117 Gunpowder (1/2)

”Ahh... fuck...” Flight Lieutenant Peter gripped the parachute controls as he floated down, his chute deploying automatically. A second white chute was drifting down following the wind, meant that Flight Sergeant Legos had also safety ejected from the dead plane. ”Tommy is gonna tear me a new one for ruining his plane...”

He had tried a tricky maneuver, going vertically up and dropping all power, letting the plane free fall down before bringing the throttle up. He nearly succeeds, the plane slowly responding to his controls, but it pushed the engine beyond its limits and started to overheat, red warning lights lit up and the engine died, sending the plane into a flat spin.

Immediately he yelled for Legos to eject, and pulled the release for the canopy where explosive bolts blew the canopy away and he waited till Legos to eject out before he pulled his own ejection bar.

As he floated down, a couple of jeeps with red and blue lights flashed and raced towards their landing locations, while another jeep and a red half track headed to the crashed plane were thick smoke was brewing out, most likely the red fire truck was going to put out the fire.

The ground soon reared up towards Peter and remembering his training, he flared the parachute and kept his knees bent and landed, his momentum making him running a few paces before he came to a stop.

Almost a hundred meters away, Legos also landed, but with more grace than him who gave a thumbs up to indicate he was alright, after which he started to collect the parachute.

One of the jeeps screeched to a halt next to Peter while the other jeep headed to where Legos had landed. ”Any injuries?” One of the elves asked, his armband had a red cross.

”I'm unhurt, just my ego is injured,” Peter gave a sigh as he rolled up his parachute. ”Gonna be a hell of a report to write when I get back.”

-----

Sawtooth Mountain Pass, Marine Support Base, CO office

Peter and Legos stood at attention, having a day to recover from their mishap, in front of Commander Tommy's desk. Captain Blake sat at one of the chairs, facing the two pilots, watching them sweat.

”So from your report, you tried to pull a stunt, going 90 degrees vertical and flat dropping down into a dive, but was unable to recover cause the engine stalled?” Tommy asked sternly.

”Yes, Sir!” Peter responded. ”As per instructions on the test run, I managed to find a way on how the engine will overheat and stall, Sir!”

Blake gave a bark of laughter. ”Damn this kid is good.”

Tommy's face turned red, ”Goddamn it Peter, you knew that this is a prototype and maneuvers like that, especially on a pusher configuration, the engine will stall!”

”Now you just cost us weeks and months of research and material losses!” Tommy scolded, ”You are lucky the Captain did want to write you up on charges of recklessness and destruction of government property!”

”Calm down, Tommy,” Blake said, ”Good thing is both pilots are fine, we can always build another plane, it is also the purpose of the trial flights to find issues and problems before mass production.”

”Dismissed!” Tommy said, waving the two out of his office, who both gave a salute and retreated rapidly out.

”Well, at least we know pushing the engine too hard will cause it to overheat and stall,” Blake said. ”Guess we need a coolant for the engine.”

Tommy nodded, ”That's an issue with pusher engine configurations, it doesn't get cooled as much as a pull configuration engines as the propellers cool the engines.”

”I think the next gen aircraft design will be a traditional engine mounted forward,” Blake sighed, ”New monoplane designs for faster speeds in the future once we have enough materials to construct them, but we really lacking the skill sets and knowledge on building a proper aerodynamic frame.”

”Luckily we have a couple more airframes on standby, except we are not using carbon fiber for the struts and supports, but with wood,” Tommy said. ”We don't have that must stock of carbon fiber, nor do we have the capability to produce more.”

Tommy mentally calculated and said, ”My guys will be able to assemble up the remaining two airframes in a day. As for the crashed bird, maybe the engine and cockpit could still be salvaged, but the airframe, wings, and tail are totaled.”

”We can rebuild it, but it will take a week or so,” Tommy added, ”At least, a basic flight can be achieved with the prototypes. I could get the recruits to start doing practice takeoffs and landings first.”

The current cadre of trainee pilots was drawn from volunteers from both elves and humans. Some of the crew members had experience in flying hover cars and ultralights as hobbies when on Earth. They applied to be part of the Airforce when they heard that pilot positions were opened. Now, after everyone passed the basic entry requirements, which out of 200 over applications, less than 60 passed. They went through a daily rigorous training both physically and mentality, as they require a fit and strong body to resist against G-forces, and also the ability to handle stress while making split-second decisions while under fire.

”Once the other two prototype frames are fitted with the engines, I will start the men on the basics, once they are ready, they will be doing actual flying,” Tommy said, ”So far all they were doing is just simulated flying and lessons on tactics and formations.”

Blake nodded, ”Do it but do it with safety in mind. I don't wanna lose both men and machines to careless mistakes.”