Basher Five-Two

by Scott O'Grady

  Setting goals was a necessity for me. Whether it was to grab a quick nap, find something to eat, or move a few yards closer to that final hill, having a goal focused my thoughts and energies. Growing up, I had always carved out one goal or another for myself. Whether it was making my high-school football team or becoming an air force pilot or getting rescued, I could never live my life any other way.

  Lying there in that hole, I would at times grow sad and feel sorry for myself. That’s when I tried my best to remember that I had been extremely lucky so far. I knew the Vietnam-era stories of U.S. Navy and Air Force pilots who’d been shot down by the enemy and captured and who had then spent years in captivity. Many had died. If I was captured in the days ahead, I too had to be prepared to give my life for my country. I knew I could do that, but I also knew that if I stayed alert and determined, the enemy would have to be very good and very lucky to find me. During the Vietnam conflict, an American pilot named Lance Sijan had been forced to eject from his plane over the mountains of Laos. His leg was mangled, and with no emergency rucksack containing water or food, he had to crawl through the Laotian jungle for six weeks, surviving on whatever he could find. Later he was captured, managed to escape, but was recaptured by the enemy. Eventually he died in a prison in Hanoi. Nevertheless, his strong will to survive and be free was an inspiration to every pilot I knew.

  Staring out at the Bosnian countryside, I began to wonder what was happening at Aviano. I knew it was too early to assemble any kind of rescue attempt. No one had proof that I was alive or knew where I was. But I was confident that I hadn’t been forgotten. I hoped that Wilbur and other pilots were flying overhead looking and listening for some sign of me. My friends weren’t going to let me down, just as I wouldn’t have let them down if they had been in my shoes. Teamwork is the cornerstone of the military. From the first day of your training you learn to trust and rely on the person next to you, just as he or she trusts and relies on you.

  In the middle of my thoughts, I suddenly heard two male voices in the distance. I immediately pressed as deeply as I could into the ground. The voices grew clearer and louder. Soon I could hear footsteps. Where had they come from? Were they soldiers? I curled my body into a tight ball and once more held my breath. I was staring into the ground and couldn’t see their faces. Though I wore my gray ski mask, I didn’t risk looking up. I knew from survival school that just the whites of your eyes were enough to give you away.

  The two men came within feet of me—as close as the grandfather and grandson had come yesterday—and, miraculously, they walked on.

  I don’t know how long I waited before I turned my head and gazed back at the countryside. Everything looked peaceful, but my ears told me a different story. I could hear gunfire in the distance, and after a few hours the rotor blades of a helicopter vibrated in the sky. The chopper was skimming the tree line and for a few seconds hovered nearby. My heart leaped to my throat. Could it be from Aviano? I twisted my head up and recognized a Soviet-made chopper called the Gazelle. The chopper belonged to my enemy, not to any of my rescuers. I could actually pick out the faces of the two pilots, and even though I was well hidden, I worried about their spotting me by chance. The fact that the Serbs were now mounting an air search meant that I was a very valuable prize. More soldiers and helicopters would probably be coming. Minutes earlier, I had boldly thought of trying to make radio contact during daylight. The sight of the Gazelle chopper convinced me to give up that fantasy. I couldn’t risk having my signal intercepted by the enemy and being found.

  There were no more incidents the rest of the day. I could hear cows mooing in the distance, but no sounds of people. By evening I was prepared to move again. My goal was to make my way toward that hill I had marked on my EVC. I didn’t know how long it would take, and I wasn’t going to fix a deadline. I was mentally prepared to be in Bosnia for weeks, if necessary, because I refused to rush into careless mistakes.

  Sometime around nightfall I made the decision not to pick up and run. Despite the encounter with the two men this morning, my hole-up site gave me decent cover, and I wasn’t risking too much by sticking around another twenty-four hours. There might also be something to gain. First, I needed to conserve and even build my strength. If I got some sleep, I’d be in better shape for tomorrow night’s journey. I hadn’t slept in thirty-six hours. Why struggle ahead now, when my mind wasn’t clear? Second, I’d have ample time tonight to try my radio again. Third, I could keep observing and listening to what was around me. I could do some intelligence gathering and maybe pick up a pattern of enemy activity.

