Irish Luck - Surviving Partial Ejection from A-6 Aircraft (2024)

Follow-Up, Feedback from Readers and Related Information

Recent Podcasts and Videos about this event (updated: 2023)

"So There I Was" podcast

Aviation YouTube inverview with the LSO

Close-up view of LT Gallagher (Navy photo)

Introduction

This is a true story about my cousin - Keith Gallagher surviving a very unusual and life threatening incident while serving as bombardier navigator on a A-6 aircraft off the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Indian Ocean on July 9, 1991. Keith would recover from this accident, return to flight status, and complete his service in the Navy. Keith now works in the telecommunications industry and lives in Atlanta with his wife Michelle and their two children. Mark Gallagher

Editor'sNote: The aircraft in this story is a Green Lizard KA-6Daerial tanker and this was a aerial refueling missionoverhead the carrier. On July 9, 1991 the USS Abraham Lincoln is four days out of Singapore headingnorthwest for patrol duty in the Persian Gulf.

Navyjargon used here:

"abeam"- a direction 90 degrees (perpendicular) to the side of the ship.

"aft" -toward the stern (rear) or "blunt end of the boat"."astern" - behind the ship

"attitude" - in thecontext of this story (during landing on the deck of the carrier), it is arequest to raise the nose of the aircraft so the hook at the back of theaircraft is low enough to catch the arresting wire

"boat"- any navy ship, the aircraft carrier is "THE Boat".

"BN" - aviator trained as bombardier and navigator

"Boss" - the Air Boss, he rules the flight deck

"Bravo Zulu" - praise for a good job.

"chocks" - wheel chocks holding the aircraft in place on the deck

"emergency pull-forward" - the pilot declares an emergency situation exists that requires a priority landing on the carrier as soon as possible

"JO"- junior officer, usually with all the answers

See Also

How to calculate an exchange rate

"hop" - a mission or flight

"NATOPS - The Naval Air Training and Operating Procedures Standardization program, responsible for rules and regulations governing safe and correct operation of all naval aircraft, (sometimes used in jest to mean "Not Applicable to Our Present Situation").

"Paddles" - Landing Signals Officer - aids pilots in landing aboard a carrier

"steady up" - straighten the ship (stop turning)

"trap" - an arrested landing on the carrier

MoreNaval Aviator Slang / Jargon

Lieutenant Mark Baden's (pilot) Account of the Incident

As we finished the brief,my BN (bombardier navigator - Lt. Keith Gallagher) told me that it was his birthday and that our recovery would be his 100^thtrap on the boat. To top it off, we were assigned the plane with my name on theside.

Aswe taxied out of the chocks, I was still feeling a little uneasy about all therecent mishaps. To make myself feel better, I went through the "softshot/engine failure on takeoff" EPs (emergency procedures), touching eachswitch or lever as I went through the steps.

"Atleast if something happens right off the bat, I'll be ready," I thought.

Thefirst few minutes of the hop were busy. Concentrating on the package-check andconsolidation, as well as trying to keep track of my initial customers,dispelled my uneasiness.

Editor'sNote: The KA-6Dis a tanker version of the A-6 Intruder. Atotal of 90 KA-6Ds were produced by Grumman for the Navy by modifying existing Intruder airframes. To makethe conversion, certain radar and bombing equipment is removed and replaced withan internal hose-and-reel refueling package, with the drogue fairing protrudingfrom underneath the rear fuselage. The KA-6D retained a visual bombingcapability (which was seldom exercised). The A-6 had a long and outstandingrecord of reliable service for the Navy from 1963 to 1997.

Factsabout the A-6 (KA-6D tanker)

Aswe approached mid-cycle, that most boring time in a tanker hop, we keptourselves occupied with fuel checks. We were keeping a close eye on one droptank that had quit transferring with about 1,000 pounds of fuel still inside. Ihad tried going to override on the tank pressurization, but that didn't seem towork.

My BN and I discussed the problem. We decided it wasprobably a stuck float valve. Perhaps some positive and negative G would fix it.We were at 8,000 feet, seven miles abeam the ship, heading aft. I clicked thealtitude hold off and added some power to give us a little more G.

At230 knots I pulled the stick back and got the plane five degrees nose up. Then Ipushed the stick forward. I got about half a negative G, just enough to float mein the seat.

