By Sam Bluntzer
Fighter pilots are an interesting group. I spent the better part of 20 years amongst them, trying to figure out what made my colleagues good at their craft—what made them tick. I suspected there was some commonality, but finding that mutual characteristic proved to be elusive. Counter to common belief, not all fighter pilots are cunning and daring men with devilishly good looks. We come in all shapes, sizes, intellect and attitudes (both good and bad). College wrestlers, former frat boys, nerdy mathletes, you name it.
Besides the pedestrian desire to drink beer, chase women and push the limits of legal, administrative, and aerodynamic laws, I found that all fighter pilots did, in fact, have something in common: there was at least one particular personal skill at which they performed on a master level. That specific skill varied pilot to pilot, but each one had a talent where they weren’t just good, they were great. Some guys had phenomenal mental clarity and could recall their entire sortie, down to the last detail, allowing for a thorough debrief post-flight and therefore, not making the same mistakes in the future. Others just had damn good eyesight, and like a turkey spotting a hunter’s movement out of the corner of its eye, always had the first jump on everyone else. Some were just brutally aggressive and flew with such killer instinct that they were always slashing proverbial throats, overwhelming their opponents. For a while I wasn’t sure if I had that “one thing.”
Another common thread among fighter pilots is we are not known to be home much. We travel to every clime and place to train with other units both in the air and on the ground. One of these places is Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, a fighter base in the Lowcountry of South Carolina, where we were to train for two weeks. MCASB’s Officers’ Quarters are remote, nestled in the swamps at the edge of the base. To get to and from the hangar for the day’s flying, the US government was nice enough to provide rental vehicles. The typical set up was a handful of compact, rice-burning sedans and, if you’re lucky, a minivan.
Also deep in the bowels of the base, near our quarters, was a small neighborhood that had previously housed married Marines of the youngest sort. To no surprise that neighborhood, and the houses within it, didn’t last long. They were razed after some years and all that remained was a giant, mile-long residential circle along where the houses had been. The curb-less, asphalt road sat surrounded by South Carolina pines and the infield was a swampy, unimproved mess.
What do you get when you combine rental cars and fighter pilots? The natural outcome is to create a road race and this abandoned neighborhood was the perfect place to do it. Now it goes without saying, Marine brass would not find it entertaining to know their highly trained pilots had been passing time racing government-funded rental cars (on base, particularly), but as the two-week training took place, we would finish our flying for the day or night and detour to the “track” on our way back to our quarters. As days passed, track times became better and particular rental cars were determined to be the ones with the best speed and handling. I held the best time of the group, I made sure everyone knew it, and with that, placed a target on my back.
At some point though, my time was beaten by Captain Nicholas Johnson, a fellow aviator with whom I had a traversed flight school, our first big boy squadron, and multiple watering holes during our first deployment to Japan. Nick was a connoisseur of motor sports (the European sort), a college lacrosse player, and downright cocky bastard. He let it be known that he now held the time to beat and it stuck in my craw.
That evening, I met up with some old townie friends from my time stationed in Beaufort. We met down on Bay Street and, like all southern suppers, the brown liquor flowed. Digestifs complete and on my way back to the base, Captain Johnson’s track time started bothering me again. I knew the proper course of action was to continue to the officer’s quarters, retire, and live to fight another day—but is that what Pappy Boyington would have done? No.
I tried talking myself into doing the right thing but as the turn-off approached, I gave into my primal side and found myself back at the track, under the cover of the pines. I stopped at the starting line, gave myself a pep talk and ran the track in my mind, imagining every subtle dip and curve. I held the brake, revved the engine of my rented Nissan Versa and started my watch. Between the desire to reclaim the top time and some slight lubrication from dinner, I was making great time. Hitting all the checkpoints perfectly, I glanced at my watch as I rounded the last turn.
