| It was now 1977 and my career as an active duty Air Force pilot had not been going very well for the past couple of years. The squadron commander and operations officer did not like me. You might think that as professional in the Air Force whether you're liked or not should make little difference in your career progression, but by this time I had learned it was everything. I decided that since my commitment was running out in six months, I would leave active duty and try my hand at commercial or corporate flying, or even some other line of work. I began to talk to Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve units across the country to see if I could land a flying position and aid in my transition to civilian life. I soon landed a position with the New Jersey Air National Guard at Atlantic City flying the F-106. I would be leaving Michigan in July. Aircraft tail number 70230 was my airplane now, the same one I had the aborted takeoff with the fire some three years earlier. It had taken our unit a year and a half to repair it from that incident, but when it came back out of the hangar, it had my name on it. I took pride in having my own aircraft and flew it as often as I could. It was June now and I was getting short, only a few weeks to separation and my new position as a full-time alert pilot with the New Jersey ANG. The ORI (Operational Readiness Inspection)Team was at our unit and we had been undergoing an extensive review and inspection. I was flying two and three times a day, getting lots of time and having a ball, I really loved flying. One day I was seated in my aircraft, #230, on the runway, running my engine up as I waited for takeoff clearance from the tower. Everything checked out and I received my clearance and started my roll. I selected AB and accelerated out nicely. At 135 knots I fed in back pressure on the stick to raise the nose to takeoff attitude. At 150 knots there was a tremendous explosion and the aircraft immediately began to vibrate wildly. The instrument panel was unreadable due to the shaking, so I had no way to confirm anything on my instruments. I decided almost immediately that the engine must have blown up and so I started through my abort procedure. I cut the throttle to idle, then thought if my engine is coming apart I'd be better off with the throttle in off, so I cut it to off. I reached up quickly to pull the drag chute handle, rotating it 90 degrees clockwise to emergency deploy it. I bypassed blowing off my external tanks this time because I thought I had enough runway to slow sufficiently so as to take the BAK-12 cable at below maximum speed. I hit the tail hook button and the light illuminated telling me the hook was down. Meanwhile the aircraft was out of control. It was literally jumping up and down from one main gear to the other, the nose swinging abruptly 20 to 30 degrees left then right. Then a calm male voice began instructing me. "A little left rudder, OK, now bring in the right, that's it, a little left now, Ok, Just bring the nose down now, a little more right rudder, you're doing good, feed in a little left rudder now, that's fine." I was not hearing the calming voice over my headset, but in my head, directly from a presence that had positioned itself on my right shoulder. I could sense this invisible being which was about one foot tall and I responded to its coaching. Within a five to ten second time frame the aircraft was under control and the vibration ceased. I rolled out smoothly and engaged the cable at the end of the runway. I quickly egressed the aircraft and ran to the side of the runway. The fire trucks soon arrived and as I sat there in total bewilderment I noticed the right main tire was gone. I then realized what had happened. I had blown a tire. I could not believe that just blowing a tire could be so violent; but when you realize that a 22 ply, "Goodstone" tire, inflated to 325psi, and supporting a 42,000 pound airplane, and all that moving at over 150 miles per hour; then its not too surprising. My buddy, the squadron operations officer was quick to point out that I probably had my big feet on the brakes and thereby caused the brakes to overheat during the roll out, causing the tire to fail. I knew better, after all I had over 1000 hours in the Six by now and had never done such a thing. I was cleared as the cause a week later when another F-106 at another base had the exact same scenario happen, but with much less success by the pilot. He was not able to regain control and ended up sliding down the runway upside down. He was very fortunate to survive the crash. Investigators discovered that "Goodstone" had provided the Air Force with a batch of improperly manufactured tires. These tires were recalled, and I'm sure an apology from "Goodstone" followed. I certainly never heard any apology from my operations officer. No matter, I would be off to my new job in a couple of weeks. This experience of actual physical and mental contact with what I believed to be my guardian angel was a real revelation in my life. Not only was I now convinced beyond any doubt that my previous visions had come directly from the spiritual realm, but now I had direct contact which in some strange way imparted a knowledge I had not had before. There was more to life and the world than I had believed. As a child I had been to church off and on, been baptized, confirmed, even read the Bible twice, but up until these incidents it meant nothing to me. There never was any connection. One more vision was yet to come that would change me even more, but also the life of someone very close to me. |
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| My Angel Speaks |