“We can’t do much about the tactical situation,” Hardcastle said. “We can nail the pilots busting the rules or declaring an emergency in order to circumvent the rules and get on the ground faster, but for the time being I don’t think Washington is going to want to hear any more plans to restrict air traffic any more than what we’re doing right now. I’d like to see the FBI take off the kid gloves and beat the bushes a little harder for Cazaux, but I believe they’re working as hard as they—”
“Major Kestrel, another target just busted the arrival routing,” one of the surveillance technicians said as he approached the group. “SD wants you back up on headsets.”
“On my way,” Kestrel said, popping one more antacid before leading Hardcastle and Vincenti back to the Weapons Controller section of the AWACS radar plane. He reached his seat, slapped on his headset, and turned to his Senior Director: “What do we have, Todd?”
“A private 727 on the Acton Two Arrival with a lost flight plan,” the Senior Director reported. “Departed San Antonio International about an hour ago—that’s been confirmed by the tower crew.”
“Can’t let him into DFW without a flight plan,” Kestrel said emphatically. “Why the hell didn’t ATC kick him out and tell him to return to San Antonio?” He knew that was a rhetorical question that his Senior Director couldn’t answer, so he flipped his communications panel to his discrete Dallas Approach channel: “Dallas West Approach, Tiger Airborne Control.”
“This is Dallas West Regional, go ahead.”
“Yes, sir, that private 727, radar ID 35T90, doesn’t have a flight plan for Dallas-Fort Worth International. Landing is prohibited without an IFR flight plan coordinated through me. Landing at DFW, Love, or Alliance is not authorized.”
“Stand by one, I’ll give you to my military operations desk.” Kestrel was put on hold for about a minute, and then he had to explain the situation all over again to the Dallas TRACON military operations officer again, who responded, “We’ve been losing lots of flight plans, Tiger. The system is jammed. We’d lose five percent of the flight plans on a normal full-up day—now, with every plane in the sky filing a flight plan, we can’t keep up.”
“I understand your problem, Approach, but let’s deal with this guy first,” Kestrel interjected. “Reroute the guy either to one of the satellite airports or back to San Antonio—he can’t land at DFW, Alliance, or Love.”
“I thought the procedure stated that you military types would visually identify any aircraft that was not on a flight plan or that was not following his clearance.”
“That’s correct,” Kestrel said. “If he tries to fly toward the primary airport in Class B airspace without a flight plan, without a clearance, or if he’s not following his clearance, he will be intercepted.”
“So why not just intercept this guy, visually check him out; then make the decision to let him land?”
“Sir, that’s not the purpose of the procedure,” Kestrel said patiently. “The purpose of an intercept is not to visually identify him, but to shoot him down as far away from the primary airport and from populated areas, if that becomes necessary.”
“Why do you want to shoot him down, for God’s sake?” “I don’t want to shoot him down,” Kestrel said. He looked at Hardcastle, who was listening in on the conversation with an expression of absolute disbelief on his face. Sir, the aircraft does not have a proper flight plan in the system—that’s a violation, and it makes him a suspected terrorist. He’s approaching a high-volume primary airport in Class B airspace, one of the airports designated as a high-value asset by the federal government. He’s supposed to be on the Acton Two arrival, but I have him three miles east of HULEN intersection and one thousand feet low.”
“Is he on a vector?”
I don’t know, sir,” Kestrel said, ready to tear his hair out in utter frustration. He turned to his Senior Director, who nodded his head “yes” at the question. “My senior director says he is on a vector, Approach, but that doesn’t matter. All I know is that he doesn’t have a flight plan, he’s not on a published standard arrival routing, and he’s not on a published approach procedure. I’m asking you to divert him to a satellite airport or back to his departure airport.” There was a slight but maddening pause, then: “Okay, Tiger Control, I . . . sir, it’s really busy here, and I’m not quite sure what the problem is . . .”
“I’m trying to explain it to you, if you’d just listen to me.” “I didn’t catch that last, Tiger,” the supervisor said in a detached, bureaucratic way that told everyone listening in that he heard what Kestrel said but was ignoring him. “If you think you’ve got a terrorist situation, perhaps I’d better turn you over to the chief of security operations or the deputy director. Stand by one.”
