How to Protect Your Dick
-Ron "Rowdy" Doughty
I was flying the F-4E at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, NC, 1981 to 1983; a damn fine assignment. We had all kinds of missions, plenty of deployments, including an occasional deployment to the German oasis there at Ramstein Air Base. I was sitting around in the squadron reading a flight safety magazine. A flight safety magazine is a collection of articles about airplane crashes. The typical article is written by some safety officer who investigates the case where some pilot screwed something up and augered his jet into the ground, and then a safety guy preaches a sermon about how you can protect your own dick so that YOU don't go out and crash and burn. The way I see it, church preachers and safety officers have somewhat similar jobs, but a different focus. A preacher manages various programs with the objective of preventing you from going to hell. A safety guy manages programs with the objective of preventing you from going to hell prematurely!
Apparently it had become my turn to be a safety guy and some guy handed me the phone and said "Rowdy, you have a call from MPC." There was some captain there at the personnel center at Randolph AFB telling me that they had an assignment for me to go to Kunsan to be the wing flight safety officer there in Korea. A one-year "remote." Now, I had heard stories about Kunsan, and they weren't good, and I knew this wasn't a good deal that they were trying to deal me from MPC, and I asked if there was an alternative.
"Chief of flight safety at the 3d TFW at Clark Air Base."
"When do I need to be there?"
"May 83."
So, 14 years after having had some adventures in that Philippine tropical paradise, I was heading back.
I drove out to California and took the flight safety officer course at Norton AFB. I got on a 747 at LAX, stopped off in Alaska and Japan. During the flight from Japan to Clark, there was an announcement on the intercom.
"Major Ron Doughty, please come forward in the cabin and identify yourself."
Naturally, I was wondering what the hell the deal was.
Lt Colonel Odis Dinning shook my hand and said he was my new boss and welcomed me to my new assignment. He had my travel itinerary and he had been TDY in Japan and by chance ended up on the same flight with me. That was the most bizarre welcome I've ever had.
A few months later, Dinning got a new assignment and I took his job as chief of safety at the 3d Tactical Fighter Wing. There were multiple military organizations on the base, and the wing was the host unit, so basically I was in charge of, in one way or another, of the whole safety program of the base; ground safety, weapons safety, and flight safety.
Since I was part of the wing commander's staff, they issued me a "brick." A brick was a two-way radio, about the size and weight of a brick, on a frequency used by the wing king's staff. I was the lowest ranking guy on the frequency and I soon realized that the main reason I had a brick was so that the colonels had someone to call and order around. The brick weighed enough that it was a pain in the ass to carry around.
My bronzed souvenir "brick"
One time it did come in handy; I was at the Standardization/Evaluation office taking a test, and there was a critical question on it that I was clueless about. I radioed my office with the brick and had a guy look up the answer for me.
While I was at Clark, the Filipinos had a rebellion, overtook the government, and they were after president Ferdinand Marcos to hang him, or something. The U.S. and the Philippines were allies, and we had orders from Washington to help Marcos escape. Basically, Marcos was on his own to get his ass to the base and then we were to insure that he safely got on a C-130 and escaped to Hawaii. There were a lot of Filipinos who worked on base, and we didn't know whether there might be a plan by some of them to intercept Marcos. The base security police had a motorcycle unit and the chief of security police, Colonel Stan Johnson, planned to have a fleet of motorcycles escort Marcos down to the flightline and get him on the C-130. Marcos showed up at front gate in a motorcade that was hauling all of Imelda's shoes, and whatever other treasure they were able to make off with from their palace in Manila. Colonel Johnson was there, but the motorcycles weren't. I heard the following radio calls on the brick to the security police desk sergeant.
"This is Colonel Johnson at the front gate, where are the motorcycles at?"
There was a hesitation, and the desk sergeant replied:
"Uh, they should be there."
"I KNOW where they SHOULD be, I wanna know where they ARE!"
That's one of the coolest radio calls I've ever heard, and ever since I'm reminded of it whenever someone tells me the way something should be. We had a big ice storm here in Cape Girardeau recently and I heard on the local radio station that Ameren expected the power to be back on by 5:00 PM. At 6:00 I called them to find out when the power was going to be on. They said it should be on now.
"I know that it should be on; I wanna know when it is going to be on."
The safety job at Clark turned out to be one of my best assignments. I got to investigate all kinds of incidents and accidents. I was attached to the 3d Tactical Fighter Squadron for flying the F-4 and twice a week I'd call the scheduler, "This is Major Doughty, put me on the schedule tomorrow around noon." Then I'd show up, get to fly all over hell in the F-4, drop a bunch of bombs, fire 20mm, then come back and get back into the safety action.
