Testimonials - "Operation Newcastle Freedom"

by Phil "Maverick" and Rhonda "Viper" Murray

It wasn’t my fault.

Clearly, this time…………it really wasn’t my fault.

Sure, in Vietnam there was ‘the incident’ which involved Phil with an AK-47, a busload of Japanese tourists and several hundred rounds of ammunition, but that was also just ‘an accident’. Regrettable, sure…..but understandable.

The plan was simple enough. Phil had just turned 50 and, as a special present, Rhonda had organized a jet fighter flight for her ‘newest senior citizen’.

The 40 minute flight would involve a full range of aerobatic maneuvers plus a simulated ‘Sea Strike’ on a tanker or cargo ship moored off the Newcastle coast. The flight was to be undertaken from Williamtown airforce base. Simple enough.

Rhonda knew the risks. Phil and military equipment were like ‘nitro’ and ‘glycerin’ – safe enough when apart, but a questionable combination at the best of times.

The ‘problem’ began shortly after arrival at the airbase and during briefing and preparations for the flight.

Let Phil recount the tale....

In the airport Men’s Room, as I began to don the flight suit I would wear during the 40 minute adventure I glanced into the mirror. Was that Tom Cruise I could see looking back at me? Was I ‘Top Gun’? Almost immediately ‘Highway to the Danger Zone’ began on an endless loop in my head. Tom Cruise or Phil Murray? Murray or Cruise? Cruise or Murray? As I removed my glasses, and squinted into the mirror, the similarities blended as one. Yes, I had become a vision impaired Tom Cruise at this point.

Returning to the Briefing Room, Easty, my pilot (a current serving RAAF pilot flying FA/18's with over 4,000 hours of flying experience no less !) began to explain what the flight would entail.

It was all going so well.

Yes, we would do several ‘aileron’ rolls, a barrel roll, figure eights and loops. But soon as Easty began explaining our ‘Sea Strike’, problems began, or rather a ‘big problem’ (no a ‘huge problem’) arose as it were.

Easty: “We’ll reach the ‘Initiation Point’ over the Newcastle Breakwater, roll 90 degrees to port, drop to 500 feet and approach the moored tanker. A mile out we’ll gain altitude, pull about 3 ‘G’s’ and activate all weaponry…”

That was it. ‘Activate All Weaponry’. I could feel my own joystick rise in my flight suit as I anticipated the launch of the weapons.Yes,yes,yes... Aaaaahhhhh.

Strapping on the parachute was the final straw. The bondage of the tight straps, instructions for a possible parachute jump, the helmet and visor under the arm. It was all too much. My every sick military fantasy was coming to realization.

Picture it. Just picture the scene.

As I strode across the tarmac towards Easty and my waiting Strikemaster Jet, it was obvious I was bringing my own ‘joystick’ to the party, eyes rolled back in my head like an attacking shark and drool cascading from both side of my lips. It’s Showtime!

Mount the wing. Jump in. Canopy closed. Strap in. Buckle up for the ride of your life.

Pilot Easty: “Are you ready for your flight, Mr. Murray?”

Phil: “Kick the tyres and light the fires baby, let’s punch a hole in the big blue and let’s send the enemy to hell in a hail of lead. Let’s get rrrrrrrrrready to rrrrrrumble !!!”

Pilot Easty: “Sir, a simple ‘yes’ will suffice.”

Initially, at least, all was fine. I swear......... really it was.

The aerobatics went well. The first sign of ‘the problem’ was when Easty said: “OK, let’s commence our attack run. Pick a target.”

Pick a target. Pick a target. How can you pick ‘a’ target? Dozens of ships were moored off the coastline and anyone in my position would clearly want to blow them ALL up!! Pick just ‘a’ target, yeah right. Like one peanut is ever enough!

Then, as the attack commenced, Easty made his fatal and last error.

Easty: “Would you like to fly the plane?”

