chance on me; to Rick Horgan, senior editor at Donald I. Fine, Inc., with whom I spent many long hours hammering this story into shape; and to my wife Jean, who gave me the support to get the job done. Thanks.
Contents
1 Aboard a B-52 Bomber
2 Over the skies of Kavaznya, Kamchatka Peninsula, Soviet Union
3 The United Nations, New York
4 Fighter Weapons Training Range, Nellis Air Force Base, Las Vegas, Nevada
5 Downtown Manhattan
6 Ford Air Force Base, California
7 Sunrise California
8 Nellis Air Force Base, Las Vegas, Nevada
9 The United Nations
10 Fifty miles east of Kavaznya, in the North Pacific
11 Vandenburg Air Force Base, California
12 Washington, D.C.
13 Washington, D.C.
14 The Space Shuttle Atlantis
15 Washington, D.C.
16 Washington, D.C.
17 Over the Arctic Ocean North of Barrow, Alaska
18 Aboard the Old Dog
19 The White House Situation Room
20 Fifty Miles from Kavaznya
21 Over the Skies of Kavaznya
22 Ossora Airfield
23 Anadyr Far East Fighter-Interceptor Base, Russia
24 Seward Air National Guard Base, Nome, Alaska
1 Aboard a B-52 Bomber
The Strategic Air Command B-52 was ready to begin its final assault. Though half its bomb load had already been expended, one gravity bomb and four Short-Range Attack Missiles (SRAMs) still stoo
d in the bomb bays. So far, the crew of six had successfully guided their aged bomber through a crucial air refueling; a high-altitude bomb run from thirty-seven thousand feet, with a surprise SA-2 surface-to-air missile attack shortly afterward; and three subsequent bomb runs through a maze of hills and valleys.
Up ahead, closing in on them at a speed of six miles per minute, was the target area—defended by surface-to-air missile sites, radar-guided antiaircraft artillery, and prowling patrols of the most advanced interceptors in the world.
“IP inbound in three minutes, crew,” First Lieutenant David Luger announced over the interphone. He was following the B-52’s course on a narrow cardboard chart, mentally measuring the distance and computing the time to the IP, or “initial point,” the start of a low-altitude nuclear bomb run. Time to start reviewing checklists, Luger thought. The action was going to start soon.
He glanced down at the plastic-covered checklist pages, anticipating each step of the “Before Initial Point” and “Bomb Run (nuclear)” checklists before he came to it. Long years of training had enabled him to fix in his mind the exact details of what he was about to do.
“SRAM missile pre-simulated launch check, completed,” he said. “Computer launch programming completed.”
No one acknowledged him, but he had not expected a reply. The checklist had been reviewed hours earlier. As Luger reread the checklist items over the interphone to key everyone else that the busiest portion of the ten-hour sortie was about to begin, he found himself squirming in his seat, trying to get comfortable.
“Radios set to RBS frequency,” Luger said. He glanced at his chart annotations. “Two seventy-five point three.”
“Set,” Mark Martin, the copilot replied. “RBS bomb scoring plot is set in both radios. I’ll call IP inbound when cleared by the radar.”
“Camera on, one-to-four,” Luger announced, flicking a small black knob near his right shoulder. A special camera would now record the bomb run and missile launches on thirty-five millimeter film for later study. “E.W., start-countermeasures point in sixty seconds.”
“Defense copies,” First Lieutenant Hawthorne replied, double-checking his jammer and trackbreaker switch positions. The same age as Luger, Hawthorne was the E.W., or electronic-warfare officer. His job was to defend the B-52 against attack by jamming or decoying enemy surface-to- air missile or artillery-tracking radars, and to warn the crew of missile or aircraft attacks.
“Rog,” Luger said. “Checklist complete.” He checked the TG meter, an antique gear-and-pulley dial that showed the time in seconds to the next turnpoint. Luger flipped the plastic-covered page over to the “Bomb Run (Synchronous)” checklist, then glanced over at the radar navigator’s station beside him. “About one-fifty TG to the IP, radar,” Luger said. “Got it together, buddy?”
“Uh huh,” Patrick McLanahan said. He was bent over a pile of bomb run charts and radar scope predictions, intently studying his bombing “game plan” as if this was the first time he had seen it. His work area was littered with snippets of paper, drawings and notes. A thermos, which lay underneath several books and papers atop his attack radar set, was leaking coffee over the cathode-ray tube display and the radar controls.
Luger impatiently waited for his partner to begin. The two navigators, representing their SAC bombardment wing in this important competition sortie, were a study in contrasts. Luger was a tall, lanky Texan, with immaculately spit-shined boots, closely cropped black hair, and a penchant for textbook perfection. He was fresh out of B-52 Combat Crew Training after graduating top of his class from both the Air Force Academy and Undergraduate Navigator Training, and was easily the Wing’s most conscientious and professional navigator. He studied hard, performed his duties to perfection, and constantly drove himself to higher levels of achievement.