We wore a Pacific Air Forces patch on the front of the flightsuit, and a wing patch on the left shoulder, and a squadron patch on the right shoulder. Considering that I was chief of safety, I decided that rather than wear a squadron patch, I'd rather wear my own wing safety patch. On the way over to Colonel Luig's office to ask him for approval of that, I was thinking that after I ask, they'll probably have to do a study and maybe get approval from PACAF headquarters or maybe the Pentagon and that I'd be long-gone before somebody said OK. So I drew up a patch design and took it downtown to Angeles City. The Filipinos are very talented and resourceful and I can guarantee you that you could get anything you wanted downtown. An embroidery shop took my design and made up some patches for me, and I just started wearing them.
I figured if some colonel noticed the new patch and asked about it, I'd just say that, no it wasn't a new patch, that we'd always had that patch at Clark. No colonel ever asked. When you are a can-do type guy, you have to be aggressive and know that you can do what you need to do and go do it.
I had developed a philosophy of investigating accidents that I think I got from detective Lieutenant Columbo; basically, you act dumb, but keep asking "why" questions until you arrive at the root cause of the accident.
When you find the root cause of an accident it will always turn out to be a human failure or error. Typically, you'd find that an aircraft system failed because of a design problem, a manufacturing problem, an installation problem, a maintenance/support problem, or an operation problem. Once you find out what the human error was in one of those areas, then you can recommend a change to keep the same type of problem from happening again. For example, if an engine failed on a jet and it crashed, it's easy just to conclude that engine failure was the cause of the accident. Instead, you ask why the engine failed. So, what you need to do is keep asking "why," sort of like Columbo would, until you get to a "root" cause, to a point where you can determine a preventive action. In this example you might find that the engine failed because of a design problem with a fuel control; then you could recommend a re-design of the fuel control.
Some of the investigators who worked for me were a little annoyed about my philosophy of the cause always being a human factor, because it made investigations more complicated, tracking back to a "real" cause. One time we had an F-4 go out on a night mission and it got hit by lightning and there was enough damage that it triggered a safety investigation. The investigator, Captain Bob Kent, came to my office and enthusiastically announced that he had found a case where my philosophy didn't apply. He proudly pronounced that his investigation was complete, that there was no human factor involved; the airplane got struck by lightning; it was an "act of God."
I said, "Wait a minute, lemme see the weather forecast sheet." Lightning comes out of thunderstorms, and the weather forecast included thunderstorms in the area that night. Sometimes you can't see thunderstorms at night, but they show up real well on the F-4 radar. I asked why they hadn't used their radar to avoid the thunderstorms. It turned out that they discovered during preflight checks that the radar was inoperative, but the pilot wanted to fly the mission anyway, even though there was a regulation prohibiting flight at night in an area of forecast thunderstorms without an operable radar. Then I asked Bob what they were doing when they got hit by lightning. "Cruising at 13,500 feet." I looked at the weather sheet and it said that the freezing level that night was 13,000 feet. The weather manual said to avoid cruising in the vicinity of the freezing level in the vicinity of thunderstorms because that's where most lightning strikes occur. Bob Kent changed his mind about this affair being an act of God. Never trust a guy who has two first names.
When you are a safety guy, the preferred way to have an aircraft crash and burn is for someone to fly a jet from their base and crash it on your base. That's because you are less likely to know the guys who get killed, and the accident investigation board will come from some independent base. And that's what happened several times. Jets flew into Clark from all over the Pacific for the Cope Thunder exercise, and we had our share of accidents. The way it works when a jet augers in, is that the fire department roars out to the scene to put out the fire and rescue any survivors, then the sky cops secure the scene, then the safety guys go in to preserve any perishable evidence and to do a preliminary investigation. That's the fun part of the investigation. A couple of days later the investigation board shows up and they have to do the hard part: dig in and find all the root causes, and come up with a bullet-proof report that describes what happened and what needs to be done to prevent recurrence. One thing that makes the board's job not so pleasant is that the board president is usually a colonel who is under consideration to be promoted to brigadier general, and they gave him the board job as a test. So the colonel knows he is under a magnifying glass and in the spotlight, and he is always cracking a whip over the board members to make them leap around and jump through hoops to get the investigation done right and on time.
We had an F-16 crash during one Cope Thunder exercise; and two helicopters flying in formation at night flew into a mountain and killed eight guys during another Cope Thunder.
Cope Thunder was a large-scale, realistic, 10-day air combat training exercise held about four times a year at Clark. Each Cope Thunder exercise was a multi-service combat operations exercise. Cope Thunder participants were organized into "Red" "enemy" forces stationed at Clark and "Blue" offensive forces that deployed into Clark. The enemy force included ground-control intercept and surface air defense forces to simulate threats posed by potentially hostile nations. These forces generally employed defensive counter-air tactics directed by ground-control intercept sites. Range threat emitters -- electronic devices which send out signals simulating anti-aircraft artillery and surface-to-air missile launches -- provided valuable surface-to-air training. The offensive force included the full spectrum of U.S. and allied tactical and support units.
