Page 107 - Never Fly Solo

80 | NEVER FLY SOLO
sight of me? How many times did I tell him not to lose sight?
Who wants to go into combat with someone who can’t even
stay visual?
Although I had lost sight of Koz, I prayed he hadn’t lost
sight of me. The Serbian missile operators on the ground
would love that.
It seemed an eternity before Koz answered. “Two, come
right thirty degrees, I’ll be on your nose for three miles, slightly
high.”
Whew! Koz came through again. How’d he do that? I
thought to myself.
He talked my eyes onto him, and I could feel the tension
dissipate as we got back into position. We were back on
course, flying, as we say, the “same way, same day.”
Fortunately, the rest of the mission was uneventful, and
you can bet that my eyes never left Koz’s jet and his six
o’clock. During the debriefing, Koz asked why I went blind,
and I was straight with him. He was my wingman, and I owed
him the hard truth. I told him I was too busy messing with the
radar and sightseeing and thus failed to check his six as I
should have. And while he didn’t criticize me, I could sense
the disappointment in his eyes. I had let him down, failed in
my primary role as a wingman: not to lose sight. Koz didn’t
need to remind me how hazardous it was for me to go blind,
especially in combat. If the threat had been severe that day,
we both would have been sitting ducks. I never forgot how I
felt that day and vowed I would never again lose sight of my
wingman.

THE INTEGRITY OF YOUR EYES

We have a saying in the fighter pilot world: “Lose sight, lose
fight.” In every combat and training mission, rule number one