Airbase

Reading the radio

The tower and ground controllers talk plain aviation English. Everybody else uses brevity: short, fixed code words so a whole tactical picture fits into one transmission.

Picture

The air situation, as the controller sees it. Picture clean means nothing out there.

Bullseye

A shared reference point. Here it sits on the airfield: bullseye 270/25 is 25 miles west of it.

BRAA

Bearing, range, altitude, aspect: where a group is from the fighter itself.

Angels / cherubs

Altitude in thousands of feet, or for cherubs in hundreds.

Hot / flank / cold

Coming straight at you, crossing, or going away.

Hostile

Declared enemy. Cleared to shoot.

Commit

Go and intercept that group.

Fox 3

Radar-guided missile away, the kind that finds its own way at the end.

Splash

Target destroyed. Trashed means the missile missed.

Leaker

Something got through the outer defences.

Birds away

Surface-to-air missiles launched.

Joker / bingo

Fuel getting low, and fuel at the point where you have to go home.

Winchester

Out of weapons.

Buster

Fly fast. Full military power.

Running it yourself

Auto raids sends a raid every minute or so; switch it off and nothing comes in until you press Raid now. + C-RAM and + Patriot let you place up to three extra sites each: pick one, then click a spot on the map (not on the runway, taxiway or apron). The dashed ring shows what it will cover. Placed sites are remembered for this base in this browser, and Clear sites removes them again.

Is this a real base?

No. The layout, name, callsigns and squadrons are made up from a random seed, and so is every raid. Nothing here is tracked or live, apart from the clock. Press New base for another one, or share the address with the seed in it to show someone the same field.