Free Thud Ridge by Jack Broughton Page A

over the edge of the area and it's definitely not open." Don had filled the square necessary to announce his decision.
    I helped him with "Yeah, I agree, it looks like a loser to me. I concur and would say negative on the whole works for Pintail and all the rest of the flights."
    Don executed the abort with "Pintail here, we're coming out, coming out. Left one eighty." Back down the line of flight leaders the call was echoed and each of the four-shippers swung to a preplanned divergent course to establish the necessary separation between the low-flying, fast-moving flight as everyone moved without delay to get someplace other than on top of that gray blanket covering the active defenses.
    Laredo did his best to keep us advised, but continued to have trouble getting through. "Contact is back up, eleven o'clock, high indication."
    "Ahh, Pintail, ah—this is Nash four five. What are your intentions?"
    A proper reply would have been to tell him that I was going to talk to him about radio discipline when we got back on the ground, but Don confined himself to "Roger, withdrawing."
    "Pintail—this is Harpoon. Understand you are withdrawing."
    "Pintaa, that's Roger." That third flight of ours had been having trouble ever since they got their wingman on the wrong side way back by the river.
    Laredo finally got through with "Pintail, suggest you exit back up the Ridge. We've got lots of high indications down here in the Phu Tho area." He really did good work for us and was most interested in seeing that we did not get down into the little box he had worked himself into as he baited the defenders.
    "Roger, we'll cut back north," and the exit was in progress. "OK, Harpoons, we're withdrawing." He talked almost as much as the support guys.
    Sam was not ready to quit and Laredo passed on, "OK, contacts at your four o'clock—high indication."
    "Nash one one, four five returning to orbit." Good, I thought, maybe he'll be quiet out there.
    While Nash faded, Harpoon made up for him with "Pintail —this is Harpoon. Understand you are calling it off." What was the matter with him?
    "Rog."
    "Ozark."
    "Two."
    "Three."
    "Four."
    This exchange told us that the first flight from the next strike wing was entering the area, and from the briefing, we knew that flight to be their Sam chasers who would be contacting our boys before long for a rundown on what was hot in the area.
    Meanwhile, Otter flight, whom I had thought so unkindly of before, was still soaking up the Sams in the other quadrant and I felt much better toward them now that I was headed out of the area. "Contact is at one o'clock—high indication only. Otter, you hear me? Launch at one going to six." It sounded like they were having quite a day.
    It looked like Ozark was going to inherit the same voice problems that Laredo had endured as he attempted to make initial contact with "Laredo—this is Oz—"
    "Nash zero one, the target is three six zero now."
    A patient retransmission of "Laredo—this is Ozark". showed he was still fresh and unfrazzled.
    "Nash flight going to three six zero at this time" was all he got for his trouble and he wisely decided to wait awhile before trying again.
    Our strike flights had the problem of finding an alternate area that was suitable to work and having flown all the way in on top of the clouds, we knew that would not be easy, yet we did not want to haul those bombs all the way home.
    "Pintail—Elmo."
    "Go ahead, Elmo—Pintail."
    "Rog. Boy, you see anything north of the Red worth working on?" There was nothing really worthwhile and the only faint hope might have been back past the area of the initial turn-in.
    "Ah, it looks like there might possibly be some slight breaks back to the northwest, but this—it's really solid."
    "Nash, Nash, go three six zero at this time."
    "Harpoon is up by the lake and there's nothing up here."
    The radio was just too much for Mallard lead and he made the smart move with "Mallard, let's go flight manual, flight