One hundred knots, release the nose wheel steering, the rudder is effective now keeping us straight down the rapidly disappearing concrete. Speed is building quickly now as the two J-79 engines howl, blue afterburner plumes blasting the runway behind, pushing the F-4, lightweight for once, into the sky. ‘The twin afterburners torch off with a thump and a kick in the ass, thrust is reporting for duty, a quick check of the exhaust nozzle gages, both full open, no warning lights. The Phantom, which was straining nose down under full military power against the brakes, leaps forward, eager to be shed of the ground. Release the brakes, shove the big throttles forward into afterburner, hold down the nose wheel steering button, pull the stick full back, and we’re rolling. ‘To record the flight time, I punch the stopwatch stem on the instrument panel it’s time to clock in at the job site. He flew 375 combat missions with the same number of landings as take-offs. His first fighter plane was the F-104 Starfighter and the last was the F-16 Viper. He knows fighter planes, fighter pilots, and air combat well. He also served as an Air Intelligence Officer working with the CIA, FBI, and M16 on a variety of covert projects. Bestselling author Ed Cobleigh has been a fighter pilot with the US Air Force, US Navy, Royal Air Force, Imperial Iranian Air Force, and the French Air Force. The following story appears in Ed Cobleigh’s book War for the Hell of It: A Fighter Pilot’s View of Vietnam. With nothing else to do, I watch the Mach meter unwind I want to see a number starting with a 2,’ Ed Cobleigh, former F-4 Pilot. ‘We are supersonic and still accelerating, the maniacal engines will not be denied.
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