Chapter 471 Cargo Accident

"Attention, align with the glide path." The voice of the landing guide came through the headset.

The Fresnel optical landing aid system uses optical principles. As long as the height and glide angle of the carrier-based aircraft are correct, the pilot can see the orange light ball in the center of the green reference light. Keeping this angle can accurately glide and land. If the pilot sees a yellow light ball and it is above the green reference light, he must lower the altitude; if he sees a red light ball and it is below the green reference light, he must immediately raise the altitude, otherwise he will hit the end of the aircraft carrier's tail column or land in the sea behind the tail.

Such a system greatly reduces the risk of landing, and the principle is not complicated. Therefore, it is not only used by American aircraft carriers, but even Soviet aircraft carriers are equipped with such landing assistance systems.

However, this landing aid system also has a prerequisite, that is, the pilot can see these lights!

For Powell now, all he could see was the deck shaking back and forth, which was all blurry! In front of his eyes, there was sweat all over! His goggles had been lifted up, and the sweat on his forehead was still dripping down.

His condition was already at its worst, which made the radar operator in the rear cabin sweat. However, he had no flying authority and could only wait for an unknown fate. Powell, who had more than 600 landing experiences, should be able to complete this landing, right?

Powell was trying his best, but his arms were stiff, his fingers could no longer operate the joysticks flexibly, his head was starting to feel dizzy, and even the sound in his headphones became noisy.

"Pull up, pull up!" In the main flight control room on the left rear of the upper part of the island, a flight control officer was monitoring the situation on the flight deck and in the air. From his perspective, Powell had no chance of landing successfully! He had to pull up and take off!

Pull up! This sentence was easy to say. Powell in the air felt that his condition was already the worst. He had no ability to pull up and take off again. In that case, he could only eject and throw the plane purchased with taxpayers' money into the sea!

Land, land! Powell felt that flying had begun to scare him. He tried to hold the joystick steady, waiting for the rear wheels to land on the carrier.

"Hook, hook!" The conductor shouted loudly when Powell was about to land. Damn it, this plane didn't even release the hook! If he couldn't hook the arresting cable, he had to go around!

Almost everyone noticed the unusualness of the plane and they all stepped back for fear of being affected.

"Put up the arresting net!" the flight controller shouted. Now, there was only one last resort left! What had this poor boy experienced in the air?

The flight control officer knew that the pilot definitely didn't have the confidence to make a go-around, so he had to force a landing. But now, the pilot didn't have the ship hook, so he could only rely on the arresting net!

The arresting net is the last of all landing methods. A net is raised at the front end of the landing area to force the fighter planes to crash into it. This will forcibly stop the plane. The advantage is that the plane can stop. The disadvantage is that even if the plane stops, it will be seriously damaged. Although it does not need to be scrapped, it will definitely need a major overhaul, and the nose may even have to be replaced.

This trick should not be used unless it is absolutely necessary.

Upon hearing the order, the personnel in charge of the barrier net quickly raised the barrier net, but at this moment, the situation changed again.

As the main landing gear of the landing Tomcat hit the deck, there was a bang, and the violent impact caused the right wheel to burst!

This poor Tomcat, with a flat tire, suddenly changed its direction and headed straight for the parking area on the right.

The deck crew here dodged one after another. The Tomcat fighter jets were descending at a speed of over 300 meters per second, and the force of their impact was extremely shocking.

"Boom!" The Tomcat fighter plane hit an A-7 attack aircraft in the parking area. Although the A-7 had no bombs on board, it was full of fuel and exploded immediately. In the explosion, several fighter planes nearby were all affected, including the E-2 early warning aircraft with folded wings!

At this moment, with a bang, the Martin-Baker MK14 zero-altitude ejection seat demonstrated its stability and reliability, ejecting the two pilots from the cockpit. This was a true zero-altitude ejection!

In fact, the moment he landed, Powell felt that he had exhausted all his strength. He didn't have the strength to eject manually. Everything was automatically controlled.

The Tomcat fighter not only switched to the F110 engine, but also adopted a new ejection seat. This MK14 ejection seat eliminated the two ejection pull rings on the upper part of the headrest and was equipped with an electronic sequencer to automatically adjust the seat according to the speed and altitude of the aircraft to achieve precise ejection.

When the collision was detected, the ejection seats were automatically ejected, saving the lives of the two pilots. However, the losses caused were enormous.

There was chaos on the USS Independence and the fire was spreading. If it was not controlled, it would burn to the lower levels and not only the carrier-based aircraft but also the ammunition and fuel would be ignited!

There was a wind blowing on the sea, and the fire was on the deck and spreading towards the bridge!

The Independence aircraft carrier was already in ruins, and the brave American sailors were fighting the fire tenaciously. The damage control team took emergency action to put out the fire.

It took a full hour to put out the fire, and the entire rear deck of the aircraft carrier was already in ruins.

Sitting in the command room, Captain Colonel Hilton was extremely depressed. He looked at the two people who were pulled out of the sea in front of him. Powell, who always regarded himself as the ace of American carrier-based aircraft pilots, actually made a serious mistake. He couldn't even master the most basic landing maneuvers of carrier-based aircraft pilots!

"Powell, what's going on?" Colonel Hilton asked him.

"Report, it's all my fault." Powell said. He had become much more sober after being pulled out of the sea by the rescue helicopter, but that huge fear still loomed in his heart.

Is it all my fault, or is it because the Soviets are too powerful?

"You can't just admit your mistakes and solve this problem! The entire rear deck of our aircraft carrier was burned, and we lost more than a dozen carrier-based aircraft. The elevator at the rear was also stuck. We need to leave the Indian Ocean and return to the shipyard for overhaul!" Hilton said, "We lost our combat effectiveness due to a landing accident! Powell, your report cannot be solved by simply admitting your mistakes!"