McLanahan ... was McLanahan. He was of medium height and husky build, a blond and tanned Californian who looked as if he was fresh off the boardwalk at Venice Beach. Despite McLanahan’s casual appearance and disdain for authority, he was acknowledged as the best navigator in the Wing, and quite possibly the best in SAC. Together he and Luger combined to make the most effective bomber crew in the United States Air Force. And they were about to go to work.
“Well, let’s get this over with,” McLanahan said finally.
“Good idea,” Luger said. He proceeded to run down the remaining items on the checklist, pausing at intervals to check switch positions with the pilot, Captain Gary Houser. Two minutes later, all switches had been configured and it only remained to activate the bombing system and tie all of the individual components together with the bombing computers.
“Master bomb control switch.”
“Good,” McLanahan said. “I mean, on, light on.”
“Bombing system switch.”
“Auto.” The bombing computers now had control of everything—the steering, when to release the bomb, even when to open and close the bomb doors. McLanahan had only to position a set of electronic crosshairs precisely on a preselected aiming point on the radar scope, and the bombing computers would do the rest.
The computers would translate the crosshair positioning into range and azimuth data and display the target direction on the Flight Command Indicator (FCI) at the pilot’s station. The computers fed altitude, heading, airspeed, groundspeed, and drift through a set of precomputed ballistics data, and derived an exact release point based on that information. Even if the airspeed changed slightly, or if the winds shifted, the computers would recompute the exact point for bomb release.
“Coming up on sixty seconds to the IP, crew,” Houser announced. “FCI centered. Sixty TG, ready, ready . . . now!”
“Got it,” Luger said, starting a stopwatch as a backup. “Bomb run review.”
“Roger,” McLanahan replied. “Rocket, rocket, bomb . . . uh, concrete blivet . . . rocket, rocket. This is the live drop over the range. Let’s not fuck this one up, ladies. Some joker is going to run out there with a tape measure to see how we score. Nav?” McLanahan said, turning to Luger.
“SRAM fixes will be on the Airport, fix number thirty; target Bravo, fix number thirty-one; and the pumping station, fix number thirty-two. We are running fully synchronous, all computers fully operational, with a drift rate less than—”
“What he means,” McLanahan said, “is that the SRAM is tighter than that virgin lieutenant Gary’s been seeing.”
A conspiratorial snicker could be heard over the interphone.
“Thirty seconds to IP,” Houser announced. “Defense?”
“Electronic warfare officer ready for IP inbound, pilot,” Mike Hawthorne replied. “India-band radar is searching but hasn’t locked onto us yet.”
“Gunner has back-up timing, radar,” Bob Brake, the crew gunner, replied. “Fire control radar is clear. I’ll get back on watch after the bomb run and get set for those Air National Guard fighters they told us about.”
“Twenty seconds to IP,” McLanahan announced.
“Better stay on watch, guns,” Houser said. “Sometimes those Air National Guard guys get a little antsy. Remember last year’s Bomb Competition—they didn’t wait for the bomb run to finish before they jumped us. The rules committee let them get away with it, too. Realism, you know.”
“Okay,” Brake said. “I’ll still be keeping backup timing until I see something.” He flipped some switches and returned to his small five-inch square tail radar display. At the tail of the huge bomber, the turret with four fifty-caliber machine guns slowly came unstowed and began a preprogrammed search pattern.
“Guns unstowed, system capable, radar-search, radar-track,” Brake reported.
“Ten seconds to IP,” Luger said. “Next heading will be zero-one-zero. Airspeed three-five-zero true. Clearance plane five hundred feet.”
He turned to McLanahan. His partner had just removed his helmet and was rubbing his ears, then snapping his neck hard from side to side.
“What the hell are you doing?” Luger said.
Houser’s FCI slowly wound down. “Coming up on the IP, crew . . . ready . . . ready . . . now!”
“Right turn, heading zero-one-zero, pilot,” Luger said. The huge aircraft banked in response.
“Boy, is it flat out there,” McLanahan said, studying the radar scope.
“Roger, radar,” Houser replied. “I guess that means we’re clear of terrain.” That information was important to Houser—he was handflying the huge bomber only five hundred feet off the ground at almost six miles per minute. Houser used the EVS, or Electro-optical Viewing System, and terrain-avoidance computer to provide a “profile” of the peaks and valleys ahead, but the best warning was McLanahan’s thirty-mile range radar and his experience in guiding the huge bomber around trouble. The “Muck”— McLanahan’s less-than-flattering nickname—wasn’t always by the book, but he was the best and Houser trusted him with his life. Everyone did.
“Ten degrees to roll-out,” Luger reminded the pilot. “Drift is zero, so heading is still zero-one-zero. Radar, I’ll correct gyro heading after rollout. Pilot, don’t take the FCI until it’s displayed on the EVS scope.”
“We’re IP inbound, crew,” Luger reported. “Pilot, center the FCI and keep it centered. Pat, I’ll check your switches when you—”
“Pilot, airborne radar contact at two o’clock!” Hawthorne yelled suddenly over the interphone. “Possibly an F-15. Breaking apart now . . . there’s two of them. Search radar on us . . . switching to target track . . . they’ve seen us.”