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" The old Harrier is a temperamental beast, and sometimes it refuses to fly. Today, Oct. 9, 2010, the fuel pump craps out, and the wrench gang sits around glumly, waiting for the spare part to arrive. The timing of the \u00ADbreakdown is demoralizing. Thousands of people have flocked to Culpeper Regional Airport in rural Virginia to witness the spectacle of Sea Harrier XZ439\u2014the only operable aircraft of its type in civilian hands\u2014thundering through the air, approaching its top speed of 730.25 mph. That&amp;#039;s an impressive number for a 31-year-old decommissioned fighter. But the spectators ringing the tiny airstrip don&amp;#039;t care about fast. They came to see the Harrier dance. Owner Art Nalls made history at 13:57 hours on Nov. 10, 2007, by getting the reconditioned Harrier airborne, at St. Mary&amp;#039;s County Regional Airport in Maryland; he was the first nonmilitary pilot to accomplish the feat. Nalls describes the aircraft as &amp;quot;a puppet without strings.&amp;quot; With four directional nozzles pouring out 21,500 pounds of thrust, the 7-ton plane can take off and land vertically (hence the common name, jump jet), spin like an ice skater and hover and dart like a dragonfly. The roar of the Rolls-Royce Pegasus Mk. 106 engine adds to the sensory assault: One air-show announcer described the jet as &amp;quot;hovering on a cloud of noise.&amp;quot; Says Nalls, 56, who first fell in love with the machine as a U.S. Marine Corps pilot, &amp;quot;Watching the Harrier is like watching a magic show.&amp;quot; But now the would-be star of the Culpeper Air Fest sits idly. Adding to the frustration is the fact that Nalls&amp;#039;s pal from the Marines\u2014Joe Anderson, 64, a pilot with 33 years&amp;#039; active duty and a wrench-gang member\u2014\u00ADwas due to take the Harrier up, and he&amp;#039;d invited a dozen family members to watch. A big man with ruddy cheeks and graying hair, Nalls slumps in a folding chair at the mouth of the hangar. He glances up at a formation of six biplanes. His gaze shifts to the Harrier. &amp;quot;Nobody is happy with this outcome,&amp;quot; he says. Sitting nearby are several of the Harrier&amp;#039;s mechanics, each of whom has volunteered weekends for more than four years to work on the plane. They try to lighten the mood. Barrel-chested Rich Gill, 51, of Dameron, Md., cracks that his wife calls the plane &amp;quot;my big, gray mistress.&amp;quot; Pete Weiskopf, 68, of Hollywood, Md., chimes in: &amp;quot;My wife wishes\u00AD I had a mistress instead of the plane, so she could see more of me.&amp;quot; Nalls&amp;#039;s wife, Pat Hatfield-Nalls, later confirms that the Harrier crew has experienced domestic strife. &amp;quot;I hear it from the guys: &amp;#039;My wife is jealous I&amp;#039;m working all those hours on Art&amp;#039;s plane,&amp;#039;&amp;quot; says Hatfield-Nalls, a Navy veteran who met Nalls in 1991. &amp;quot;Women say, how could you put all your money into a plane.&amp;quot; (She says the project cost more than $1 million.) &amp;quot;The answer is, I believe in dreams.&amp;quot; One of the lead mechanics, Christian Vlahos, 34, admits to a different motivation. &amp;quot;The air-show sponsors send limos for us, put us up in nice hotels, take us out for dinner,&amp;quot; says Vlahos, whose forearms are covered with flame tattoos. &amp;quot;Plus, there&amp;#039;s nothing like the looks on people&amp;#039;s faces when they watch the Harrier fly.&amp;quot; That&amp;#039;s what Vlahos aims to witness tomorrow. The plan is to replace the fuel pump tonight, fire up the jet in the morning and put Anderson at the controls. The audience will be smaller but the flight still thrilling and significant. The 2008 Culpeper Air Fest, XZ439&amp;#039;s debut show, drew more than 4000 spectators. The jet&amp;#039;s return this year was meant to be an encore and prove a point: The Harrier&amp;#039;s unique flight capabilities are supported\u00AD by a notoriously complex mechanical system\u2014and after all those weekends and late nights spent restoring that system to make XZ439 fly, the wrench gang will let nothing prevent them