The upset over Natanz and the climb back to altitude and extended burner time to return to cruising speed played hell with the fuel consumption schedules, and I knew I would be fuel-critical on landing. And, of course, an unforecast thunderstorm crossed the airfield as I was 100 miles out.
Diego Garcia is the southernmost and largest of a string of atolls
that make up the Chagos Archipeligo, governed as the British Indian Ocean Territory.
Unforecast thunderstorms supplied an unexpected challenge.
Diego Garcia gets over 102 inches of rain a year. Some of it arrived just before Killmore.
Fortunately it had blown over by the time I rolled in on final. I taxied clear of the runway with just over 300 pounds of fuel remaining — not enough to go around even once. Total flight time was three hours and three minutes.”
View of the cockpit when just clear of the runway. Note the fuel remaining.
All wings and speed brake in landing configuration, the F-136 is down and done flying at Diego Garcia.
Killmore’s expression changed, and his eyes were focused off in the far distance. I knew in that moment he was back in the cockpit, seeing the world as it looked through the transparent aluminum windscreen more than twenty years ago. “Just as I reached up to pull the throttles back for the decel/descent into Diego Garcia, I paused and took a long look out at the black sky and the curve of the horizon, far ahead and below, and I thought, There may be stuff in orbit, or a hypersonic research vehicle or two out there, but right this instant, this Sunday morning, inside the atmosphere — damned if I’m not the fastest thing on Earth!”
