“It will be good to see you again too, mon ami. ” Cazaux laughed.
They were now less than two miles from the runway. McKenzie had made the decision to stay with the cargo plane for the entire approach, flying to the left and slightly behind the L-600—and she kept her 20-millimeter cannon armed and the pipper within a few mils of Cazaux’s plane. If given the signal, she could squeeze off a one-second burst that would certainly shear off the L-600’s left engine nacelle and propeller and send the cargo plane spiraling into the ground, away from the more populated areas of the town of Rancho Cordova north of the airfield and into the vacant tracts of land to the south. She was not sure where Vincenti was, but she assumed he would keep both aircraft in sight at all times and be ready to assist, track, or attack if something went wrong.
“Keep it coming, Cazaux,” Fortuna radioed again. “Keep that airspeed down — and if we hear the power come up on those engines, that’ll be our signal to open fire.”
“I understand, Russ,” Cazaux radioed. He switched quickly to intercom: “Stork — how far?”
“One mile now, sir.”
Cazaux hit a switch on the aft cargo-bay bulkhead, and the cargo ramp began to lower and the upper ramp door began to retract upward into the cargo bay. The electrically actuated upper door was fully raised in just a few seconds; the ramp, powered by large hydraulic arms, took considerably longer. “Get on the front of that pallet, Mr. Krull,” Cazaux said, wearing an evil grin, “and stand by on that last toucari clamp.”
Krull had just barely made his way forward to the front of the pallet when he heard the engines rapidly spooling up to full power. “Get ready!” Cazaux shouted. He switched to the comm channel on the intercom and shouted into the microphone, “Russell, my friend, hold out your hands and close your eyes — I’m going to give you a big surprise!” then dropped the microphone and grasped a bulkhead handhold.
At that instant, the cargo plane heeled sharply upward. Korhonen’s timing was perfect: when Cazaux looked out of the open cargo doors, all he saw was dozens of emergency vehicles clustered near the intersection of the main runway and the large midfield taxiway.
“Now!” Cazaux shouted. “Release!”
Krull pulled on the clamp lever, but nothing happened— it was jammed. He struggled with it, but the steeply angled deck had pulled the straps tight, and the curled toucan clamp would not budge. “It ain’t goin’, man!” Krull shouted.
But Cazaux was already moving. Struggling against the steeply sloped deck, Cazaux reached across the pallet, his large switchblade knife in his hands, and cut the remaining strap. The pallet did not need a push by anyone — sliding on the rollers embedded in the floor of the self-loading cargo hold, the pallet picked up speed rapidly and actually seemed to fly for several feet before it disappeared from view.
Just as McKenzie thought it was all coming to an end, when she could fly her F-16 back to Fresno and receive the warm congratulations of her friends and commanders, all hell broke loose.
The LET L-600 heeled sharply right just a few feet from the ground, right over the biggest cluster of emergency vehicles lining the north side of the runway. The move took her by surprise — she was concentrating more on lining up with the south edge of the runway and keeping the Fighting Falcon in control as she followed the L-600 down the glide path. She applied right stick to follow, but the fighter wallowed and started to sink, and she goosed the power back up to 80 percent. Her next responsibility was to get the gun- sight back on target, but at her present speed and angle of attack, that was impossible. Then the L-600 went into a steep climb, passing virtually directly in front of the pipper. “Control, this is Foxtrot Romeo Two, do I have permission to fire?” she radioed.
“No!” a frantic voice shouted. “Don’t fire! Hold your fire!” But McKenzie realized that the voice didn’t identify himself, and it could be anyone giving that order — even Cazaux himself. She brought the landing gear handle up, then put the aux flap switch to EXTEND, which would keep the trailing-edge flaps down while the gear was up and allow her to fly slower and stay in control.
“Control, do you want Foxtrot Romeo to attack? The target appears to be evading — do I have permission to attack?”
“Linda, this is Al,” she heard on the interplane frequency, “break left! ”
She could hear Vincenti’s sudden warning, but she didn’t dare try to look down into the cockpit to change radios— she was less than three hundred yards from the L-600. She had a momentary thought about turning — an order to “break” was not just a turn, it was a command to get the hell out of there. Instead, she stayed lined up on the left wing of the L-600 and said on the command channel, “I’m staying on the target! Control, what are your instructions? Do you want me to attack? Control, respond…
McKenzie caught a glimpse of a bright flash of light off to her right, but it was near the ground and she assumed it was one of the emergency vehicles’ rotating lights or a photographer’s flash.
Then she saw a huge ripple of lights erupt all around her jet, heard a thunderous bang! and felt a gigantic ramming force smack her F-16’s fuselage.
The thirteen grenades shoved between the cases of Stinger missiles exploded well before the pallet hit the ground, which only served to increase the devastation. The chain reaction created by the exploding grenades was quick and furious — the shrapnel from the grenades tore through the battery unit cases, blowing apart the high-pressure nitrogen-gas canisters, rupturing the battery cells, cooking off the chemicals and spraying superheated chemicals inside the missile coffins. The rocket motors went next. Normally they would slowly bum inside their cases, but the shock and hot chemicals caused them to explode instead. Some of the missiles did cook off, sending white-hot spears of fire into nearby buildings and vehicles. The fragmenting pallet erupted into a blossom of fire when it hit the emergency vehicles on the ground, throwing petals of fire and explosive Stinger warheads out in all directions. The Stinger missiles seemed to have eyes, or active seeker heads — it seemed as if every one of the missiles that cooked off slammed right into a building or vehicle.
“Oh, shit. was all Jefferson Jones could say as he and Cazaux watched the maddening scene unfold below them. It was like watching a fireworks show’s finale from above — the big explosion, followed by numerous smaller explosions, then ripple after ripple of side explosions, and then the twinkling of burning debris scattered all across the airfield.
“That… was… magnificent,” Cazaux muttered. “That was… incredible. Absolutely incredible…
As the L-600 began to level off, then point earthward to regain speed and begin evading pursuit, Krull moved aft and began motoring the ramp and upper cargo doors closed.
Cazaux stumbled around on the right side of the cargo bay, leaning against the second pallet. He then eyed the forward pallet, the one containing the real explosives.
“Move that second pallet aft to the edge of the ramp,” he told Krull as he located the microphone, “and help me move that third pallet aft. I am going to deliver that last pallet on a target that no one will forget for a very long time.” He clicked open the mike: “Stork, do exactly as I say, and your navigation had better be dead on.”
The large MASTER CAUTION light on the left eyebrow panel came on, along with the HYD/OIL PRESS warning light on the right eyebrow panel. It seemed as if the entire caution-light panel was illuminated — ELEC SYS, CADC, STBY GAINS, FUEL HOT, those were the biggies — and the oil and hydraulic pressure gauges were bouncing all over the place.