Iheard a sharp bang and felt the co*ckpit instantly depressurize. The roar of thewind followed. I ducked instinctively and looked up at the canopy expecting itto be partly open. Something was wrong. Instead of seeing a two or three inchgap, the canopy bow was flush with the front of the windscreen. My eyes trackeddown to the canopy switch. It was up.

Myscan continued right. Instead of meeting my BN's questioning glance, I saw apair of legs at my eye level. The right side of the canopy was shattered. Ifollowed the legs up and saw the rest of my BN's body out in the windblast. Iwatched as his head snapped down and then back up, and his helmet and oxygenmask disappeared. They didn't fly off; they just disappeared.

Mymind went into fast forward.

"Whatthe hell happened?" I wondered. "I hope he ejects all the way. What amI going to do now? I need to slow down."

Ijerked the throttles to idle and started the speed brakes out. Without stopping,I reached up, de-isolated, and threw the flap lever to the down position. Ireached over and grabbed for the IFF selector switch and twisted it to EMER. Iwas screaming "Slow down! Slow down!" to myself as I looked up at theairspeed indicator and gave another pull back on the throttles and speed brakes.The airspeed was passing 200 knots.

Ihad been looking back over my shoulder at my bombardier the whole time I wasdoing everything else. I felt a strange combination of fear, helplessness andrevulsion as I watched his body slam around in the windblast. After his helmetflew off, his face looked like the people who get sucked out into zeroatmosphere in some of the more graphic movies. His eyes were being blasted open,his cheeks and lips were puffed out to an impossible size and the tendons in hisneck looked like they were about to bust through his skin as he fought for hislife.

At200 knots I saw his arms pulled up in front of his face and he was clawingbehind his head. For a moment, I thought he was going to manage to pull thehandle and get clear of the plane. I was mentally cheering for him. His arms gotyanked down by the blast and I cursed as I checked my radio selector switch toradio 1.

"Mayday,Mayday, this is 515. My BN has partially ejected. I need an emergencypull-forward!"

Thereply was an immediate, "Roger, switch button six."I switched freqs and said (or maybeyelled), "Boss (Air Officer), this is 515. My BN has partially ejected. Ineed an emergency pull-forward!"

FirstRadio Communication - LT Baden and the Boss(mp3 file, 14 seconds)

Islapped the gear handle down and turned all my dumps on (in an effort to getslower, max trap never crossed my mind).

TheBoss came back in his ever-calm voice and said, "Bring it on in."

AsI watched, the indexers move from on-speed to a green chevron I worked the noseto keep the plane as slow as possible and still flying. The plane was holding ataround 160 knots and descending. My BN's legs were kicking, which gave me somecomfort; he was not dead. But, watching his head and body jerked around in thewindblast, being literally beaten to death, made me ill.

Ihad been arcing around in my descent and was still at seven miles. The boss cameup and asked if the BN was still with the aircraft. I think that I caused a fewcases of nausea when I answered, "Only his legs are still inside theco*ckpit." It made sense to me, but more than a few people who werelistening had visions of two legs and lots of blood and no body. Fortunately,the Boss understood what I meant.

Editor'sNote: In the sound clipbelow, the pilot asks "How's the deck looking?", meaning is the deckclear and ready for an emergency landing. You also hear the Boss attemptto better understand the situation by first asking the pilot a question and thenhe contacts other aircraft in the area.

Second Radio Communication - LT Baden and the Boss(mp3 file, 59 seconds)

(Navy photo)

I cringed when I didn't immediately feel the tugof the wire. I pulled the stick into my lap as paddles was calling for attitude.I got the nose gear off the deck and then felt the hook catch a wire.

Editor'snote: In the sound clipbelow, listen to landing signal officer, "paddles"make requeststo the Tower and the Captain to "steady out" or "steady up". TheCaptain is turning the ship toface the wind, but there is not enough time and paddles is saying "I'lltake the wind", meaning straighten the ship (steady up) and I will takethe wind direction as it is.

Also,at the very end of the audio clip, the call by paddles for "attitude"is an urgent request to the pilot to raise the nose of the aircraft so the hookin back is low enough to catch a wire.

