I Want Them to Get Off Here!

It was a dark fall night in North Carolina.  We were practicing a fairly standard airfield assault operation.  Since the Army was in charge it always worked exactly the same way.  Everyone took off out of Pope AFB, flew around for about 30 minutes and then went into a holding pattern about 8 miles north of the airfield.  The first plane in was flown by a guy named “Trash.”  He was supposed to be holding at 1500’ with the second aircraft holding 500’ above him and then eight more C-130’s stacked at 500’ intervals straight up.  The second crew was commanded by a guy named “Macho.”  It takes about 3 1/2  minutes for the plane to transit those last 8 miles as it starts at 180 knots and then slows to the 100(ish) knots at landing.

The plan was the first two MC-130 aircraft would land, offload a runway security team and then next eight C-130’s would bring in an assault force to go do their army thing.

At the time Trash was supposed to leave holding the crew was distracted and didn’t leave.  A minute later Macho departed on his way in.  Trash saw Macho leave and realized they were all screwed up so he pulled out and went screaming as fast as he could below Macho trying to get into the runway on time.

I had planned this mission so I knew exactly what was supposed to happen.  I was standing next to the Army Major General as we looked to the North for the infrared landing lights to come on.  We would generally turn on the lights about a minute out.  I kept switching from the night vision goggles to my watch when the lights didn’t come on as expected.

After about 30 seconds of nervousness, the lights flash on and then about 15 seconds later we see the airplane land.  I realize something is amiss because lights and landing are too close together and he is about 30 seconds late on landing (well outside the 15-second standard).  As I watch things get really crazy from that point on.

Our tactic called for the aircrew to open the back door and lower the ramp to horizontal as the aircraft slowed past 50 knots.  This keyed the Army Rangers to start the engines on their quad runners and motorcycles.  When the aircraft comes to a complete stop the ramp goes the rest of the way down, and off they go to their assigned positions.

As I am watching, all the sudden the back of the airplane explodes in a shower of sparks and people start coming out of the aircraft while it is still moving at 50 knots.  The motorcycles come out and tumble down the runway, the quad runner comes out and does a 360-degree turn, people are just tumbling off the aircraft as it slows.

Finally, the plane comes to a stop in front of the General and me; one solitary Ranger jumps off, looks around, and runs off into the darkness.  Looking back along the runway we can see people moving off the runway as #2 prepares to land.

The General was from Tennessee and had a deep rich drawl.  What he said next was, I think, the greatest understatement ever made directly to me.  He turned and said “Welllll, that was about the most impressive offload I’ve ever seen, but Major, I want them all to get off here!  At that, he points his finger at the end of the runway, as he turns and leaves.

The Hercules raises its ramp and taxis to its assigned parking space to await the time to fly back.  While there they check for damage and report the ramp is pretty torn up, but there doesn’t appear to be any fluids leaking.  I think they flew back to Pope but I’m a little fuzzy on that part.  There was about $50,000 in damage and we may have had to bring in the maintenance team before we flew it.

At debrief, Trash explained they thought they had another minute in holding when Macho left, the Navigators had miscalculated the departure time.  On landing the loadmaster was scrambling to make sure he was ready as soon as they stopped, but in his hast, he put the ramp all the way to the ground, and once the Rangers started moving he couldn’t pull it back up.  I was a planner then, and when this crew arrived they had told me they would take over since they were the first team and would have to check all my work.  They had changed the run in time and I could only smile inside.