At the Initial Point (IP) to the range, the lead switches the flight over to range frequency and calls the range officer for clearance. The wingman now splits off and makes a 360-degree turn, which will leave him about two minutes spacing on the lead’s aircraft for a nuclear over-the-shoulder delivery. Meanwhile, the lead arms his switches, gets clearance, pushes up to delivery speed, and heads toward the range.

What follows is a variation on what he practiced earlier at Nellis:

The bull’s-eye is a set of concentric circles on the ground: the outer circle is 2,000 feet in radius, the next is 1,000 feet, the next is 500, and the smallest is 100. The lead’s immediate task is to fly over a spot upwind from the bull’s-eye. For example, if he has a wind from the northeast at 20 knots and he is heading north on the run-in, he lines up his jet over the ground to the right of the bull’s-eye, waits until he is past the bull’s-eye at the prescribed offset point, lights the afterburner, and presses the pickle (the bomb-release button on top of the stick). At that point, he starts an Immelmann. At a preset angle, nose up (which primarily depends on the outside temperature and wind velocity at release point), the bomb is automatically released. Sometimes this is a twenty-five-pound practice bomb, but often it is a 2,000-pound bomb shaped like a nuclear weapon (when he releases one, his aircraft bounds like a kangaroo). The bomb then climbs to more than 30,000 feet above the ground, runs out of speed, and turns around and heads to earth. When it strikes the ground, a shotgun shell filled with white phosphorus puts out a large puff of smoke. This allows the range crew to score the hit by referencing it to the circles. Since the pilot is dropping a simulated nuclear weapon, a satisfactory score is well over 1,000 feet.

Meanwhile, at release he calls, “Off on top wet,” which means that a release light lit in his cockpit, and the bomb is in the air headed for the ground. He then rolls out so his wingman can start his run. As he comes off on top, they both enter the bombing and strafe pattern. After they expend all their bombs and bullets, they join up and start for home.

As they cross the Channel, the lead checks in with the British, so the cousins don’t scramble a fighter on them, and enter the holding pattern at Hopton beacon on the English coast (which served as the initial fix for airfields in East Anglia), until the expected approach clearance time, EAC.