Would I like to fly the plane? WOULD I LIKE TO FLY THE FRIGGIN’ PLANE!!!!! Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh……!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, the Pope is Catholic. Yes, bears $h1t in the forest, and Yes, I WOULD like to fly the plane.

Calmly seizing the controls, I wrapped my fist around the joystick and applied 400 lbs of pressure powered by an 18 inch bicep and 4 litres of adrenalin.

I can say with pride that ever since adolescence, once I get that joystick in my hand, I’ll never let go till the jobs done! That’s just the sort of dedicated kinda guy I am.

Easty..............you just lost ya plane buddy.

That’s when I saw ‘it’.

The real cause of the whole problem which was about to unfold.

There, on the top of the joystick. You couldn’t miss it. The ‘nitro’ to my ‘glycerin.’

A BIG RED BUTTON, with the words ‘Cannon Fire’ written above it.

Hell, you might as well hang a sign off it saying: “Wet paint, please don’t touch”

From this point on, it’s all a little fuzzy. The last thing I recall is that first burst of cannon fire.

The water around the target vessel seemed to be ‘alive’ and ‘dance’ as rapid fire tracer shells smashed into the sea and jets of spray soared skywards.

A huge explosion followed. The Strikemaster passed at over 700 kph through the billowing smoke plume and flame – all that remained of the now ‘ex-target’.

Easty now feared that the worst scenario he had trained for had been realized. He was now but a passenger on the ride of his life….....or maybe ‘death’.

Highway to the Danger Zone.

Easty: “Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. This is not a drill. Repeat, not a drill. Control Tower, this is Strikemaster. We have a ‘Code Red’ Repeat Code Red.”

All hell broke loose back at the airfield. You could smell the fear. Staff ran from building to building across the tarmac. A ‘Code Red’ had never been called before.

Seated in the passenger terminal, a red haired Queensland woman with an annoying nasal sounding voice closed her copy of Mein Kampf, book marking the pictures (since she has never actually read a book) with her copy of The White Australia Policy, jumped to her feet and exclaimed: “Please explain!”

A clearly panicked airport worker stopped running, turned and attempted to explain.

Airport Worker: “Code Red m’am. Code Red. It means we have a 50 year old birthday boy Labor Voter with steroid arms who has taken control of a Strikemaster Jet.”

Red haired woman, let’s call her say ‘Pauline’, does a quick tango twirl and says through her nose: “Jeez, what about the airforce?”

Airport worker: “All three planes are in Iraq m’am. John Howard’s Australia lies 6,000 feet below……… at this disillusioned Labor Voter’s mercy!”

Pauline: “Iraq? Is that anywhere near Nauru? What can we do?”

Airport worker: “There’s only one option… get little Johnny to issue more terrorist fridge magnets”

Meanwhile, back in the air, the scene off Newcastle Harbour looked like the newly liberated and now ‘free’ Baghdad……completely f**cked, ...smoke and explosions as far as the eye could see.

Phil: “Ya know Easty, I really feel like contributing, you know, being part of ‘The Coalition of the Willing'”

Easty (now passenger Easty) trembling: “What exactly does that mean?”

Phil: “Targets of opportunity Easty. Targets of opportunity. American airforce - strict protocols. Shoot only targets that flee... or targets that may flee.... or anything remaining stationary that could flee at a future date.”

Stockton beach lay below....and, as if on queue...

Phil: “Look!... there they are. Targets... hundreds of the bastards.“

I was in the position that every sedan driving motorist yearns for:

A Strikemaster Jet with a beach full of bloody Four Wheel Drives. Push into my lane will ya. Eat my lead you oversized gas guzzlers.

It took only a few minutes.The beach was strewn with Desert Dueller tyres, fishing rods, copies of Ralph magazine, general wreckage and “I shoot, I fish, I vote…yes, I’m a redneck” bumper stickers.

The Strikemaster moved on. Hard banking to the left. Williamtown airforce base awaits.

Back at the airport, another lone woman sat unfazed, in the lounge area, reading her book, “Psychosis, Why Your Husband May be Nuts”. A picture of serenity amidst the chaos. She had seen this coming. An airport worker burst through the door, clearly hysterical.