from getting the jet airborne again. &amp;amp;gt;  Development of the jump jet began in the U.K. in 1957 with the advent of thrust vectoring, which provides the plane&amp;#039;s unique maneuverability. The British firm Hawker Siddeley made Harrier prototypes in the late 1950s and early 1960s; the first production model came out in 1967 and began military service in July 1969. In various iterations featuring flight- and weapons-systems upgrades, the Harrier has seen combat for more than 40 years, primarily via the U.S. Marine Corps, the Royal Navy, the Royal Air Force and the Spanish Navy. But just 10 days after XZ439 was grounded at Culpeper, the British government announced the retirement of the 80 Harriers still in Royal Navy service. The move, part of a 7.5 percent defense-spending cut, marked the end of an era. Art Nalls entered the U.S. Naval Academy, in Annapolis, Md., in 1972. He majored in aerospace engineering but also found time to indulge his quirky DIY sensibility, creating and riding what was then the world&amp;#039;s smallest bicycle (5 inches tall). After graduating from the Academy and earning his wings in Kingsville, Texas, he became a lieutenant colonel in the Marines, whose arsenal included a domestic Harrier variant, the AV-8B, by McDonnell Douglas. Nalls&amp;#039;s first carrier landing in a \u00ADHarrier was on the deck of the USS Iwo Jima. &amp;quot;When you fly this \u00ADairplane, you become almost fearfully passionate about it,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;That&amp;#039;s how powerful it is.&amp;quot; With its aggressive stance, sharp angles, flat-gray shell and flared inlets, the Harrier is unmistakably a war machine, and one with retro charm to boot. But what truly sets the Harrier apart is its blend of raw power and agility. A pilot experiences the euphoria of levitating the behemoth and then discovering it&amp;#039;s as nimble as a hummingbird. But the Harrier can also be tetchy. On April 29, 1983, \u00ADduring a training flight near Richmond, Va., Nalls lost engine power at 17,000 feet. &amp;quot;I was doing about 350 knots,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;That&amp;#039;s plenty of energy to get the plane on the ground, but stopping it after that was another question entirely.&amp;quot; He glided the plane onto a civilian airport runway. &amp;quot;It was 9000 feet long, and I stopped 50 feet short of the end,&amp;quot; he says. The engine-out landing, a first for a Harrier pilot, earned Nalls the coveted Air Medal. Nalls stopped flying Harriers for the military in 1990, after he was diagnosed with an inner-ear ailment. &amp;quot;It devastated him,&amp;quot; Hatfield-Nalls says. But it also gave him a new ambition\u2014to become the first civilian to own and fly a Harrier.  &amp;amp;gt; CONTINUED &amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;gt;   Christian Vlahos has never met a plane he couldn&amp;#039;t fix. A former Navy mechanic, he&amp;#039;d worked on F-14s and F/A-18s before returning to civilian life in rural Maryland, near St. Mary&amp;#039;s Airport. After retiring from the Marines in 1998, Nalls also settled in the area. He started a real estate company that essentially bankrolled Nalls Aviation\u2014pursuing his passion for restoring antique military aircraft. In the early 2000s, he was looking for mechanics to maintain his planes. Vlahos was an obvious choice; he owns Chesapeake Aviation, an aircraft maintenance outfit at St. Mary&amp;#039;s. &amp;quot;Art is charismatic, and he&amp;#039;d give you the shirt off his back,&amp;quot; Vlahos says. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s natural to feel loyal to him.&amp;quot; In 2005, Nalls located Harrier XZ439 in Britain. He phoned Vlahos to say he was shipping it home, and Vlahos, in turn, called Gill. &amp;quot;Art bought a Harrier,&amp;quot; he said. &amp;quot;What in the hell did he do that for?