As I crossed the finish line in the pitch-black darkness, I stopped my watch with one hand while holding the steering wheel with the other and simultaneously executed a celebratory dance at the realization that I once again had the top track time. The dance proved to be too much and the Versa left the track, careening into the swampy bog. I put the sedan in reverse and quickly realized that this fine piece of machinery wasn’t going anywhere. It was axle-deep in muck.
It had been years since I needed to get a vehicle out of the mud and it was under more favorable circumstances than this. The last time was with a girlfriend I had taken mudding in my 1983 4×4 F-250. This was a different scenario altogether. I’m a grown-ass man, on a military base owned by the United States Marines and had consumed quite a bit of fun-broth that evening. Furthermore, all my buddies that would be willing to help were sound asleep getting their beauty rest for training the next day. Rousting them to help would destroy their required crew rest, ruining the following day’s flight schedule and highlighting all the Tom Foolery with which we had been engaged. I had gotten myself into this mess and now I needed to find a way to get myself out.
Knowing nothing in my immediate vicinity would be of any help, I started to walk towards the modicum of civilization that was the Officers’ Quarters. Making my way along the main road, I kept a close eye out for oncoming vehicles. Surprisingly for this hour, a few appeared and when I hid in the trees along the road, the level of illegality of my present actions became more apparent. Eventually, on my left was a small, single-lane service road that seemed to run parallel with the direction I intended to move. Deciding to take this less-traveled road, I came across a chain link enclosed construction yard I didn’t know existed.
Inside this yard was a bevy of implements and a handful of 18-wheeler-style line trucks that I guessed was for the construction of the new Joint Strike fighter hangers that were underway. The gate was chained but it wasn’t hard to pull it open slightly, just enough to squeeze my body through. I found a perfectly-coiled long webbed strap and, against my better judgment, I approached a truck, found the driver door unlocked and climbed in. In the dark I reached to the ignition and found keys conveniently in place. Deep down, I didn’t want the keys to be there because I knew if they were, I would be taking this truck for a ride. I pressed the clutch, turned the keys, and the big diesel engine roared to life. This is a bad idea, I thought, but defeat wasn’t an option.
Placing the truck in the first of its 16 gears, I lurched forward and approached the chained gate. Is minor property damage upon a federal government installation really that big of a deal? Probably. I placed the bumper of the big rig on the gate and ever-so-slightly eased off the clutch until, amazingly, the chain popped and the gate swung open. I was in the wild now and under the cover of darkness. Feeling renewed, I drove back up the road to the Versa. After wrestling around in the mud underneath the car for a while, I found something to which I could attach the strap, jumped back in the truck, and effortlessly pulled the car to dry land.
The mission was half complete—I still had to clean up the crime scene and get to safe harbor. I drove the truck back to the yard and ensured it was parked just the way I found it. Using a rag I found in the cab, I wiped down for fingerprints. I closed the gate, chaining it back (with one broken chain link, hoping nobody would notice the following day). I hiked back to the rental car, which at this point was covered in mud. To make matters worse, the strap had been cinched so tightly to the underside of the car, I couldn’t get it off barehanded.
Now well after midnight, and in my quest to eliminate any evidence of wrongdoing, I drove to the on-base car wash with the strap tucked neatly away in a partially opened trunk. After about $10 in quarters the car had been sprayed clean of any mud, but the tightly affixed strap still posed a problem. After arriving back at the Officers’ Quarters parking lot, I went to search for a knife. Finding a cutting device proved difficult. For whatever reason, and I always found it funny, Marine Officers’ Quarters across the world always have wine glasses in the room. A proper whiskey glass would be more fitting, but in this case the wine glasses came in quite handy.
I broke the glass in half and, feeling like a prisoner during a jailbreak, sawed at the knot using the jagged edge of the stem. After a while, it came loose. My final task was to dump the contraband strap in a dumpster and cover it with some trash. Mission complete.
After a shower and a mental recounting of my evening, I slept soundly knowing that my record track time was restored and that maybe I did have “one thing” after all: Never say die.