Airport Worker: “M’am, it’s your birthday boy. Can you come to the Control Tower and maybe talk him down.”

Rhonda calmly finished the paragraph she was reading, closed the book, raised her head and stared purposefully at the airport worker.

Rhonda: “Take me to the Tower son................ I guess I picked the wrong week to give up glue sniffing.”

Reaching the Control Tower, Rhonda could see the Strikemaster, guns blazing, rapidly closing on the airport............ its new ‘target of opportunity.’

At that very moment an Italian looking man with his shirt off and carrying a large calibre weapon ran from one of the airplane hangars screaming things like: “Sir, can we win this time” and “Adrian”. Clearly, getting his dialogue and movies mixed up.

At the very same instant, an even more heavily muscled German man (I um nut German, I um Osstrian) ran from a hangar on the opposite side of the airport and began shooting at invisible targets that he claimed were moving in the tree tops.

Well, let me tell you, it rained koalas that day my friends. It rained koalas.

As the 2 idiots collided, film critics world wide rejoiced!

Back in the tower, Rhonda grasped the microphone, looked around the room and yelled assertively: “Quiet,........ I need absolute quiet.”

Not a sound. Not a movement within the Tower, but chaos all around the Tower.

It was like the eye of a hurricane as it passes overhead. SSShhhh. All eyes were on the petite Cronulla19 handicapper. What could she do, what could she possibly say to distract birthday boy and save the World?

Rhonda: “5 minute call. This is a 5 minute call. Phil Murray to the 1st tee. Phil Murray to the 1st tee”. It never failed.

Incredibly, no response.

Faintly, in the background, Rhonda could hear her birthday boy humming:

Highway to the Danger Zone, Highway to the Danger Zone. That was the key. Rhonda recognized that Phil was off in ‘Phil’s Fighter Pilot Fantasy Land'.

She immediately knew the approach to take.

Rhonda: “Maverick, this is Viper......over”

Phil: “Rrrrrrrrroger that Viper, this is Mmmmaverick. I read you 5 by 5............over"

Rhonda: "Rrroger?????”

Phil: “No, Mmmaverick, not Roger…..over"

Rhonda: “Roger,......... over”

Phil: “Christ No, I’ve got Easty here next to me. Who the hell is Rrrrroger?”

Rhonda had to think quickly.

Any more of this and the whole Abbott and Costello ‘thing’ would probably start. No, not the comedy team baseball sketch, I mean those dopes in Canberra that have just been re-elected.

A flash of brilliance. Rhonda now knew how to bring her boy home and save John Howard’s Australia.

Rhonda: “Phil, George Bush says you’re doing a great job and keep up the good work!”

That was it. It was over as quickly as it began.

George Dubbya’s support was the final straw.

Phil returned control of the aircraft to Easty.

Landing and taxiing the Strikemaster through the smoke and crater marks that now littered the runway Easty stowed away his now full sick bag and turned to his passenger.

Easty: “I trust you have enjoyed a pleasant flight with us sir and please fly with us again at the earliest opportunity.”

Phil: “Roger Easty………or whatever your friggin’ name is.”

Phil and Rhonda made their way to the carpark and exited the airport.

Fire trucks zoomed by, exploding tanks of aviation fuel could be seen in the distance, spent shell casings littered the ground.

Just another day in Murray Retirement Land.

Driving back to Nelson Bay, Rhonda stared blankly out the passenger window, Phil quietly dozed behind the wheel.

Rhonda: “You know,.................. I hear there’s a place in Victoria where they’ll let you drive an ex-Vietnam 50 tonne Centurion tank”

An almost demonic smile slowly enveloped Phil’s face.

Phil: “Really? Centurion tank. I wonder what calibre shells it fires? .......................
..........can’t wait to turn 51”

Rhonda: “Happy 50th Birthday, Maverick”

Phil: “Thanks Viper”

THE END

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