Third Radio Communication - LT Baden and Paddles(mp3 file, 62 seconds)

Ibreathed a sigh of relief. Testing the spool-up time of a pair of J-52s as Irolled off the end of the angle was not the way I wanted to end an already badhop.

Murphy'sLaw says, "Whatever can go wrong, will, and when you least expect it."(And, of course, we all know that Murphy was an aviator.) Murphy was correctbeyond his wildest dreams in my case. Fortunately for me, however, he failed tofollow through. On my 26^th birthday I was blindsided by a piece ofbad luck the size of Texas that should have killed me. Luckily, it was followedimmediately by a whole slew of miracles that allowed me to be around for my 27^th.Not even Murphy could have conceived of such a bizarre accident (many peoplestill find it hard to believe), and the fact that I am here to write about itmakes it that much more bizarre.

Wewere the overhead tanker, one third of the way through cruise, making circles inthe sky. Although the tanker pattern can be pretty boring midway through thecycle, we were alert and maintaining a good lookout doctrine because our airwinghad a midair less than a week before, and we did not want to repeat. We felt wewere ready for "any" emergency: fire lights, hydraulic failures andfuel transfer problems. Bring 'em on! We were ready for them. After all, howmuch trouble can two JO's get in overhead the ship?

Aftermy third fuel update call, we decided that the left outboard drop was going torequire a little help in order to transfer. NATOPS recommends applying positiveand negative G to force the valve open. As the pilot pulled the stick back Iwondered how many times we would have to porpoise the nose of the plane beforethe valve opened. As he moved the stick forward, I felt the familiar sensationof negative "G", and then something strange happened: my head touchedthe canopy. For a brief moment I thought that I had failed to tighten my lapbelts, but I knew that wasn’t true. Before I could complete that thought,there was a loud bang, followed by wind, noise, disorientation and more wind,wind, wind. Confusion reigned in my mind as I was forced back against my seat,head against the headrest, arms out behind me, the wind roaring in my head,pounding against my body.

"Didthe canopy blow off? Did I eject? Did my windscreen implode?" All of thesequestions occurred to me amidst the pandemonium in my mind and over my body.These questions were quickly answered, and replaced by a thousand more, as Ilooked down and saw a sight that I will never forget: the top of the canopy,close enough to touch, and through the canopy I could see the top of my pilot'shelmet. It took a few moments for this image to sink into my suddenly overloadedbrain. This was worse than I ever could have imagined - I was sitting on top ofa flying A-6!

Pain,confusion, panic, fear and denial surged through my brain and body as a newdevelopment occurred to me: I couldn't breathe. My helmet and mask had rippedoff my head, and without them, the full force of the wind was hitting me squarein the face. It was like trying to drink through a fire hose. I couldn't seem toget a breath of air amidst the wind. My arms were dragging along behind me untilI managed to pull both of them into my chest and hold them there. I tried tothink for a second as I continued my attempts to breathe.

Forsome reason, it never occurred to me that my pilot would be trying to land. Ijust never thought about it. I finally decided that the only thing that I coulddo was eject. (What else could I do?) I grabbed the lower handle with both handsand pulled-it wouldn't budge. With a little more panic induced strength I triedagain, but to no avail. The handle was not going to move. I attempted to reachthe upper handle but the wind prevented me from getting a hand on it. As amatter of fact, all that I could do was hold my arms into my chest. If either ofthem slid out into the wind stream, they immediately flailed out behind me, andthat was definitely not good.

Thewind had become physically and emotionally overwhelming. It pounded against myface and body like a huge wall of water that wouldn't stop. The roaring in myears confused me, the pressure in my mouth prevented me from breathing, and thepounding on my eyes kept me from seeing. Time had lost all meaning. For all Iknew, I could have been sitting there for seconds or for hours. I wassuffocating, and I couldn't seem to get a breath. I wish I could say that mylast thoughts were of my wife, but as I felt myself blacking out, all I saidwas, "I don't want to die."

LT Gallagher's upper-body and arm are seen above the canopy as the A-6 comes in for an emergency landing.
(Navy photo)

Someoneturned on the lights and I had a funny view of the front end of an A-6, withjagged plexiglas where my half of the canopy was supposed to be. Looking downfrom the top of the jet, I was surprised to find the plane stopped on the flightdeck with about 100 people looking up at me. (I guess I was surprised because Ihad expected to see the pearly gates and some dead relatives.) My first thoughtwas that we had never taken off, that something had happened before thecatapult. Then everything came flooding back into my brain, the wind, the noiseand the confusion. As my pilot spoke to me and the medical people swarmed allover me, I realized that I had survived, I was alive.

