North Cape

To allow the power plant to enter the ramjet mode, the blades were mounted upon variable stator disks and could be turned edge-on to the airstream. In addition, the air inlet plug, a large rounded cone of metal mounted in front of the air inlet, could be moved forward to increase the air compression.

A ramjet engine works by ramming air into its combustion chamber at high speeds, where it is mixed with fuel and ignited by a glow plug. Because the ramjet must have a certain flow velocity of air before it will begin to operate, it usually must be carried aloft by another engine to the proper speed and altitude. But once in the thin reaches above eighty thousand feet, the two engines, now operating as ramjets, far surpass the potential and efficiency of the turbojet or turbofan.

A ramjet of this efficiency has a rather narrow operating "en. velope." When the air inlet plug is rammed forward to compress the air while the compressor blades are turned edge-on to — the airstream, a carefully designed tolerance between plug and inlet must be maintained to provide the maximum flow of air to the combustion chamber for the altitude and speed. This tolerance mechanically limits the altitudes and speed beyond which the ramjet may be operated in direct proportion to the growing lack of atmosphere. Beyond 170,000 feet, Teleman could elect, if the extra speed and altitude were needed, to go to the rocket mode.

Now, clamshell doors closed down the area ahead of the combustion chamber — or burner ring in the case of the A-17 engines — and liquid oxygen was fed directly into the burner ring to mix with the fuel — liquid hydrogen — thereby providing a rocket engine that was capable of taking the A-17 to Mach 5.9, only two thousand miles per hour less than would be needed to achieve sub-orbit. Teleman had never had occasion to use the rocket mode except on practice missions. It' was a last-ditch stand when all else failed: The rocket mode could use six hours worth of carefully metered fuel in two minutes of burning time.

Most experienced military pilots who had received their training during the Vietnamese War were now edging toward the age where their efficiency was slowly being whittled away by the heavy demands placed upon them by their aircraft. Many had gone into the Vietnam War well past the age that a World War II flight surgeon would have considered them capable of controlling even the relatively slower and much less technically complicated fighter aircraft of that period. The younger pilots who had received their baptism of combat flying in the mid-196os had left the service in droves at the end of the war to answer the lure of high salaries and lifetime sinecure in commercial airlines, which were expanding tremendously in the wake of the giant airliners, supersonic transports, and rapidly growing travel markets.

The human organism is still the most reliable of all mechanisms in spite of the strides that had been made in automation. Rather than load the aircraft down with servomechanisms and complicated gear to perform many of the tasks that the pilot could do, the designers had opted for the human factor.

The A-17 had been on the threshold of man's ability to control under the difficult and microsecond decision points that had to be reached and gated properly when the aircraft was closing on its target at nearly four thousand miles an hour. The elapsed time from the moment a ground target — often less than a hundred feet across — came into sight until the A-17 had left it behind was often no more than four seconds. During this time, the information displayed on the screens had to be accepted, interpreted, a decision for action made, and the decision implemented; all with enough time remaining to allow the cameras and other recording devices to do their job.

Even in those instances where circumstances dictated that Teleman could loiter the aircraft over the target and select his objectives, someone had to decide what should be recorded, what must be searched for to make the picture complete, and handle the volumes of data that poured in, constantly interpreting, re-deciding and shifting objectives — and often targets. No computer could handle this job. Teleman was trained in the use of certain psychic energizer drugs of the amphetamine and lysergic acid families that could boost his body system output to fantastic heights in relation to normal physiological response. The LSD derivatives extended his powers of concentration and, through their hallucinogenic effect, made him feel that he was actually part of the aircraft. They also increased his comprehension and ability to deal with a multitude of facts in a very short time.

The amphetamines provided the same effect for his bodily responses, increasing his reaction time and slowing his time sense to compensate for the demands of the aircraft's speed.