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He rotated the knob on his radio to turn it to the strike group’s air defense controller. “Red Crown, two one zero, mother’s two eight zero for seventy-four, angels twenty.”

“Two one zero, sweet, sweet, contact Strike.”

After repeating his check-in with Strike — who cleared Colt into the Carrier Control Area — he was instructed to contact Marshal for his Case III instructions. During the day and with good weather, aircraft proceeded directly overhead to hold in a stack above the carrier for a Case I recovery. But at night or in inclement weather, aircraft held on a radial away from the ship and flew an instrument approach.

“Marshal, two one zero, two zero eight for fifty, angels twenty, state eight point oh.” Colt reached up and slapped down on the handle near his right knee to extend his tailhook.

“Two one zero, mother is VFR, altimeter two niner niner four. Case three recovery, CV-1 approach. Marshal on the two four five radial at twenty-five, angels ten. Expected final bearing three four five, expected approach time three one. Approach button seventeen.”

Colt read back the instructions, then turned his jet to the piece of sky twenty-five miles southwest of the ship where he would hold at ten thousand feet. He still had close to twenty minutes before commencing the approach, and he compared the fuel he had left with the ladder he had built to make sure he had enough. It was a rough estimate, but he figured he’d have to dump no more than five hundred pounds.

Nearing his holding point, he descended from twenty thousand feet and leveled off at ten. The first aircraft to commence its approach held twenty-one miles from the carrier at six thousand feet — the lowest altitude Marshal assigned. The next held at twenty-two miles and seven thousand feet, and each subsequent aircraft held one thousand feet higher and one mile further away. That meant Colt was fifth in line to begin his approach.

Reaching the holding point, Colt slowed to two hundred and fifty knots and engaged the auto throttles, letting the jet maintain the correct speed while he adjusted his angle of bank to enter the holding pattern. “Two one zero, established angels ten, state seven point five.”

After announcing his presence in holding — as much for the Marshal controller as for the surrounding aircraft — Colt dropped his mask and reached into his helmet bag for a bottle of water. There was nothing left to do but watch the fading orange glow on the western horizon and wait another twelve minutes until it was time to commence his approach. Because he had taken off during the day and flown his mission in daylight, he hadn’t brought night vision goggles he could use to find the other aircraft in holding. But the weather was perfect, and he spotted their blinking strobe lights and fading silhouettes with ease.

“Ninety-nine, altimeter two niner niner four, final bearing three five zero.”

With four minutes to go, Colt recognized he was slightly out of position and needed to turn a little earlier on the downwind leg to reach the holding fix at the appointed time. He adjusted his angle of bank and continued making mental calculations every fifteen seconds until his Super Hornet crossed the twenty-five-mile fix exactly on time.

“Two one zero, commencing, state seven point oh.”

He pulled his throttles to idle, extended the speed brakes, and nosed the Super Hornet over to establish a four-thousand-feet-per-minute rate of descent at two hundred and fifty knots.

“Two one zero, switch approach, button seventeen.”

Colt rotated the knob on his primary radio to the approach frequency. “Two one zero, checking in, state six point eight.”

“Two one zero, final bearing three five zero.”

Colt banked his Super Hornet to the right as he crossed inside twenty miles and adjusted his heading by thirty degrees to correct to the landing area’s extended centerline. Just over a minute later, his radar altimeter warning let him know he had descended below five thousand feet.

Whoop! Whoop!

“Two one zero, platform.”

He retracted his speed brakes to slow his rate of descent to two thousand feet per minute and maintained it until leveling off at twelve hundred feet over the water. At fifteen miles, he turned to place the carrier on his left wingtip and arced at twelve miles from the boat until he reached the extended centerline.

“Two one zero, fly bullseye.”

Colt guided his Super Hornet onto the vertical line in his Heads Up Display, representing the lateral portion of the Instrument Landing System. At ten miles, he lowered his landing gear and flaps, then slowed until the angle-of-attack indexers lit up amber next to his HUD. But his focus was on the speck of light straight ahead — the faint, tiny speck of light they expected him to land on.

Colt had over one hundred night landings, but it still got his blood pumping.

He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly when the symbology in his HUD blinked to indicate the carrier had locked up his jet with the Automatic Carrier Landing System.