Captain, Steve Ritchie of the
555th TFS, flying his F-4D Phantom through a hail of deadly enemy
flak, exits the target area after a typical FAST FAC mission
on enemy installations in North Vietnam, 1972. Behind him a vast
trail of devastation marks the mission’s progress, as his
fellow Phantom crews continue to wreak havoc with their heavy
ordnance, the target area explodes in a series of mighty detonations.
Ritchie would, in the space of a few weeks during Operation Linebacker
in the summer of 1972 become a legend - the only USAF fighter
pilot Ace of the Vietnam War. |