Hardcastle keyed his headset mike button: “Dallas Approach, this is Admiral Ian Hardcastle speaking. I’m the Special Assistant to the President for Air Defense Operations.” Kestrel was shaking his head at Hardcastle, silently asking him not to get into it, but it was too late now. “I’m in charge of this antiterrorist operation. I’m ordering you to divert this suspect aircraft away from Dallas-Fort Worth Airport until his identity can be verified. Do you understand me?”
“Who is this again?”
“This is Admiral Hardcastle, Special Assistant to the President.”
“President of.. . the United States? Is that what you’re saying?”
Hardcastle’s back stiffened angrily, his cheek muscles quivering. He grasped his headset mike, pulled it closer to his lips, and shouted, ‘The name’s Hardcastle, sir. I am the man who is going to make your life miserable if you don’t comply with my instructions.”
“Ah . . . right—Mister Hardcastle.” It was obvious by the controller’s voice that he wasn’t accustomed to being threatened and he was done talking. “I’m turning you over to the deputy facility director—you can make your requests and your threats to him. Stand by, please.” And the line went dead, replaced by soothing mood music.
“Damn it, he cut us off,” Kestrel said. On intercom, he said to his senior director, “Todd, divert Tango X-Ray-311 for an ID intercept on target ID 35T90. Classify that target ID as ‘unknown.’ Transmit an alert to Tiger units 112, 113, 131, and 132, but send a HOLD FIRE and have all units acknowledge.” Kestrel turned to Hardcastle and said bitterly, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this one, Admiral. The shit’s starting to pile up real fast.”
Air Defense Battalion Master Information and Coordination Central, DFW Airport
Lieutenant Colonel Valerie Witt was breathing heavily from the run from the control tower to the access elevator that took her up to the roof of terminal 2W. This was where her Master Information and Coordination Central van was ! set up, as she hurried into the van and stood between the battalion engagement officer, Captain Jim Connor, and the battalion fire unit technician, Master Sergeant Mike Pierini, in the front of the cab. “What do we got, Jim?”
“Tiger Control just made this guy an UNKNOWN,” Connor replied, tapping the eraser point of his pencil on his radarscreen. “No flight plan on him. Tiger is scrambling two fighters, and they’ve alerted NAS Dallas and Carswell Patriot batteries and HAWK units 131 and 132. We’ve acknowledged the HOLD FIRE order.”
Witt relaxed and got her breathing under control. It was just another alert, probably the fifteenth one since she set up operations here less than two days ago. As it was during the Persian Gulf War of 1991, the brass aboard the AWACS radar planes flag everybody even marginally suspect as UNKNOWN during the first few days of a conflict. When the friendly forces became more organized, everyone got more comfortable, and procedures became better understood and more routine, the numbers of alerts decreased, even to the point where engaging a SCUD missile was considered routine. This was shaping up to be the same. Witt checked the status readouts—yes, every Patriot, HAWK, and Avenger fire unit was reporting “HOLD FIRE.” The unknown was still over thirty miles out, well within range of Patriot and coming within range of HAWK bat
teries in a few minutes. The Air Force fighters were airborne, and MICC had a solid track on them. No crisis yet.
Witt studied the battalion engagement officer’s radarscreen as the fighters converged on the suspect airliner. The airspace for fifty miles around Dallas-Fort Worth had been divided up into safe-fly corridors, which corresponded to the FAA’s published STAR, or Standard Terminal Arrival, procedures. The corridors were like gradually narrowing chutes beginning at four radio navigation beacons surrounding DFW, angling down from the higher en route altitudes to lower terminal and approach altitudes. If they were heading toward DFW in a threatening way—a combination of high airspeed, low altitude, not following airways, and no identification beacon meant “threatening” to the Patriot fire control computers—any aircraft straying outside the safe-fly corridors could legally be shot at by Patriot surface-to-air missiles. Inside twenty miles to the airport, the corridors became narrow funnels, and within two miles of the runway, the safe-fly zone was a thin tube only a few hundred feet wide. Although Patriot missiles could hit a hostile plane anywhere along its route of flight, even at very low altitude and close to the terminal buildings, their assigned fire area was from twenty to fifty miles from DFW. The HAWK missiles ; would engage between twenty and two miles from the termi- [ nal buildings, and the Avenger Stinger missiles and .50- caliber cannons would engage inside two miles.
