encore Aim for the Stars

A new Air Force instructor pilot is feeling confi dent in his fl ying skills until he fl ies a night, two-ship sortie with the squadron’s experienced operation offi cer.

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In the summer of 1972, I was a young Air Force captain flying a Strategic Air Command KC-135A air refueling tanker from Hawaii to Guam. It was the longest leg of our deployment from the U.S. to Southeast Asia, where we would fly refu- eling missions during the Vietnam War. After cruising along for five hours, with not much to see other than Wake Island and the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean, terminal boredom was setting in. As I looked around the cockpit, my eyes were drawn to the small, aluminum disk that Boeing used to cover the center of my flight control yoke. Curiosity got the better of me, and I popped the cover off to dis- cover a secret message underneath: “The guy on your right wants your job.” The guy on my right was the copilot,

and like most copilots, he couldn’t wait to get enough flying hours to upgrade to aircraft commander. It is a necessary rite of passage that marks the careers of pilots who fly multi-place aircraft. Similarly, most tanker aircraft com- manders were eager to upgrade to in- structor pilot. In those days instructor pilots got to do a lot of fun things, such as touch-and-go landings, that they weren’t permitted to do before they upgraded. Instructor pilots also conducted in-flight training, and, if they were really good, they might be selected as standardiza- tion/evaluation pilots. As a newly upgraded instructor pilot in the fall of 1974, I had a touch of swag-

92 MILITARY OFFICER JANUARY 2015

ger and was pretty confident in my flying skills. So when I learned I was scheduled to fly a night, two-ship sortie with our squadron’s operation officer (a lieuten- ant colonel with more than 4,000 flying hours), I was excited, to say the least. It was a dark, moonless night when we took off from Ellsworth AFB in western South Dakota about a minute behind our flight lead. The operation of- ficer was in the jump seat as I maneuvered our jet north to rendezvous with our leader. After a few minutes, he asked me whether I had the other aircraft in sight. I assured him I could see his lights clearly, but a few sec- onds later, he tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Look down and to the left.” I was about to overshoot our flight leader! I quickly pulled the throttles back and slipped into position on lead’s right wing. I had mistaken a bright star for the lights of our formation leader. How embarrassing! After the mission was completed, the

operation officer informed me I had earned a new nickname: Star Chaser.

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— Doug Schott is a retired Air Force lieuten- ant colonel and a Life Member of MOAA. He lives in Goodlettsville, Tenn. For submission information, see page 6.

Tell Your Story Submit your humorous true stories (approximate- ly 450 words) of service- related experiences by email to encore@moaa .org or by mail to Encore Editor, 201 N. Washington St., Alexandria, VA 22314. All submissions will be considered for publication.

ILLUSTRATION: KOTRYNA ZUKAUSKAITE