Instant Separation

Author: David Haulman

I loved formation flying in the T-38. I was solo on the wing of an instructor (Captain James as I recall) when he gave me the speed brake signal. As he nodded his head forward, I "popped my boards" while he plugged into afterburner as a joke. We instantly had about half a mile of separation. It didn't take me long to close to fingertip formation and give him an appropriate signal of my own. It made me feel good, though. He wouldn't have done it if he had perceived me to be a weak formation pilot.