“I don’t get it—what’s going on here?” Witt murmured. Until a few seconds ago, this new unknown had been a reg- , ular inbound, a private Boeing 727 executive corporate or charter job, squawking all its normal beacon codes and doing generally normal things in a very confusing airspace system. Now, the Air Force AWACS radar crew had made it an “unknown.”
“We got a kill code of 0.75 from Patriot,” Sergeant Pierini called out. The Patriot fire control computer was ] programmed with a set of hostile-aircraft flight parame- ters—distance, speed, heading, altitude, flight path, location in or away from the safe-fly zones, general tactical , situation—and every target was assigned a hostile track code, or “kill code.” A score of 1.0 meant that Patriot be- < lieved the hostile was going to strike either the Patriot site or Patriot’s assigned protection zone. Next to the target’s 1 kill code was Patriot’s estimate of a successful kill if it launched on the hostile track—right now, patriot’s confidence of a kill was 0.95. It was probably an underestimate.
“Hold fire, Sergeant,” Witt said. “The fighters are on him. Let them deal with this sucker.”
“All units acknowledging HOLD FIRE,” Pierini replied.
Aboard the F-16 ADF Fighter Tango X-Ray-311
The vertical and horizontal antenna sweep indexers on the F-16 ADF’s AN/APG-66 radarscope continued to move, but a small white box had appeared at the upper-left portion of his F-16 Fighter Falcon ADF’s radarscreen. Captain Ron Himes, 111th Fighter Squadron “Texans,” Ellington Field, Houston, Texas, clicked a button on his throttle, moving two white lines called the target acquisition symbol onto the white box, then pressing and releasing the button to lock the cursor onto the target. He switched to medium PRF, or pulse-repetition frequency, to get a clearer look at the target. The fire control computer displayed the unknown target’s flight parameters—range thirty miles, speed three hundred knots, altitude five thousand feet and descending. Himes clicked open his radio and reported, “Tango X-Ray-311, judy,” indicating he had the target on radar and needed no further intercept information.
“Roger, 311,” the weapons controller aboard the E-3C AWACS radar plane responded. “Check nose cold, ID only. You’re cleared in the block angels six to eight.”
“311 copies, ID pass only, nose is cold,” Himes responded, letting the controller know—for the third time since takeoff—that all his weapons were safe. He transitioned from the radarscope on his instrument panel to his heads-up display, which also showed the radar target lock, and prepared for the intercept. Unlike the past few years, when all the F-16 Air Defense Fighter birds carried was ammunition for the cannon, Himes’ and his wingman’s birds were fully armed in air defense/intercept configuration. Himes carried six AIM-120A Ram radar-guided missiles on this mission, plus one fuel tank on each inboard wing pylon and two hundred rounds of ammunition for his 20-millimeter cannon; his wingman carried four AIM-9P Sidewinder heat-seeking missiles instead of the newer Ram missiles. The AIM-120A Ram missile was a medium-range “robot” missile, capable of guiding itself to a target at over twice the speed of sound from twenty-five miles away with its own on-board radar, rather than having the launch aircraft illuminate the target for it.
A lot of low-level humidity haze and a few summertime thundercloud buildups in the vicinity of Dallas-Fort Worth Airport were the only obstructions in the sky. Himes encountered a little thermal turbulence at all altitudes, and the cockpit glass acted like a greenhouse, trapping the hot Texas sun inside the cockpit and baking his slate-gray helmet. Himes usually enjoyed flying, even in these conditions, but this assignment was demanding and very frustrating. Only two F-16 fighters from his unit had deployed to DFW Airport, since Texas Air National Guard fighters were being sent as far away as Ohio to fly air defense missions over major airports, and resources were very scarce. That meant Himes and his wingman, Captain Jhani McCallum, one of the first black female combat pilots in the world, took all the scramble calls for this very busy airport.
It was never anticipated that the interceptors would be used so much, and the strain was starting to wear on Himes. On average, an Air National Guard fighter on alert would launch once in a three-day alert shift and spend about two hours in the air. Here at DFW, they were launching every few hours, day or night, good weather or bad. No sooner would they land from one scramble and refuel, and they’d be off on another chase. A sortie lasted only twenty to thirty minutes, but the tension was ten times greater than anything most of them had ever experienced. They were chasing down a deadly terrorist who could kill hundreds of people in one pass if the interceptor pilots didn’t do their job. But so far all they had accomplished was to train live missiles and guns on airliners filled with travelers, not explosives. It was a deadly game.
