I flew with student pilots in our Cherokee 140s for the water bombing contest. I rode the right seat cradling three water-filled balloons on a paper plate in my lap while the student handled the controls. On the first run I thought I could roll the balloon off the wing but it broke on the step. Tossing the balloon behind the wing clear of the step worked but it didn't land anywhere near the target, the airport sewage lagoon.

It became obvious that hitting the lagoon with a balloon from a low-wing airplane at 500 feet was about as easy as throwing a gumdrop from a speeding car into a tin cup blindfolded. I thought the teams flying the high-wing aircraft might do better.

I took a couple of steaks-on-a-bun to Chainsaw Charlie, our bombing referee. His pick-up truck was parked in the airport infield near the lagoon. I asked him the score. He showed me a blank clipboard.

"My truck has been hit three times," he said. "I thought they were doing it for a joke at first, eh, but no one has come near the lagoon. I was thinking it would be safer to park next to the lagoon but it stinks too much."

I watched a couple of bomb drops from beside the truck. They were all short of the mark. I flew runs with students that afternoon and delayed the release. We got closer to the lagoon but it was obvious that this was not an exact science.

We had scheduled the contest until four o'clock. By three, there were still no lagoon hits. It wasn't from lack of trying. There had been a steady stream of aircraft in the bombing circuit all day. Between the two flying schools, Summer had collected two hundred dollars for charity. Al Milton had done a brisk business with the barbecue and Dave Michelin had run out of donuts.

Airport manager Barney Swallow walked into The Flying Circus office at three thirty. He was carrying a small metal bomb that looked real. It was mounted nose down on a block of wood. He saw the surprised look on my face.

"It's a five-pound practice bomb from the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. I've had it since World War II." His words whistled through his dentures. "The warhead contains paint," he explained, holding the bomb up by its fins and looking at it, "probably dried up by now. Anyway, I thought you should have a trophy for your contest so I had a little inscription made up and put on there."

He handed me the bomb. I read the metal tag pasted on the side:

"Circus Water Bombing Contest - Best Percentage Hits".

"That's very thoughtful of you, Barney. Thank you, but I have some bad news. There is half an hour to go in the contest and no one has hit the lagoon yet."

"Has nobody entered?"

"Plenty. More than 100 balloons have been dropped but no hits."

Barney looked around in disbelief. "Is the Cessna available?" he asked.

"Yes."

"You fly; I'll drop."

I knew that Barney had been a bomber pilot in the war.

"The Cessna is not equipped with a Nordine Bomb Sight," I offered.

"And we're not bombing from 20,000 feet," he growled. He slowly extracted a wallet-on-a-chain from his back pocket, opened it and pulled out five dollars. He turned to Summer who was seated at the registration table and handed her the money. She gave him a plate of three water-filled balloons.

"Are you bombing for the flying club or the Flying Circus?" she asked.

Barney handed one of the balloons back to her. He pointed at the remaining two on his plate.

"Both," was all he said.

Summer looked at me. I nodded to her that it was okay. Barney headed out the door. I scooped up the Cessna's logbook and keys, signed us out and rushed after him. Outside, Barney was hobbling like the old man he was toward the airplane. I caught up to him.

"What's the minimum speed on this crate, flaps down?" he asked.

"Sixty-five mph," I replied.

"On the bomb run to the lagoon, give me 70 mph and five hundred feet."

"Okay."

He stopped and turned to me.

"Not just okay. I want 70 mph and 500 feet exactly. No variations!" he barked.

"Yes, sir!" I replied.

"That's better. On the bomb run, use the rudder to change course on my command. When I say 'left', that's a one-degree turn; 'left, left' is two degrees. Got that?"

"Yes sir!"

"Let's go. The Huns are waiting."

Barney placed the balloons on the floor of the Cessna under the right front seat and hauled himself into the airplane. I checked the gas and oil, climbed in and fired it up. We took off from Runway 06. Barney stared at the target on his side of the airplane. I flew a left-hand circuit at 500 feet and lined up on the lagoon.

"Left, left, left!" Barney commanded as soon as I had established straight and level flight a mile back. I skidded the airplane left.

He said nothing until we were close to the target.

"Left, left!" he barked.

The way he had us headed, we were going to miss the lagoon well to the left. Then Barney unlatched his door and opened it against the slipstream with his left hand. The airplane reacted by turning right in a curving flight path to the lagoon. I didn't correct it.

My view of the target was disappearing under the nose when Barney picked up both of the balloons by their knots with his right hand. With his face pressed against the window, he held them over the opening at the bottom of the door. I could see that he was controlling our direction by varying the amount the door was open. We must have been right on top of the lagoon when he yelled.

"Bombs away!" He slammed the door closed.

I banked right so he could watch the bombs out his side.

"Nice shot Ace," the air traffic controller in the tower said. "Do you want to continue in the right hand circuit for another run?"

"No, that's it," I replied. "We'll take a full stop. Was it a hit?"

"Double-barreled, dead centre!" the controller replied. "You're cleared to land."

Illustration by Francois Bougie