Mind over matter

Flying Safety, July, 2003 by LCDR Robert Shaver

My naval aviator career spanned 22 years from 1958 to 1980. During those years I logged over 5400 pilot hours in six squadrons with almost 400 left-seat carrier landings. I completed the Aerospace Safety Officer program at USC and served three tours as Aviation Safety Officer (ASO) and one as NATOPS Officer. I served as the senior member on several aircraft investigating boards, and personally wrote many aircraft incident and accident reports while serving in the Med, CONLTS and Vietnam. I cite this brief autobiography only to give credence to this personal sea story, for I believe it still has application today.

I was an aircraft commander flying C-130s out of Rota, Spain. Our route that day was a routine Rota-Sigonella-Naples-Palma-Rota turnaround flight. Crew briefing was at 0600 (local time) with an ETA back at Rota prior to midnight. Every aspect of the flight that day was routine, except that we experienced delays at each destination. Loading and unloading times were exceeded for a variety of reasons, none of which was crew-related. As a result, we fell behind on our flight plan. Even our usual "watering hole" at Naples was closed that day due to an employee walkout over some minor point of "honor" with management.

Since we were running behind time, we pushed on without our usual mid-flight plate of pasta at Naples. As we approached Palma, we phone-patched our controlling agency and asked if we could remain overnight at Palma, since our crew duty was about to expire. (A maximum VR crew duty day then was not to exceed 18 hours from crew-brief to the completion of the post-flight inspection.) Another option, rather than RON at Palma, was to overfly the stop and continue straight back to Rota. Their instructions to us were to make the landing at Palma and get back into the air before the expiration of our crew duty time. Once airborne, we were authorized to continue to our next stop (Rota), even though we were now over crew duty. While this was not a desirable situation, it was legal; the aircraft was needed back at Rota for another flight that morning. We were all feeling pretty good at this time and pressed on, arriving about two hours over crew duty at Rota. This is where my sea story begins.

About half an hour out of Rota, I ate my usual pack of Starburst candies. That little shot of sugar always helped me to do my best on approaches. I used this trick back in my VS days prior to a night carrier landing after a six-hour flight. It worked like a charm then and did at Rota, too. Of course, there is a big difference between maybe an eight-hour VX crew duty day then, and the 20 hours I was facing over Rota. The ceiling at Rota was reported on the deck, with less than a quarter of a mile of visibility. We shot a GCA down to minimums. My copilot said he thought he saw the glow from the approach lights, so we tried one more approach. We really wanted to land, but this is not a "go-home-itis" story. On our second approach we saw nothing at minimums and took a missed approach with a clearance to our alternate, Torrejon Air Base, Madrid. Our fuel load would have permitted another approach, but I felt it was time to go.

The flight to Torrejon was uneventful, except that my entire crew fell asleep on the way. I thought it got real quiet there in the middle of the flight. About half an hour out I got one more cup of that wonderful "24-hour coffee" from our heated galley pot. My stomach was burning pretty good now since I really had had nothing of substance to eat since breakfast. With nothing to eat at Naples and Palma, my loadmaster was going through some passenger box lunches left from that morning. We shared what was available; I don't remember what I had, if anything. An apple with a bite out of it does not turn me on.

Since it was around 0400 on our arrival at Torrejon and there was no other traffic, we were given priority for our approach. (Our crew duty at this time was about 22 hours.) The ceiling was reported at 500 feet with ragged scud below. The visibility was pretty good, with about two miles in rain showers and fog. The controller asked if we would accept a short approach with radar vectors to intercept the ILS localizer; I accepted. As a result, I was still trying to let down and slow down as he turned me on a base leg toward the localizer. In a very short time I was on the localizer, above the glide slope but correcting. I was concentrating on flying that approach with every fiber of my being and thought I was doing just fine. However, on final approach I experienced at least one, maybe two "micro-winks." You know, those little periods of sleep when you wake up and don't know how long you have been asleep, but are sure you were.

I guess my concentration was not as good as I thought, for I remember the controller who was monitoring our ILS approach on his GCA radar coming up and giving me an oral command to "Disregard your gyro; turn right." Within a few seconds of that command we broke out very close to runway centerline about 400 feet AGL, and still a little high on the runway glideslope lights. A GCA was always my preferred precision approach, and I certainly would have elected to fly one that night if I had known that it was up and manned at that hour. Anyway, we landed a little long using full reverse and brakes, and another VR uneventful landing was logged, or at least I wanted everyone to think that.