Did “Top Gun” rev your prop? Still tingling over all those F-15 runs over Iraq.? Has Sky Warriors got a concept for you! That’s the name of the Atlanta company offering frustrated fighter jocks the ultimate trip-er, sortie. For a paltry $575, anyone with the right stuff (and stomach) can play Tom Cruise at the controls of a genuine T-34 Mentor with state-of-the-art laser blasters. Of course, a professional pilot in the rear seat handles most of the flying. But along with manning the guns–a laser-beamed “hit” activates a smoke device in the target plane-the passenger gets to experience all the “barrel rolls,” “overshoots” and “high yo-yos” utilized in actual Air Combat Maneuvering (“ACM,” in fighter-pilot argot). What’s more, three on-board cameras record the action for that knock-’em-dead souvenir video. (“Wow, Dad. Lucky for Saddam you weren’t strafing Baghdad!')
Sky Warriors was launched in 1990 by Michael Brady and Earl Arrowood, a pair of veteran pilots fond of chasing each other in old training planes. Figuring others might share the kick, they picked up three T-34s at $300,000 each, then assembled a crew of pilots to fly them and to conduct elaborate, military-style briefings for the would-be aces. So far more than 900 customers have donned authorized replicas of “Top Gun” helmets and zoomed off from Atlanta’s Charlie Brown Airport. Corporations use the trips as incentive prizes for their sales forces as well as unique gifts to prized customers. They’re also big for birthdays. " We get all ages, sexes and backgrounds,” says Brady, who reports that the twice-daily flights are booked through October.
However ersatz the combat, sky warfare is not for the Nintendo-bound. The sudden sweeps from near-zero gravity to four times the body’s weight can bring on “G-LOC” (gravitationally induced loss of consciousness). “I lost my stomach somewhere in one of those high yo-yos,” gasped Randy Burnett, a Cincinnati Pizza Hut manager, after finishing a sweat-drenched aerial battle with his father. Wisecracks Dad: “It’s the most fun you can have with your pants up.” Women, well, they like it, too: a few turns at the controls can transform even the meekest into flying tigresses. “I had to make myself be more aggressive,” said Denise Brigham, who gave her husband, Alan–an experienced pilot–the dogfight of his life. Mr. Brigham, in fact, seemed decidedly taken aback when he reported: “We each killed each other once.” Maybe Sky Warriors should promote itself as a surrogate for domestic battles-and not just among the married. After zapping his teenage son with a laser burst, one father crowed over the two-way radio: “I told you to clean up your room!”
