The Day Martin-Baker Saved My Life

On a sunny day in April 1965, Lt JG Bryson Thompson and his RIO, Ensign "Walls" Walthall, were heading toward the NAS Yuma practice bombing range in their new F-4 Phantom. Suddenly, they heard a loud "thump" behind them in the engine compartment. Thompson decided to return to Miramar Naval Air Station to have the plane checked out. Everything seemed fine ... until it didn't! Suddenly, smoke began filling the cockpits, the engine fire warning lights began flashing, flames were coming out of the intakes, and the controls froze. Thompson made the decision to eject.

This is the true account of the author's nightmare of being trapped in the back seat of a burning F-4 Phantom, unable to eject, and about to join expensive debris in a remote alfalfa field. And all of it was forewarned in a dream.