Buccaneer
An American pilot once told me “If the unthinkable happens, our job to to unthink back”. In the Fleet Air Arm we described the same concept in terms of duty to crown and country. Mutually assured destruction. You launch your nukes, even though we’re already dead, we’ll launch ours back just as hard. But would we? Until today it had been an abstract concept. Something to talk about with other strike pilots late at night in smokey drunken bars or to furtively discuss with the chaplain over a cup of tea.
I kept the Buccaneer low. Sixty feet above the surface of the ocean. Six hundred miles an hour. The bomb in her belly, eighteen kilotons of hell. Below radar, undetectable in the black wet filthy night, I pushed the plane harder because flying took my mind off everything else. We’d lost contact with the carrier thirty minutes out. Our radio direction finders stopped working right after that. We were on inertial navigation now. Everett, my observer feeding me minor course corrections. He started to say something about slowing down, conserving fuel for the return trip, but it trailed off into nothingness. He knew as well as I did, the carrier was gone, the UK too. Most of the world was gone if we were being honest. I’d already decided we’d try for Norway.
Fifty miles out from Murmansk naval base I armed the weapon and opened the bomb bay. It was a dumb bomb, we had to toss it in and then turn hard to escape the blast. Everett started to say something. Something about aborting. Something about civilians and pointlessness. I tried not to think about my family. My wife. I closed the bomb bay door. We cruised for sixty seconds. Everett opened the bomb bay door.
We came in on visual. The port was lit up like it was Christmas. Population, about half a million. Families, children, people like us. A school athletics field, a church, shops, a carpark. The training had kicked in and I wanted it to kick right back out. Everett made the decision. With ten seconds to spare, he shut the bomb bay doors. I had time to open them again, but fair enough I decided. Enough shit for one day. I dragged the jet up and around aiming for Norway.
It could have been a missile, it could have been a bird, it could have been my flying, but the port engine exploded just as we reached Norway. I turned the jet towards land and tried to climb, but she wasn’t having it, I looked back over my shoulder and all I could see was flame. I told Everett to eject, counted to three and then banged out myself.
I woke up head down in a snowdrift. I knew I was head down because of the blood coming out of my nose. I’d been lucky, landed on a snow covered river and the chute had dragged me to the river bank and then got tangled in some bushes.
I dug myself out and walked to this shepherds hut. Cans of food, a stove and dry clothes. I’ve written down what happened, I’m going to put this record in a bottle and bury it near the crash site. Maybe one day somebody will find it and understand. In the morning I’m going to climb to a higher location and try to get my radio working. Maybe I can find out how the world ended.
Peter Allen, Pilot, Royal Navy, 17th December 1974
Footnote:
This text was found in a metal mess tin buried near a shepherds hut north of Herdvin in 2014. The British government formally denies all knowledge of Peter Allen and there has been no nuclear war. Norweigan authorities searched for a crashed aircraft in the area but nothing was found.
Milford Haven November 2019
I kept the Buccaneer low. Sixty feet above the surface of the ocean. Six hundred miles an hour. The bomb in her belly, eighteen kilotons of hell. Below radar, undetectable in the black wet filthy night, I pushed the plane harder because flying took my mind off everything else. We’d lost contact with the carrier thirty minutes out. Our radio direction finders stopped working right after that. We were on inertial navigation now. Everett, my observer feeding me minor course corrections. He started to say something about slowing down, conserving fuel for the return trip, but it trailed off into nothingness. He knew as well as I did, the carrier was gone, the UK too. Most of the world was gone if we were being honest. I’d already decided we’d try for Norway.
Fifty miles out from Murmansk naval base I armed the weapon and opened the bomb bay. It was a dumb bomb, we had to toss it in and then turn hard to escape the blast. Everett started to say something. Something about aborting. Something about civilians and pointlessness. I tried not to think about my family. My wife. I closed the bomb bay door. We cruised for sixty seconds. Everett opened the bomb bay door.
We came in on visual. The port was lit up like it was Christmas. Population, about half a million. Families, children, people like us. A school athletics field, a church, shops, a carpark. The training had kicked in and I wanted it to kick right back out. Everett made the decision. With ten seconds to spare, he shut the bomb bay doors. I had time to open them again, but fair enough I decided. Enough shit for one day. I dragged the jet up and around aiming for Norway.
It could have been a missile, it could have been a bird, it could have been my flying, but the port engine exploded just as we reached Norway. I turned the jet towards land and tried to climb, but she wasn’t having it, I looked back over my shoulder and all I could see was flame. I told Everett to eject, counted to three and then banged out myself.
I woke up head down in a snowdrift. I knew I was head down because of the blood coming out of my nose. I’d been lucky, landed on a snow covered river and the chute had dragged me to the river bank and then got tangled in some bushes.
I dug myself out and walked to this shepherds hut. Cans of food, a stove and dry clothes. I’ve written down what happened, I’m going to put this record in a bottle and bury it near the crash site. Maybe one day somebody will find it and understand. In the morning I’m going to climb to a higher location and try to get my radio working. Maybe I can find out how the world ended.
Peter Allen, Pilot, Royal Navy, 17th December 1974
Footnote:
This text was found in a metal mess tin buried near a shepherds hut north of Herdvin in 2014. The British government formally denies all knowledge of Peter Allen and there has been no nuclear war. Norweigan authorities searched for a crashed aircraft in the area but nothing was found.
Milford Haven November 2019