It was a boring Thursday morning when the Extraction coordinates came across my computer. Cell phones starting ringing throughout the inland Northwest. Friends and riders of Thunderstruck were called to action and oh yeah. . . Bring your cameras. Flash ahead to today as Wade looks into the camera. . . “Just another tough day at the office. . .” he exclaims. Just then the desert silence is shattered by the whump-whump-whump of a Blackhawk helicopter. The 2 F-15s that were dogfighting and dropping counter-measures bug out. Wade raises his hands in welcome as the Blackhawk comes in at low level and the extraction team arrives. As the Blackhawk unloads and departs, the roar of far-off jet engines fill the sky. A quick briefing by our insider, and cameras are set with watchful eyes on the enemy targets and insurgents. The roar of jet engines gets louder and a call is made to look east just above the deck. At 380 mph and only 100 feet above us, the mock bombing runs commence with the crack of the A-10 Thunderbolt’s engines slapping sound waves off the sleds and riders of Team Thunderstruck. Sortie after sortie of A-10s roll into our position to “take us out”. A local farmer looks in awe as an A-10 rocks over just as an Apache takes out a lone insurgent in the field. The sky is filled with the thump of the rotors and the roar of the A-10s as the extraction chopper, a Blackhawk, enters stage left through a tight canyon. A hot extraction leads to an awe-inspiring exclamation point as our truck movements incite the A-10 pilots into several more bombing runs to finally neutralize us. . . Minutes later Julio watches in repose as the A-10s do dipped wing salutes to us while the Apache escorts the Blackhawk to safety. The A-10s strut some fancy moves again and as fast as they came in on us, they are gone. . .
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