A few decades late... but... ATTABOY !!
I've had opportunity to be back to Vietnam several times in the past 15
years. In fact, spent 4th of July in Hanoi in 1994, what a strange feeling
that was. During those visits I've had several former North Vietnam
officials tell me they were beaten and ready to surrender when the B52's
stopped coming..
Vietnam, the war won in country, lost in Congress and the public press...
Thanks for all you gave Wilton, and to those who gave all.
On Thu, Sep 25, 2014 at 9:59 AM, WILTON via Mercedes mercedes@okiebenz.com
wrote:
Another non-political B-52 tale:
PERFECT DASK
By Wilton Strickland
While flying Arc Light bombing missions from Guam and Thailand to
Vietnam in 1972, a normal cell of BUFFs (Big Ugly Fat Fellows - B-52's)
consisted of three bombers, with numbers 2 and 3 in the formation stacked
at 500-foot intervals above and 2 miles behind and 500 feet off to the side
of each other. At the signal, HACK! given by the ground controller, the
radar navigator/bombardier on the lead BUFF would release his load of
bombs, the radar navigator/bombardiers in numbers 2 and 3 would start stop
watches and release their bombs based on speed and distance behind lead
(time between aircraft in the cell was usually about 15 seconds). If the
three bombers were in perfect formation and the bombs from numbers 2 and 3
were released at the right times, the three strings or trains of bombs
impact in lines parallel to those from the lead bomber and start and stop
at the same line perpendicular to the line of flight as those from lead.
This perfect pattern is called Perfect DASK - for perfect Drift Angle
Station Keeping or perfect formation flying and timing of the bomb release.
We got pretty good at this. Positions for numbers 2 and 3 are
maintained by the radar navigator/bombardier in each of these aircraft
directing the pilot of each to make adjustments in speed (engine power) and
headings to maintain the aircraft in proper position relative to the lead
aircraft displayed by its blip on the radar scope. We many times made
heading corrections as small as ¼ of a degree to maintain a perfect
formation on bomb runs directed by the ground radar sites (Sky Spot).
(Bomb runs during the Linebacker II missions to Hanoi in Dec were made
individually by the crew radar navigator/bombardier in each aircraft using
on-board equipment - RADAR and computer aided.)
Pilot and radar navigator teams who earned a Perfect DASK award
received a bottle of Champagne for each award at the pre-mission briefings.
We received several of these - 'got to the point it was nearly every time
we were not flying lead position. We would, of course, take the bottle of
Champagne along with us on the mission to Vietnam each time we had won it.
I would stow it in an equipment rack near the outside skin of the aircraft
so it would be really cold upon landing. My crew many times sipped small
cups of Champagne as we rode the crew bus to post-mission debriefing. The
ground maintenance guys starting calling us the Champagne Crew as we
exited the airplane and boarded the crew bus.
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