When the Vige was designed computers were very primitive and computer modeling a futuristic concept. The good old slide rule was the order of the day, and accurate calculation of the details of airflow around the tail end of the fuselage an approximation at best.
Another curiosity was the decision to mount the fuel dump tube under the bomb tube portal between the afterburners rather than at the wingtips, as was the general practice at the time. This led to a number of spectacular demonstrations of aerial fireworks. One night a cocky young instructor pilot "Hurricane" Carson, set out with a student RAN (Radar Attack Navigator) from the training base in Albany GA for a night low-level navigation exercise around the southern states. As they're climbing the ladders to the cockpits, the student's handheld flashlight failed. It was a long walk back to Ops, and launch time loomed, so the IP gave the student his flashlight. Well, the wheels had no sooner hit the wells when both generators and the battery bus ties failed. Instant darkness, and most of the instruments dead. The RAT deployed, but could only power the items on its sub bus, as all the bus ties were down. No lights, no coms, no navs, no engine or calculated value instruments (TAS, ADC, fuel totalizer, etc), and twenty thousand pounds of fuel above safe landing weight. Gotta get rid of fuel - quick! Well, the burners are still lit, so that plus dump should hurry things along. Suddenly a thousand foot comet of flame lit up the city of Albany and threw enough light into the cockpit so Hurricane could see that his airspeed was approaching mach. He didn't want to lose the light, so he pulled up into a loop to check his acceleration. Once inverted, enough light shone through the canopy to show the airspeed increasing rapidly, so he killed the burners, throttled back and completed his loop, meanwhile rapidly guestimating how much fuel he must have burned and how much to go. The answer wasn't reassuring, so power up, burners lit, here we go again. Meanwhile the good citizens of Albany were wondering if this was WWIII, War of the Worlds, or the Second Coming! Hurricane and his hostage spent over half an hour flying flaming arcs over the city until the squadron CO launched in another RA5C to fly formation and bring them down to the runway. The student RAN opted out of the NFO program, and Hurricane was reprimanded for his Delta Sierra stunt, then commended for saving the aircraft and not ejecting over a populated area. A night to remember.
Cheers,
Wes
). Its big problem seemed to be its engines.
