'I don't want to hang around here any more than I have to, Bud,' Patrick said. 'But I'd sure like to wring the laser out a little more.' At that moment, both crew members received a warning message on their threat receiver, one of the multifunction displays in the center of the Dragon's instrument panel. 'Just got swept by fighter radar,' Patrick said. 'I think it might be time to head home.'
'Good deal,' Franken said. He started a slow left turn to the north, mindful of the towed array still extended behind them-they could easily turn quickly enough to wrap themselves up in their own array's cable. 'Just keep those puppies off us.'
'LADAR coming on,' Patrick said. He activated the laser radar for only a few seconds, but the laser radar's power and tight resolution drew an amazingly detailed picture of all air targets within a hundred miles. 'We've got a flight of two MiG-29 interceptors, coming from Tripoli,' Patrick said. 'When you roll out, they'll be at your nine-thirty position, sixty-one miles, high. Heading zero-onezero will put them at your nine o'clock.' The pulse-Doppler radar on the MiG-29, another Libyan purchase from the Russians, could not detect a target with a closure rate equal to the aircraft airspeed.
This was not looking good, Patrick noted immediately. 'Warning,' the female-voiced threat computer reported, 'MiG-29 nine o 'clock five-zero miles, flight level threethree-zero, acquisition mode. Warning, trackbreakers are in standby.'
'Either this guy is very lucky, or very good,' Patrick said. 'The leader is coming right in on us. Something's not right.' He hit the voice command stud: 'System status.'
'All monitored systems are functioning normally,' the computer said after a slight pause. Then: 'Warning, MiG-29 at nine o'clock, forty miles, tracking.'
'Oh, shit,' Patrick said. 'Trackbreakers coming on.' But it was then that he found the problem: 'The ECM system faulted-it shut itself down completely.' Patrick powered it back up.
'Warning, towed array not in coordinated flight,' the computer reported.
'That's what happened,' Patrick said. 'When we made the turn, it must've knocked the array out of whack and faulted the system. It's been back there spinning away like a great big pinwheel. I'm cutting it loose.' But that didn't work. 'The array won't jettison. It's totally faulted. I'm going to try an ECM system reset. LADAR coming on. It'll be the only threat warning we have now.'
'Warning, MiG-29 at seven o'clock, thirty miles…' But moments later, they heard, 'Warning, missile launch detected on radar, nine o 'clock, twenty-six miles. Time to intercept, fifty seconds.'
'Break left!' Patrick shouted. Franken shoved the throttles to full military power and yanked the control stick full left, rolling the AL-52 up on its left wing in a tight ninetydegree bank turn-they had to risk flying into their own cable to try to defeat the incoming radar-guided missile. At full bank, he started to apply back pressure to tighten the turn even more, presenting the smallest possible radar cross-section on the MiG-29's radar. He let up on the back pressure when the computer issued a stall warning and started to pull the control stick forward. Meanwhile, Patrick was frantically trying every countermeasures switch he could. 'ECM is completely dead-chaff, flares, jammers, everything.'
Out the cockpit window, the sight was horrifying. They could clearly see a trail of fire arcing across the sky- the Libyan radar-guided missile, heading right for them. There was no time to turn, no time to try anything, no time to even speak…
The missile dove right at them-then passed just behind them, making a direct hit on the spinning array, missing them by less than three hundred feet. To the two men in the cockpit of the AL-52, it looked as if the missile had been aiming right at the middle of their foreheads.
'Lost… lost contact with the towed array,' Patrick said, gasping for breath-he thought he had bought the farm that time. 'The missile hit it dead-on.'
'Well, that's one way to cut the array loose,' Franken said.
Patrick switched his supercockpit display to the tactical view. 'These suckers aren't going to get a chance to get another shot off at us,' he said.
'Are you going to try to hit the missiles as they come off the rails?'
'I'm not going to let them get off the rails,' Patrick said. To the attack computer, he said, 'Commit Dragon.'
'No TBM targets,' the computer responded.
