THE END OF FIBERGLASS?

One of the many perks of a sea trial is those other activities a builder will roll into a boat tester’s day aboard. Some years back, that’s how I found myself 40 miles off North Carolina’s Ocracoke Inlet, eating sashimi—with wasabi made from scratch in the boat’s galley, of course—from a yellowfin tuna I landed earlier that morning.

Then something happened that was on par with the enjoyment of that just-harvested pelagic. Cruising back into port at a comfortable 30 knots, the captain spotted something high in the sky above us. Our crew watched in awe as an F-22 Raptor positioned itself under the big, fat belly of a KC-135 refueling plane, connected to the flying