Himes saw the airliner’s smoke trail first. He wagged his vertical stabilizer, a visual signal to McCallum to extend into combat spread formation left, then gently eased into a left rolling climb. As the airliner slid underneath him, Himes continued his roll until he was above and to the 727’s right side, beside the tail. He made a fast check— good, McCallum was in position above and behind the airliner’s left wingtip. She would stay in that support position until this 727 was either on the ground, no longer classified an unknown—or they destroyed it.
“Tiger Control, 311 in position, nose cold, radar down, wingman on guard,” Himes reported to the AWACS Weapons Controller assigned to him. “Stand by for visual ID.”
“Tiger Control, ready.”
“Tango X-Ray-311 lead has intercepted a Boeing 727 airliner, registration number November 357 Whiskey. Beige in color with royal blue stripe across the windows, no lettering. Large heraldic crest in gold on the blue vertical stabilizer.” Himes slid a few more yards to the left, close enough to see a shadow of his number-one AIM-120 Ram missile on the airliner’s tail. “Reads ‘U-N-I-V-E-R-S- A-L’ on the scroll. I observe several sealed windows on the right side over the wing. The aircraft appears to be in Westfall Air livery, repeat, Westfall Air charter livery. Moving underneath.” Westfall Air, based at Dallas-Fort Worth and owned by the same company in Scotland that owned Universal Express overnight package service in Memphis and Sky Partner International Airlines in New York City, was one of the largest air charter operations in the south, and its planes were well known to most Texas fliers.
Himes gently eased below the fuselage until he could see the entire underside of the jet. It was filthy dirty from years of accumulated tire smoke and perhaps some rough handling, but otherwise normal. “311 is underneath the target aircraft. No open panels, no underslung devices. No unusual antennas. Moving forward in vis
ual range of the target’s crew.”
“Clear,” the weapons controller acknowledged.
Himes carefully slid out, then above the airliner, then eased forward until he was abeam the cockpit windows. Then he slid forward and gently in toward the airliner until he could see the pilots turn their heads toward him—he knew he had their attention now. “Tiger Control, I have positive visual contact on two male individuals in the target’s cockpit, and they do see me as well, repeat, they do see me.” He hit a button on his multifunction display, which activated a video camera that had been mounted on the right wingtip. The video was displayed on the multifunction display. Himes adjusted the steerable camera with a toggle switch on the instrument panel until he could see the cockpit, then zoomed in until he could clearly see the i faces of the men in the airliner cockpit looking back at him. / “Smile for the camera, boys,” he said half-aloud as he zoomed in for a nice tight shot.
“Tango X-Ray-311, this is Tiger Control, you are clear to divert the flight, preferred destination airport from your present position is Fort Worth-Meacham, heading three- five-one at two thousand feet, do not overfly Carswell Air , Force Base or Naval Air Station Dallas. Landing at Alliance Airport or Dallas Love Field not authorized. Weapon status is HOLD FIRE, repeat, HOLD FIRE, acknowledge.”
“Tango X-Ray-311 acknowledges weapon status HOLD FIRE, my nose is cold. Switching.” He punched up FTW on his navigation computer, got a heading to Fort Worth-Meacham Airport, just fifteen miles west of DFW, switched his radio frequency to simultaneous VHF and | UHF GUARD, the international aviation emergency chan- ' nels, and clicked open his mike. “Attention, 727 airliner November 357-Whiskey, this is the United States Air Force 1 fighter Tango X-Ray-311 abeam your right cockpit. You are in violation of emergency federal air regulations. All I previous ATC clearances are hereby canceled and continued flight toward Dallas-Fort Worth Airport is denied. You are hereby ordered to turn left and fly heading three-five- zero, descend and maintain two thousand feet, and lower your landing gear immediately. Prepare for a VFR approach and landing at Fort Worth-Meacham Airport. Acknowledge these instructions on VHF frequency 121.5 or UHF 243.0 now. Over.”
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