  The night went by peacefully. I tried my radio two or three times in the nearby clearing but heard only the familiar pattern of static. I took several short “combat naps.” These are fitful rests at best, during which you’re just on the edge of unconsciousness, ready to wake at the slightest noise. Dawn finally came, damp and chilly. I kept my arms close to my torso, hugging myself to keep warm. Even though this was summer, the mountainous climate made for cold nights and gray, drizzly days.

  I also woke up hungry. When it came to survival, I knew that food was not nearly as important as water or even sleep. You could live weeks without eating, but not more than a week without some kind of liquid. Go even three days without water, my instructors had told me, and your thinking would become unreliable. But I wasn’t terribly worried about water at the moment. I still had most of my flexipaks, and from the dark clouds that had gathered yesterday evening, I guessed there would be rain soon. Mostly I was just hungry.

  I hadn’t spotted any fruit or berries in the woods. Boldly, I picked a leaf off a tree that I couldn’t identify. Oval, pointed at one end, and thin, the leaf looked harmless enough. Before you stick anything strange into your mouth, you are supposed to test it for harmful effects. The first step is to rub the plant or leaf on the outside of your lip. If your lip becomes irritated, the leaf is no good to eat. If there is no irritation, you rub the leaf on the inside of your lip, to see if that causes a reaction. If not, the next step is to put it in your mouth for a few minutes. If there is no burning, itching, or nausea, you can swallow it with some confidence.

  Taking the recommended time between each step, you could spend up to four hours just waiting to swallow your first leaf. I didn’t feel so patient. After dining on my first piece of greenery, I waited a full hour, felt no ill effects, and swallowed several more leaves. I tried to pick clean ones, without any spots or marks. They had no real taste, and my mouth felt terribly dry afterward. Rather than fill my stomach, the leaves simply made me thirsty. For the rest of the morning I downed the water in several of the flexipaks, including two within a thirty-minute period. Even under normal circumstances the body requires about two quarts a day, with stress, you are supposed to drink more. What little I had, I did my best to enjoy. Each sip tasted more glorious than the freshest glass of orange juice. I kept looking up to the sky, praying for rain. By late afternoon a few drops had landed on my face. Then the sky closed like a door.

  Throughout the day I heard cowbells, and I worried that a herd and its handler might be coming my way. The Soviet-made helicopter made another pass above me before drifting on. Several times I turned on my radio, fitting in my earpiece snugly so that no sound could escape. There was little to hear besides static. Was the radio broken or the batteries not strong enough? Or was I just out of transmission range?

  My morale worsened by the end of the day. I wondered if the lack of water was starting to affect my judgment. Had I wasted a whole day here? Was I really strong enough to move on tonight? Doubts about being rescued dampened my mood. I closed my eyes and said another prayer, a special one this time, inspired by the very country in which I was now so hopelessly lost. The previous winter, when I was in the States for training, I had visited a friend of my mom’s. Her name was Anita, and she’d just come back from the town of Medjugorje, in the south of Bosnia, where many locals and visitors had sworn they’d seen the Virgin Mary. I had never believ
ed in miracles, but I suddenly found myself praying to the Mother of Medjugorje. I began to feel an inner peace, a certainty that I wasn’t alone in the world. I felt that a lot of people were praying for me and my safe return. It was almost like a chorus of voices, and it renewed my courage.

  Late that night, I rose stiffly from my hiding place with slow, disconnected movements. My goal was not to disturb a single twig as I pushed to my feet. Once again, I checked off the items in my rucksack and made sure my radio was secure in my survival vest pocket. I plugged in the earpiece so that I could listen to the radio as I walked. In between my vest and my flight suit I stuffed my tarp, the netting, and the large portions of my EVC, until I looked as though I were several months pregnant. I carried my rucksack like a backpack. I stepped into the meadow and began traveling southeast, heading toward the hill I had indicated on my evasion chart.

