Patterson and Hepp decided to “cheat” the racetrack pattern, making a tighter radius on the downwind turn back to the north, crossing under the Hornet to position their Skyhawk abeam of the F/A-18’s left wing.

“It came time for the practice run and J.B. and I did our cross under and slide out to get into position. Everything worked just fine and we were ready to go.”

A slight deviation from the plan occurred when the test-range supervisor extended the Hornet and Skyhawk on their downwind run because of a temporary fouling of the range.

“That messed up our plan a bit and we were further to the south than we had anticipated as we made our turn-in to run on-target to the north,” Hepp explained. “That meant we needed more speed to get into position.”

“We were closing the gap, straight and level at 5,000 feet and 535 knots … just about there off the F/A-18’s left wing. If we had had another five to 10 seconds, we would have been abeam of the Hornet. But we weren’t.”

Then, the unexpected happened.

“When they called ‘release,’ the bomb and rack were supposed to come off the station and fall away. It came off turning 90 degrees and it flew up and out to the left – not down and behind the Hornet.”

Staring intently into the high-speed 16 mm motion picture camera with which he was filming the separation, Hepp didn’t immediately notice that anything had gone awry. He filmed the bomb coming at them until it was 10 feet away. Spotting the rack and bomb climbing rapidly toward them, Patterson reacted.

“J.B. did a 300-degree roll to the left to get away from the Hornet,” Hepp said.

“As we were starting to roll, it hit our right wing and took off about half of it. Immediately, the roll reversed itself and we did two 360-degree rolls clockwise. Those two rolls took place in less than a second and a half. The impact wasn’t drastic. It didn’t make us yaw, but it ripped through the wing like it was nothing. The rolls were violent enough to snap our centerline fuel tank off and spill fuel.”

One of the tests being conducted was a salvo release of five 2,000-pound Mk. 84 bombs. Boeing was evaluating the weapons separation properties of the composite wing versus those of a conventional metal wing.

The rolls also ripped the camera out of Hepp’s hand. It flew forward and wedged on the cockpit doghouse just above the instrument panel.

“I could see the lens pointed back at me, but since we were moving backwards and forwards with lots of g, I couldn’t reach it. I just thought I’d leave it there and figure out what to do later.

“I sat back against the seat and heard the radio call from the F/A-18, ‘Mayday! Mayday!’ I knew John had his hands full, so I wasn’t asking any questions. We were just about 1.5 miles off Pax River. After the two rolls, we went straight and level briefly and I assumed we’d go back and land.”

“As I kind of relaxed – that’s a relative term – we did another flip. That’s when I saw a huge fireball go past the right-hand side of the cockpit. Prior to that, I couldn’t really see anything. My vision was blurred. I found out later that rolling at any more than 180 degrees per second, your vision blurs and your eyes can’t keep up. I had no idea that the wing had been torn up.”

The fire was a clear sign to leave the aircraft, however.

“I put my hands on the eject handle. As I looked down to make sure I had grasped everything correctly and was clear of my other cameras, John pulled his handle and the canopy came off. I sat there and waited, and waited. It seemed like an hour. I looked down and went for the handle a second time. As I touched it, the seat kicked me out. I wasn’t in the proper position when I ejected, but it worked out alright.