"ONE OF MY MISSILES HAS FIRED!"

Air Classics, Aug 2004 by De Hare, Robert L

AT THE HEIGHT OF THE COLD WAR, THE UNTHINKABLE HAPPENED AN AMERICAN FIGHTER SHOT DOWN A MIGHTY B-52 BOMBER

More than six miles above the sprawling, colorful New Mexico country - high over ancient Indian Pueblos - three aircraft played at the game of death. It was 7 April 1961, a warm day in Albuquerque. West, across the rugged mountains and canyons of the southern Rockies, hung threatening cloud formations.

One of the aircraft flying over the area was a Strategic Air Command B-52E Stratofortress of the 95th Bomb Wing, Biggs AFB, El Paso, Texas. On this day, the eight-jet bomber was an "unidentified attacker" boring in on an American city to radar-bomb as part of the training exercise. It carried a crew of eight, two more than its normal complement.

To add realism to an otherwise routine exercise, the bomber was to be intercepted by enemy fighters somewhere over the desert. The fighters were North American F-100A Super Sabres, descendants of the F-86 Sabre and the world's first operational supersonic jets.

They would be flown by veteran pilots of the Air National Guard stationed at Kirtland AFB in New Mexico, and each would carry live ammunition: 20mm shells for four nose-mounted cannons, and a pair of Sidewinders slung under the wings. Neither the cannon nor the missiles would be able to fire. A system of electronic safety devices would hold them in check, and all hits would be scored by radar.

Flying the lead F-100A was First Lt. James Van Scyoc (pronounced "Sock"), and his wing Capt. Dale Dodd. Lieutenant Van Scyoc, who would this day suddenly find himself at the center of tragedy, was a six-year veteran of the Air Force. He had served in Germany, Japan and Korea. Twenty-seven years old and a bachelor, he was judged by fellow guardsmen as a "Fighter Pilot's Fighter Pilot" - a man whose first love was flying.

Eighteen minutes earlier they had taken off on a planned intercept mission. Slung under each plane's wings were two heat-seeking AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles armed with TNT warheads.

Guided by semiactive radar until its infrared detector "felt" the heat of the bomber's engines and "homed" the missile in, the deadly Sidewinder was appropriately named. In the animal kingdom, a Sidewinder is a desert rattlesnake said to hunt food by sensing and homing in on the body heat of its victim.

Before moving in, Jim Van Scyoc and Dale Dodd double-checked the safety switches and circuit breakers that muzzled the firing mechanisms on their cannon and missiles. They were all in safe positions.

Spotting their giant target, the two Guard pilots made five skillful passes in quick succession. The first was a simulated Sidewinder pass, the rest "cannon practice." Their first pass had netted both a radar "kill."

They were practicing proficiency in the art of killing a bomber. The bomber in this instance was an eight-engine B-52.

At the controls of the B-52, named Ciudad Juarez in honor of the Mexican city across the river from Biggs AFB, was veteran SAC Aircraft Commander Capt. Don Blodgett, 39. The flight was just another SAC training mission - this time with no H-weapon aboard. Just the same old stuff: Around the horn for some bomb and nav runs, a few interceptor passes from some Air Guard jockeys in the vicinity of Albuquerque, then more bomb-nav practice, then home. Some people called it "filling squares in the paper war."

In Capt. Blodgett's crew were Capt. Ray Obel, 33, the Copilot; Capt. Steve Carter, 29, and Capt. Pete Gineris, 30, Navigators; Capt. George Jackson, 27, Electronics Warfare Instructor; 2nd Lt. Glenn Bair, 24, Electronics Warfare Officer; SSgt. Manuel Mieras, 23, Crew Chief; and SSgt. Ray Singleton, 27, Tail Gunner.

Captain Don Blodgett called over the intercom to Sgt. Singleton in the tail. "Tail gunner, this is AC"... "AC, this is tail gunner, go ahead"... "Ray, those Guard planes are scheduled to make some passes at us pretty soon. Keep your eyes open for them"... "Roger, sir."

Three minutes later, Singleton spotted the contrails of two F-100As. They streaked toward him on a simulated missile attack and then swept by overhead, almost too fast to catch with his .50-cal radar-directed guns. They were hard to track - they came in hot, and broke away quickly.

In the Ground-Controlled Intercept (GCI) radar site at West Mesa, New Mexico (call sign "Blush First"), operators were tracking the intercept.

Some 31 miles to the east at 32,800-ft, a new TWA Convair 880 jetliner with 73 passengers aboard, had just passed Albuquerque in route from New York to Los Angeles. Captain Bob Guss, a TWA senior pilot, was in the left seat. Casually, with the relaxed awareness of his profession, he switched his scan from the broad skies to his instrument panel, then back again to the horizons.

In El Paso, Navigator Carter's wife was awaiting the arrival of a new baby. At Briggs, there was a lucky man. He was TSgt. William Thomas. He had been scheduled as crew chief on the B-52. Shortly before departure, however, Sgt. Thomas was stricken with a headache so bad that it necessitated his removal from the flight. He was replaced by Sgt. Mieras.