The Well Done Award

Flying Safety, Oct, 2001 by Jeffry F. Smith

WELL DONE AWARD UNITED STATES AIR FORCE

On March 15, 2000, while leading a routine two-ship night training mission en route to the Utah Test and Training Range at 25,000 feet, Tiger 01 entered an uncommanded right-hand turn. The pilot disconnected the autopilot and attempted to turn the aircraft to the left. When he saw that his control stick was frozen in position, he transferred aircraft control to Lt Col Smith, the instructor pilot. Finding that his control stick was likewise locked in place, with no associated loss of hydraulic or electrical systems, Lt Col Smith directed the pilot to perform emergency BOLDFACE procedures to disconnect the sticks, thereby separating the two control slicks to operate independently. With the sticks disconnected, Lt Col Smith's control stick moved freely again, but only with very marginal effect on the aircraft's flight controls. During the transfer of aircraft control and the subsequent disconnect of the control sticks, Tiger 01 lost approximately 800 feet of altitude before aircraft control was regained. Lt Col Smith declared an in-flight emergency with ARTCC and continued a slow descent to regain more control over the aircraft. There was a choice between recovering to Hill AFB, about 150 miles away, or to Ellsworth AFB, nearly 300 miles away. The emergency procedures checklist directed the crew to land as soon as possible. Given the heavy fuel load and the need to reduce weight to regain more control authority, the crew elected to return to Ellsworth while dumping fuel. Lt Col smith continued to fly the aircraft from the right seat with the only stick available for control of flight. Flight with control sticks disconnected had been attempted only once before during initial B-1B flight tests by qualified test pilots, and has never been attempted since. During the flight test, the test pilots quickly concluded that the aircraft was so difficult to control that they reconnected the sticks and formally recommended no further testing take place with the control sticks disconnected. During the controllability check, Lt C ol Smith prepared to execute the first-ever landing of a B-1B with sticks disconnected. After a successful check, Lt Col Smith accomplished one practice approach, then landed the aircraft flawlessly from a subsequent approach. The superior airmanship professionalism and crew coordination exhibited throughout this never-before-seen emergency in the B-1B directly resulted in the safe recovery of an irreplaceable $280 million flying asset and the lives of four crewmembers.