I began working on F-111s at RAF Upper Heyford, England in May of 1989. I went on three very interesting TDYs (Air Force business trips) while at Upper Heyford. My first was to Aviano Air Base Italy in late August of 1990 to repair a F-111E that would not transfer fuel from it's right external tank. If you will recall, Iraq had invaded Kuwait by this time and the U.S. Air Force was building up it's forces in the Gulf and western Europe at a frantic pace. This particular aircraft had broken enroute to Incirlick AB, Turkey to participate in Desert Shield, the precursor to Desert Storm. While there we had enough down time to take a train to Venice and sight-see. My wife liked it because I bought her a cameo in Venice!

My second TDY with the F-111 was to Incirlick AB, Turkey in March of 1991 right after the end of the Gulf War. On a Friday afternoon my wife and I heard President Bush on British radio say that we would give military protection to the Kurds who were being harassed in Northern Iraq. I looked at my wife and said, "I bet we'll (the 111s at Upper Heyford) be going." That was Friday afternoon. The next morning at 6:00 I got a call from my boss telling me to pack my bags and at 7:00 that night I was on a C-141 headed to Turkey. We deployed with a package of 4 EF-111As in what was called Operation Provide Comfort. We arrived at Incirlick at midnight and had to break into the local DOD elementary school to have a place to live while we were there. All the kids and their families had been evacuated because of the war and we had the place to ourselves. We stayed there only a week because the Turkish officials told us that the EFs represented and gave too much of a offensive capability.

My last TDY with the F-111 was to Dhahran AB in Saudi Arabia from July till September of 1991. We had 6 EF-111As with us. The military end of the TDY was pretty much uneventful but in my off duty time I got to water ski in the Persian Gulf every weekend I was there!! Having grown up water skiing in Alabama, that made the trip worthwhile!!

The F-111 is a supersonic, deep interdiction fighter/bomber. It can go air to air, but its bread and butter is high speed, low-level, bomb dropping. It can carry both conventional and nuclear weapons. One of its unique characteristics is the ability of the wings to "sweep". That is, they can go from all the forward to all the way back for high speed runs. It can travel at speeds in excess of Mach 2 (two times the speed of sound). It came in two variants: The F-111 pictured above (F-111F from RAF Lakenheath, England) and the EF-111A radar jamming platform pictured in gray. The EF-111A was basically an A model (flown in Vietnam) that was rebuilt in the late 70's as a jammer. I worked on the EF-111As and F-111Es at Upper Heyford.

See John's EF-111A Page!

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