Patrick touched the MiG-29 icon on the supercockpit display and spoke, 'Attack target.'
'Stinger airmines out of range,' the computer responded. The AL-52 Dragon kept the built-in defensive weapons of the EB-52 Megafortress, including the Stinger airmines-small guided missiles fired from a cannon in the tail that created clouds of shrapnel in the path of enemy fighters tail-chasing the bomber. But the airmines could only attack targets within two miles of the bomber in the rear quadrant.
'Designate airborne target as TBM target,' Patrick commanded. 'Commit Dragon.'
'Stand by,' the computer responded. It was something never attempted-shooting down an aircraft with the airborne laser. Patrick didn't even know if the programming existed for the attack computer to take a non-TBM, or tactical ballistic missile, target and process a laser attack against it. But he received his answer moments later: The supercockpit display was suddenly filled with the image of the southernmost MiG-29. The laser radar had locked onto the rear one-third of the aircraft, the same spot that it would normally lock onto a missile. 'Caution, target velocity data not within limits.'
Patrick remembered that the laser attack computer was programmed to lock onto only fast-moving targets, like ballistic missiles-the MiG was flying much more slowly than a rocket. 'Override velocity data.'
There was another long, nervous pause; then: 'Caution, target velocity parameters overridden. Laser ready.'
Patrick zoomed the image in until he was looking directly into the cockpit of the Libyan MiG; then he used his trackball and moved the crosshairs to the left side of the fighter, right on the nose of the largest missile he came across-he remembered that MiG-29s usually fired missiles off the right side first. He could see it clearly: a huge R- 27 radar-guided on the number-three hardpoint. 'Lock onto target and attack laser,' he commanded.
'Warning, laser attack, stop attack,' the computer said. The Megafortress's antiaircraft attack logic had taken over for the Dragon's anti-ballistic missile attack logic and successfully started treating the chlorine-oxygen-iodine laser as another air-launched weapon. Seconds later, the computer reported, 'Laserfiring.'
The results were spectacular. Less than three seconds after the 'laser firing' warning, the R-27 missile on the MiG-29's hardpoint exploded in a blinding flash of light. The entire left wing of the lead MiG sheared off in the explosion. Patrick expanded the optronic view on the supercockpit display just in time to watch the Libyan pilot eject from his stricken fighter. The laser radar display showed the second MiG peel off sharply to the north.
'We got it!' Patrick crowed. He quickly locked up the second MiG-29. The supercockpit display now showed the diode laser locked onto the center top fuselage section of the second MiG. 'Attack target laser,' he commanded.
'Attack target laser, stop attack,' the computer warned. The second shot took several seconds longer, but soon Patrick could see a stream of smoke trailing from the MiG's fuselage-and then suddenly the fuselage seemed to disintegrate from the inside, with ribbons of flames trailing from several cracks and tears in the upper-fuselage fuel tanks right above the number-one engine. The MiG-29 was into its second flat spin, its left engine burning hotly, before the pilot ejected.
'Wow, that was very cool,' Franken exclaimed. 'A laser powerful enough to shoot down a MiG-29 fighter. Very cool.'
'Let's try the last part of the test,' Patrick said. He quickly entered commands into the attack computer. It had stored information on the launch point of the SA-10 missile they had shot down, computed from tracking information by the laser radar arrays. Patrick slaved the laser telescope to the launch point coordinates, starting with a wide image. There, on the multifunction supercockpit display, he saw the entire SA-10 'Grumble' surface-to- air missile battery-the mobile engagement radar, the command post and low-altitude radar vehicle, a reload vehicle, and the four-round transportererector-launcher vehicle. Two rounds had obviously been fired from that vehicle. Patrick focused the telescope until the crosshairs were centered on one of the still-loaded launch tubes. The image was not as clear as the others were-the image was out of focus and wavered. Obviously it was harder for the adaptive optics to focus the image while shooting down through the atmosphere than it was to shoot across or up.
'C'mon, baby, let's see what you can do,' Patrick said. He hit his voice command button: 'Attack target,' he
