The takeoff on July 16, 1975, of two T-38 Talons from Randolph Air Force Base (AFB), Texas, was like most other flights by student pilots flying the sleek supersonic trainers. Once airborne, the planes looped and rolled and flew Immelmans and Cuban 8s, standard aerobatic maneuvers student pilots must master. (1) They landed back at the base after the one-hour flight. "Freedom 138" was the call sign of one of the planes and, for its student pilot, the flight was anything but routine. It was the "Champagne Flight" of former POW Col. Robert W. "Bob" Barnett who last flew an Air Force jet seven years and nine months earlier when he was shot down in his F-105D over North Vietnam. (2) This flight, with instructor pilot Lt. Col. Rocco DeFelice of the 560th Flying Training Squadron, was the beginning of Bob's return to flying status after five and a half years of torture and isolation in North Vietnamese prisons and two years of recuperation following his "Freedom Flight" on the C-141 that flew him and his fellow POWs out of North Vietnam on March 14, 1973. (3) Of his T-38 flight after years out of the cockpit, Bob Barnett remarked, "I felt that I hadn't missed a beat. We made a formation take off and I was right there." (4) This article tells the story of how he got there. It describes his being shot down in his F-105 and his three days on the ground before being captured and taken to Hanoi. It is one of many combat stories about F-105 pilots and their valiant efforts during the failed bombing campaign called "Rolling Thunder." Bob's ordeal began with his mission on October 3, 1967.
