A letter I wrote my Dad about a B-52 Mission

 (This was my 1988 SAC Bomb Comp mission. June, 1988)

“…Flew all the way out to Red Flag - 11.5 hours round trip! Talk about tired! It was a good mission - we got jumped by a couple of F-15s right after we entered the route, but we dove into the mountains and all they got were a couple of IR passes. My gunner locked ‘em up twice, so we’ll see how it turns out.

The bomb run was pure chaos! They set up Surface-to-Air Missiles all along the approach to the target, and the EW had us all over the sky “avoiding” the threat. All the while I’m trying to aim on radar and zero out our timing. My Nav was sick as a dog, so I’m flailing away doing three things at once! Evidently things worked because the pilots said we flew right over the target and we released within a second of our assigned time.

The Wing Commander met our plane when we finally landed and wanted to know how we did. Who knows? - We’re flying 370 kts at 500 feet… it’s hard to judge if you put it on target or not. So, I lied and said it was a “Shack.” Made him feel good. Oh well, one more to go.”