  My day of rest in the woods had not been wasted. While I was still thirsty and hungry, I felt a new reserve of energy. Although there were more stars out than last night, making me more noticeable to any sleepless Serbs, I looked upon the night as an old and reliable friend. My legs pushed me up a hill, over its crest, and into an open field. I hesitated. The thought of being exposed as I marched across the field worried me. It made more sense to take extra time and walk along the borders of the field, where there were trees to conceal me. Then I remembered the motto of the Juvats, the Eightieth Fighter Squadron, with whom I had served in Korea. Audentes fortuna juvat, I told myself. Fortune favors the bold. I began walking across the open field.

  Maybe I suddenly had get-home-itis. The desire to get out of Bosnia now fought with the more cautious voice inside me, the one begging me to slow down and be careful. As I navigated across the field, my pace quickened along with my heart. After about fifteen minutes I came over a rise and stopped cold. A pair of steel power line towers, about a quarter mile apart, dominated the landscape like a couple of giants.

  I began to worry about being near a population center. Worse, it was less than an hour before daylight. Birds were already starting to sing. As I hurried ahead, the field narrowed into a broad path, which led up a slope to some dense foliage. With the rucksack bouncing on my back, I sped up my pace toward what looked like a secluded cove, bordered by a steep six-foot-high granite ledge. Still in darkness, I dropped into a maze of bushes and trees.

  Using the Guard channel, twice I called out on my radio. Even though I was now on higher ground, where the transmission should have been better, I got nowhere. Frustrated, I closed my eyes. I didn’t mean to fall asleep, but I did. When I was awakened by the first light of dawn, it took me only seconds to realize I had made the same mistake as two nights ago. In my haste to hide and my inability to see clearly, I had chosen a less than desirable hole-up site. The trees and the undergrowth were too sparse. And the granite ledge behind me made a quick escape difficult.

  As the sky flooded with light, I dashed ten yards into a clump of high thistle bushes across the way. I didn’t care if the thistles scratched my face and hands; the important thing was that they were deep enough to cover me. I went through my slow-motion routine of laying down my tarp and covering myself with the camouflage netting, but not before spreading out my gear so that everything was within easy reach. I had a strict and specific place for each piece of my gear—penlight here, radio there, GPS receiver by my leg. I had come to think of setting up camp as building a nest. It was a step-by-step process, like that of a mother bird bringing in nest material straw by straw. The overall effort, considering how slowly and carefully the nest had to be built, was exhausting. Even stopping to go to the bathroom took ten times longer than normal. At the end of the nest building, my feet once again stuck out of the short netting, my boot heels resting only a few feet from the open field of grass. There was nothing I could do about it. My hole-up site wasn’t perfect, but at least I could see the whole cove and the path leading into it.

  Around me birds flitted from one tree branch to another. Earlier I’d seen a black squirrel scamper across the ground. As hungry as I was, there was no way I could catch the squirrel or a bird, much less start a fire to cook them. The distant sound of a jet to the south took my mind off my stomach. My neck arched up, and I scanned the skies eagerly, hoping the plane was one of ours. The clouds were too thick to see anything, but it didn’t matter, I thought. My faith told me the plane had to be one of NATO’s. It was now Monday. I had been shot down late Friday afternoon. No one had given up on me.

  Fumbling with my radio, I tuned in and tried to monitor both the Guard and the Alpha channel. That’s when I realized that part of my earpiece—the tiny nipple in the middle—was missing. My hands began desperately to search the ground around me. I couldn’t silently monitor the radio without the entire earpiece. And what if the part had fallen on the path to the cove or in the larger meadow? That was the kind of mistake I had worked so hard to avoid. If a local found it, he or she would be sure to tell the entire world, and I could expect an invasion of soldiers. Twenty minutes later, the crisis was over; I found the missing part inside my tarp.

  By the time I fitted in my earpiece, the skies had cleared of any jets. And my radio turned up nothing.