Itdidn't take me very long to realize that I was a very lucky man, but as I heardmore details, I found out how lucky I was. For example, my parachute becameentangled in the horizontal stabilizer tight enough to act as a shoulder harnessfor the trap, but not tight enough to bind the flight controls. If this had nothappened, I would have been thrown into the jagged plexiglas during the trap asmy shoulder harness had been disconnected from the seat as the parachute deployed (see Technical Aspects of LT Gallagher's Mishap by a Navy Technician).

Thereare many other things that happened, or didn't happen, that allowed me tosurvive this mishap, some of them only inches away from disaster. These littlethings, and a s-hot, level headed pilot who reacted quickly and correctly arethe reason that I am alive and flying today. Also, a generous helping of goodold-fashioned Irish luck didn't hurt.

Send feedback to: keith.r.gallagher@gmail.com

Lt.Keith Gallagher's Describes His Injuries:

My most seriousinjury was that 1/2 my right arm (the shoulder, bicep, andforearm) was paralyzed due to a stretched nerve in my shoulder. In addition, myleft shoulder was damaged as well. I have all of the damage of someone whodislocated his shoulder, but it was not dislocated when I landed. My suppositionis that it dislocated, and popped back in upon landing. Other than that, I wasjust extremely beat up. Via physical therapy, I recovered within 6 months. Myright shoulder "came back" in about 1 month, my forearm in about 2-3months, and my bicep returned in about 4-5 months. I had to re-do all of myphysiological qualifications (swimming, etc) to prove that I was OK, but I flewagain 6 months to the day after the accident.

Keith Gallagher and Family in 2022

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TechnicalAspects of LT Gallagher's Mishapby AME1(AW) Jung, a Navy Safety and Survival Systems Technician who was the VA-95's Aircrew Life Support Systems (ALSS) Quality Assurance Representative at the time of Keith Gallagher's mishap..

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E-mailfrom Dalton Wright to Keith Gallagher (1/02/01)

InadvertentEjection from an A-6 in 1971

A friend andformer naval aviator Bob William's forwarded the story and photos of yourejection seat malfunction and chute deployment that occurred in 1991 and Ithought you might find my experience of interest. On Nov. 15, 1971, I wason a maintenance test flight for VA 42 in an A-6 A out of NAS Oceana.While leveling off at 10,000 feet, my seat fired leaving my BN LT. John Adairwithout a pilot and forcing him to eject.

The cause of theejection was determined to be a faulty drogue gun that fired and ripped thedrogue chute out the top of the seat pulling the two ejection seat cables, whichinitiated the ejection. After I was ejected, I thought I had amidair as I was tumbling through the air and did not know why I was there andassumed the airplane had been torn apart. I did not get automatic chutedeployment because the chute was shredded or fouled due to it being pulledthrough the ejection cables. As I fell I wanted to give up, but somethinginside kept me working on the problem. After a period, I realized I hadthe chute pack on my back, but I could not find the D ring due to the windbuffeting, tumbling, and confusion. In desperation, I grabbed theparachute bag and I could see the steel pin and rigging. I grabbed it andgave it pull and the chute deployed.

During the accident investigation the seat was found and it was determined that the drogue gun caused the problem. After my accident, the safety center identified five or six other flight accidents that had resulted in fatalities and one probable hanger incident that could have been caused by the drogue gun problem. The A-6 fleet of GRU-5 (Martin Baker Back breaker) seats were inspected for excessive play/tolerances in the drogue gun firing mechanism and were replaced. John and I were very fortunate in that we survived and were not injured. I was flying again in 2 weeks and John continued to fly after ashort layoff.

I am glad you came away from your harrowing experience alive and in one piece.It was one heck of a story and it sure made me think back about my accident.Before I close, I was wondering if you have a relative by the name of BobGallagher who served as an advanced jet flight instructor in VT 26 during thelate 60's. I had an instructor by that name and he was terrific teacherand aviator.

Take care and God bless the Irish,

Dalton Wright
e-mail: wrightd@webound.com