Wings Of Honor: Heart of Ice

Chapter 20: TARFU

After a day's worth of spite fueled, silent flight, we crossed into the boarder of the Ice Kingdom.
I knew, I started shivering badly now. But I just grit my teeth until it hurt, shoved my hands into my pockets, or rubbed them until I couldn't take the icy burning anymore. I have taken this before. It wasn't any worse than Bastogne.
A few stars studded the navy sky, and Momma's waxing crescent moon hung high in the sky. The others apparently new. But then a large ice sheet cliff materialized into our view. It's ends obscured over the horizon, seeming to stretch on forever. Probably how Hitler wanted his Atlantik wall to be, before we just flew over it.
"Is that a wall?" Halestorm asked. Squinting at the landmark, same as me. "What's the point of that? A wall can't keep out dragons."
"My point exactly." I said aloud.
"You don't remember the Great Ice Cliff?" Winter replied, as if he should've known this by heart. "It's probably our oldest animus gift."
Hailstorm shrugged. "Seems like a waste of magic," he claimed. "We're going to fly right over it."
"Right, because we're IceWings," Winter said. "But if we were from any other tribe, the Great Ice Cliff would shoot icicle spears at us and most likely kill us. It's secret defensive magic — the other tribes don't know about it. Usually no one else ventures this far north anyway. But if they did, they'd get a chilly, pointy surprise."
I shivered. Would it recognize me? Would I put Winter in danger? God, I hope not.
Hailstorm skipped a wingbeat. "What if it doesn't let me past?" he said nervously.
"It will," Winter said, a little irritated. "You're an IceWing, Hailstorm. The wall will recognize that ... and so will everyone else."
Halestorm was not convinced. And his thoughts showed it.
I'm not sure. I still... I don't like this. But no. I'm an IceWing. I'm the niece of Queen Glacier. IceWing royalty. The wall won't attack me. Won't it?
I shook my head. Training my glasses at the cliff. If anything shot up at us, I might be able to warn them before we got flacked down.
But of course, the wall didn't react as we flew over it. I breathed a sigh of relief as we passed over. I don't know what I would've done if it did engage us. I guess it would've depended on whether it acted like heavy or light AA.
Heavy triple "A" are large caliber guns — notably 75mm or above — that would fire a single explode shell near a plane to riddle it with shrapnel. They are commonly placed in batteries of four or six, to make up for their lower volume of fire. Although their great range and shells large enough to down even our heavy bombers, makes them a threat to any areal target. Although, their weakness is that they have a minimum range, where their time fused shells cannot explode just yet, so lower altitudes are safer from heavy Flack.
Although, this lower altitude is just perfect for light Anti-Air. Those guns are smaller, but can be more flexably controlled to deal with fast, low-flying, aircraft. Usually around 20mm, they don't have the punch to match with heavy AA, but their shear volume of fire makes up for it, especially when they are grouped up in multiples of 2. Imagine a swarm of wasps that explode on contact with your plane. The only way you can escape their wrath, is to climb to a higher altitude, outside of their maximum effective range.
I've overheard some pilots say there's a "Goldilocks zone," where you are still under heavy AA's minimum range but high enough to stay away from light AA fire. And to that I say: medium AA (37 to 40mm), and traversing your damn gun. Medium AA are more likely to be found a little behind the lines, with guns becoming heavier as you move on, but they bridge the gap between light and heavy. They have a little less flexibility than their lighter cousins, but they have enough range to service that window into heavy's minimum range. So therefore, there is no "safe" altitude.
Second, guns don't just fire straight into the air. Unless you're bombing an urban center, Chances are you will encounter heavy AA, then medium, then light. This is because the heavy's range isn't just up, it's sideways. Which means, you could theoretically be flying low enough to under the heavy's minimum vertical range, and still get engaged by heavies if they're far enough away. I think that's even what happened to Travers' plane. They were flying low over the flacktum, and still got ripped apart by light and heavy AA.
To answer the question of "what is the safest altitude to fly at?" I give you two options.
Option 1: fly as high as possible. Heavy AA accuricy drops roughly by half every ten thousand feet. So if you fly high, say 70,000 the way our bombers do, chances are they won't get hit. No I'm not going to calculate it out, get Gregory or Daddy to do that freaky math in their heads.
Option 2: fly as low as possible. I know I just stated that even if you fly below a gun's minimum vertical range, you still might be engaged by them; but you might have a chance if you go treetop level and push the power. You might be going fast and low enough that heavier guns cannot travers fast enough to meet you. While light AA guns could still be a valid threat, you can suppress them with your own forward facing armaments. But ultimately, it's your choice. One offers greater accuracy at the cost of ramping up the excitement, while the other allows you to play smooth and slow but sacrificing your effectiveness.