&amp;quot; Gill responded. Gill&amp;#039;s incredulity was understandable: No Harrier had ever been restored to flying order by a civilian. But when XZ439 arrived stateside, in early 2006, word of the project spread. &amp;quot;Anyone who got wind of it wanted in,&amp;quot; Vlahos says. Vlahos and Gill soon found themselves leading a crew of about a dozen regulars, plus others who occasionally joined in. Two mechanics focused on the ejection seat&amp;#039;s technology. A complicated assemblage, the seat can be a lifesaver\u2014lofting the pilot into the air\u2014or a killer: It has been known to deploy in rough landings, decapitating the pilot as he is thrust through the canopy.  Joe Anderson lost a member of his flight group in this way in the early 1970s. And on Nov. 11, 2007, during XZ439&amp;#039;s second flight with Nalls at the controls, he braced for the possibility that Nalls might suffer the same fate. A hydraulic failure 11 minutes after takeoff prevented deployment of the landing gear. For 30 minutes Nalls flew tight circles, using centrifugal force to extend the struts. Then he requested an emergency landing at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, 15 miles from St. Mary&amp;#039;s. The wrench gang raced to Patuxent. Nalls hovered the plane above a landing pad. &amp;quot;My heart was in my throat,&amp;quot; Vlahos says. &amp;quot;The ejection seat was armed, and Art hadn&amp;#039;t vertical-\u00ADlanded a Harrier in 16 years.&amp;quot; Seconds after Nalls set down the plane, the landing gear buckled (it had extended but not locked). The jet crashed to the ground. &amp;quot;My head jerked forward so hard, I thought my neck was broken,&amp;quot; Nalls says. &amp;quot;But I wiggled my fingers and then my toes.&amp;quot; Vlahos, Gill and Anderson rushed to the plane. Nalls opened the canopy and grinned at his frantic crew. &amp;quot;These babies practically land themselves,&amp;quot; he said. &amp;amp;gt;  Dusk arrives in Culpeper. The air show winds down. Nalls departs for the Country Club of Culpeper for dinner with a group from the Air Fest. The mechanics hang back, ready to replace the fuel pump. As night falls,\u00AD they tow the Harrier to a well-lit hangar and remove a panel from the plane&amp;#039;s belly.\u00AD Bryant \u00ADHalford, 35, a Marine mechanic with a crew cut, uses a 3/8-inch speed-handle ratchet to remove approximately 50 tiny bolts that seat the fuel pump. He extracts the busted pump and moves the spare into position. The space is tight, so Halford is on his own, holding the 15-pound pump in place with one hand and replacing the screws with the other. It&amp;#039;s 10 pm when he finishes the job, and the wrench gang heads to the country club to join Nalls. The smell of jet fuel trails the men into the wainscoted dining room, where they are met with a standing ovation. At about 6 o&amp;#039;clock the next morning, the Harrier is towed out of the hangar. A fuel truck rolls onto the scene. Neither Nalls nor the mechanics say much; the tension seems to rise with the sun. With 30 gallons in, the guys circle the plane, looking for telltale drops of fuel. &amp;quot;No leaks,&amp;quot; Halford says. Joe Anderson dons his flight gear. With his wife and other family members\u2014including two teenage grandchildren\u2014looking on, he climbs into the cockpit and gives a thumbs up. The Harrier\u00AD taxies toward the runway with a bone-shaking roar. Hot exhaust envelops the jet in a gauzy cloud. Anderson takes the aircraft up at a hard angle, swings back in front of the crowd and brings the jet to a hover. He reels the craft around, making it stutter-step and dance. It&amp;#039;s as though the Harrier has a personality; it&amp;#039;s rakish and eager to entertain. After negotiating one more pirouette, Anderson goes full throttle and races skyward. The onlookers cheer, and Anderson circles back and lands smoothly. He deplanes, and there are hugs and \u00ADhigh-fives all around. The wrench gang has saved the day, repairing XZ439 for another successful flight and giving Anderson &amp;quot;a rare gift.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;In the air, I was all business\u2014on the radio with Art, checking my positions and settings,&amp;quot; Anderson says. &amp;quot;But once I was on the ground, I felt a huge thrill. This plane has special powers.&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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