Cope Thunder was devised as a way to give aircrews their first taste of warfare and quickly grew into PACAF's "premier simulated combat airpower employment exercise." Analysis indicates most combat losses occurrred during an aircrew's first 8 to 10 missions. Therefore, the goal of Cope Thunder was to simulate these first missions, increasing their chances of survival in actual combat environments. Each day the blue forces were given their orders for their missions, then they'd plan the missions to destroy their assigned targets. The red forces, including Aggressor Squadron F-5s that looked like MiGs, planned their missions to stop the blue forces, then the fight was on.
Clark Aggressor Squadron F-5s
On an average, more than 700 people and up to 60 aircraft deployed to Clark for each Cope Thunder exercise. Thousands of people from all four branches of the military, as well as the armed services of the Philippines, Canada, United Kingdom, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, Thailand and the Republic of Singapore, have taken part in Cope Thunder exercises.
The exercise was so large and realistic that it was especially hazardous. Before the exercise kicked off, the Cope Thunder staff had a day of briefings for the participants to aquaint them with the base and the exercise flying area and to outline the scope and procedures of the exercise. As chief of safety at Clark, one of my jobs was to give an informational and motivational safety briefing. Before I did my first Cope Thunder briefing I talked to the commander, Lieutenant Col Stu Mosbey and he said to tell 'em about the hazards, and hit 'em with philosophy, which was exactly what I was going to do anyway. What it boiled down to was that I spent 20 minutes on the stage in front of about 200 aircrew participants telling them how to protect their dicks.
I told them that how they protect their dicks when they went downtown was their business, but in the Cope Thunder exercise that it was our business.
I told them that the real secret to safety was: don't fly the F-4, F-5, F-15, F-16, A-4, EA-6B, T-33, E-3A, or KC-135, don't fly close to the ground, don't air refuel, don't fly high, don't fly close to other aircraft, don't fly in weather, don't fly at night, don't fly in weather at night, don't get low on fuel, don't max perform, don't fire guns and missiles, don't drop bombs, don't fly in a humongous exercise, and don't dick around with switches that have red safety covers. Unfortunately, those don'ts are what they had to do at Cope Thunder
Basically, the way you stay alive in a fighter is through skill and self-discipline. Self-discipline means that your dick is in your own hands. The way you protect your dick in Cope Thunder is by complying with the rules of engagement and the exercise minimums. The "minimums" were regarding established weather minimums, fuel reserve minimums, air-to-air and air-to-ground minimum distances, and altitude minimums.
Velocity vectors: I discussed the concept of the velocity vector. A velocity vector is an invisible vector that is based in the ass end of the airplane, it passes straight forward through the fuselage, including passing directly through the pilot's dick, and goes out the front through the pitot tube on the nose. It extends quite a ways out in front of the jet; the greater your airspeed, the longer your velocity vector is; I mean, it sticks out there for hundreds of feet. In order to protect your dick, you have gotta make sure that the velocity vector is protected. You can drive your velocity vector through clear air, and even through clouds, but if it hits another airplane, the ground or the water, your dick is done for. Actually, I was pretty damn serious about protecting my own dick. Prior to the F-16, fighters had a control stick right between your legs, but in the F-16, your left hand is on a throttle on the left console, and your right hand is on the control stick on the right console.
F-16 Cockpit
That looked way too vulnerable to me. So when they offered me an F-16 assignment, I told them no way. When I'm roaring around at 500 knots and 200 feet altitude, I want my fist on a stick right between my legs, right in front of my dick!
I had given this briefing numerous times, had it polished up, and it was motivational, entertaining, and always well-received. On one occasion, when I reached the climax of my protect-your-dick briefing I made the standard Air Force statement, "That concludes my briefing; are there any questions?"
A pilot stood up toward the back of the auditorium, and it was a woman.
In 1986 there weren't many female pilots in the Air Force, and until this gal stood up, I didn't realize that there was one in the audience, which was probably a good thing, considering the "protect your dick" theme of my briefing. If I had spotted her right off the bat, I would have probably tripped over my dick through the whole briefing.
Well, this put me a little bit in shock and I don't remember exactly what her question was, but it was something about how all this "protect your dick" philosophy applied to her. She thought she had me over a barrel.
The guys in the audience thought I was over a barrel also, they had big grins, and all eyes in the place were on me, anticipating that I was about to go down in flames, right there on the stage.
I mentally tap-danced for a couple of microseconds then said to this gal:
"Well, ma'am, what aircrew position do you fly?"
"Copilot."
"Well, your job, ma'am, is to go out there and fly and help protect your aircraft commander's dick."
There was a huge roar of laughter and applause from the audience, as I made a quick escape from the stage.
-Ron "Rowdy" Doughty
3TFS Scarf
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