Crash

“You’re in number 12. All the way at the end.” The uniformed man on the flight line waved Jim toward a waiting aircraft at the far end of the row. Jim made his way toward number 12, winding through knots of people and individuals, all as lost as he was. Half remembered faces smiled or frowned at him, maybe struggling to remember his name. A line of VTOL aircraft, stinking pavement, barked orders, and vaguely familiar people were not part of his ideal tenth high school reunion. Of course, nothing was normal where Colliersburg was concerned. ...

A Pilot Joins a Very Special Twelve Mile High Club. What happens at 65,000 feet can’t stay at 65,000 feet. But will– or can– test pilot Colonel Harold Hammen ever tell what actually happened when he met Gloriana. = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = The XF-139 was a very special type of plane, but then Colonel Harold H. Hammen was a very special type of test pilot. The plane was an SRA, a “Slingshot Response Aircraft” capable of responding anywhere in the world in just minutes when carried aloft by a special UTV, an “Ultrasonic Transport Vehicle.” The docked pair could be kept anywhere in the world and respond instantly to anywhere in the world when a situation arose. Both the two-pilot transport and the single pilot response aircraft would need mid-air refueling and perhaps mid-air towing to return to base, but the incredibly short initial response time meant that there was nowhere in the world that US air power could not appear in the sky within minutes of an incident. Or, at least that was the design theory that Colonel “HH” Hammen was trying to prove out in this test flight. ...