CAG turned to Wilson and filled him in on the plan. “Okay, once Annie can talk him into a position behind the ship, we’re going to bring him aboard. Right now the airborne aircraft are being recalled, and they are going to do an emergency pull-forward on the roof to make a ready deck. We’ll recover what we can until three-zero-two is ready to come aboard. After we trap him, we’ll get the rest of the airwing. Call down to your maintenance and see if three-zero-two’s systems are up for a Mode One.”
“Yessir,” Wilson answered.
From the flight deck above them, they heard the voice of the Air Boss over the 5MC loudspeaker as he commanded his sailors to carry out the orders passed down from Coral Sea’s brain trust.
“On the flight deck, emergency pull-forward! Emergency pull-forward! We’ve got an incapacitated pilot in Firebird three-zero-two! Chop chop!”
Against a backdrop of white cumulus clouds, Annie saw the “dot” in the middle of the green target designation box on her Heads Up Display. Inside that dot was Trench.
Moving from right to left off her nose, he was heading north, about 300 knots of airspeed, at 8,000 feet. She keyed the mike. “Trench, we’ve got a visual on you. Maintain your heading and airspeed. You are about angels eight.”
“Roger,” he replied.
She turned a few degrees left to sweeten the intercept as the familiar outline of Trench’s Hornet began to take shape. She checked her fuel and her clock—20 minutes to recovery time. But the recovery for Trench would not begin until after the airplanes on deck were launched. It could be 40 minutes before Trench got an attempt to land, if they could coax him into a position behind the ship and if all the black boxes worked properly.
Inside two miles she allowed Trench to drift left on her canopy, and, after checking to see that Big Jake was clear, she pulled hard into him to intercept the bearing line of his wing. As Annie slid up this imaginary line formed by Trench’s wing, it occurred to her that she needed to start a running commentary, one that wouldn’t end until Trench was aboard the ship.
“OK, Trench, we are on your left bearing line. Hold what you’ve got. Mother is about forty miles off your left nose.”
Annie then switched to the Comm 2 auxiliary frequency.
“Trench, Annie on Comm 2. Can you see anything?”
“Peripheral vision only. It’s like a black ball is right in my face, and I can only see around the edges.”
“What’s your state?”
“Don’t know. When I focus on the fuel indication — or anything — the black ball jumps in the way. I have to look away to even get a sense of anything.”