  I used my GPS to ring in three satellites for a fresh set of coordinates. It was nice to know some piece of equipment was working. I was also thankful that I wasn’t too far from my destination. I could make my chosen hill in another day—if I managed to stay alert and focused. My growing concern was water. I’d finished my last flexipak of water early that morning. In forty-eight hours I’d consumed a total of one quart, whereas my body had really needed a minimum of a gallon and a half. Every day the skies turned a deep, leaden gray, followed by a late afternoon or evening drizzle. But it was never enough rain to catch in a Ziploc bag. It was only enough to make me cold and damp. My EVC didn’t show any nearby streams or creeks. While I could hear cows mooing in the background and knew they had to have a source of water, I wasn’t ready to go exploring and risk running into a farmer.

  I don’t know how long I spent praying for a cloudburst. It didn’t have to be the size of Noah’s flood, I told God, just enough to help me fill my very dry body. My mind kept drifting, and though I tried to stay alert, I fell asleep.

  A sharp, repeated clanging woke me. I had been sleeping for maybe thirty minutes. As I struggled awake, the ground trembled behind me, and I was afraid that I had been discovered. Instead, crashing down around me were not soldiers but a pair of large cows. The clanging came from their handler, a man or woman ringing a loud bell, somewhere behind them and out of sight. I thought of shooing the cows away, but that might draw the attention of their handler. My new friends settled in by the grass next to my thistle patch and began munching away to their heart’s content, scarcely looking up at me.

  To amuse myself, I named the two cows Alfred and Leroy, even if those were boys’ names and cows are female. They were the first names that popped into my head. I called their handler Tinker Bell because he or she wouldn’t stop ringing the bell. In one sense I liked the noise. I always knew where Tinker Bell was because of the ringing. But after a while the constant ringing drove me crazy. As the afternoon wore on, Leroy came up to my boots as they peeked through the camouflage netting. I kept looking over my shoulder, wondering if cows liked leather. But my clothes were of much less interest to Leroy and Alfred than were the strands of juicy grass. After a while my friends had had their fill and wandered back the way they’d come. I never did see Tinker Bell.

  During Monday night it rained. Not just another frustrating drizzle, but a hard, merciless thunderstorm that soaked everything around me. At first I just turned on my back and opened my mouth, catching every drop I could. Soon I was using my yellow sponge, frantically running it over the crevices of my rucksack, soaking up the small pools of water. I squeezed out the sponge into a Ziploc bag, overjoyed as I watched the level steadily rise before me. I sponged water off my tarp, my vest, any surface that would cooperate. I didn�
��t have to worry about making too much noise or jerky movements—because no one else was going to be out in this storm. When the rain stopped an hour later, I’d added another pint of water to my travel pouch and had drunk enough to stop the burning in my throat.

  As the storm front passed, the night sky lit up with brilliant clusters of stars. Two meteors streaked across the heavens with a beauty I couldn’t describe. I was reminded of my summers at Camp Reed and the clear skies of northeastern Washington. I thought of my family and friends back home. Were they seeing the same stars I was watching tonight? The nostalgia hit me hard.

  When I came out of my daze, I realized that if I was ever to get home, instead of just dreaming about it, I had to try something different from what I had been doing. I pulled out my radio and turned to the Guard channel. Instead of transmitting my voice, which had gotten me nowhere the last three days, I turned on the universal distress beacon. This was a high-pitched alarm, and for a radio operator it was certainly easier to understand than was a garbled human voice. As the alarm went out, I monitored the radio for a response, turning from Guard to Alpha, the channel with the most privacy, and back to Guard. Nothing. If somebody was listening, they didn’t let me know it.

  I waited ten minutes and tried the beacon again. At first, moving back and forth between Guard and Alpha, I heard only familiar static. A minute later, on the Guard channel, a faint voice broke through. In English, no less. It was a bigger surprise than making contact with ET, and sweeter than a Garth Brooks melody. My heart was about to explode. I pushed the earpiece snugly into my ear and listened intently.

  “Flashman, this is Magic on Guard … heard some beacons … see if you can—”