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ABOARD THE U.S.S. CONSTELLATION - Streaking across the northern Persian Gulf in his F-18 Hornet, Lt. Col. J.R. "Woody" Woods has his share of worries. But the veteran Marine pilot says his top concern is not whether a missile launched by the Iraqi Army will take down his fighter.

"We've trained a long time for this. Flying in the carrier environment is a more pressing threat than Iraq," says Woods, a top officer in the Marine Corps' 323 fighter squadron, known as the Death Rattlers, aboard the Constellation.

Woods says he's more worried about tricky night landings, winds that might blow the ship off course as he comes in or a collision with another aircraft in the crowded skies of the Arabian peninsula than he is about anything Saddam Hussein could send up against him.

Woods is one of more than 300,000 U.S. and allied troops massed in the Persian Gulf region in preparation for a potential attack on Iraq. The Constellation is one of three aircraft carriers now in the Persian Gulf. A fourth is on the way, and two more are in the Mediterranean Sea. Each carrier could unleash a force of more than 70 fighter planes against Iraq.

For many pilots, Iraq is familiar - and hostile - territory. Since the last Gulf War, carriers have remained in the region to patrol the southern no-fly zone in Iraq, making sure the country meets United Nations requirements. In March alone, Iraq has fired on allied planes patrolling the no-fly zone more than 30 times, and the allies have regularly launched air strikes against Iraqi surface-to-air missile sites and other anti-aircraft weaponry.

"We've been doing southern watch for so long most of us have seen combat," Woods says. An attack on Iraq "would be doing the same thing we are doing now - just more of it."

Senior Air Force officials in the Persian Gulf recently said all fixed air defense sites in southern Iraq have been destroyed, but mobile guns and missiles remain a threat to fighters.

The Constellation, the second-oldest carrier in the naval fleet at 41 years and slated for decommissioning this summer, could be called upon to do some of the war's heaviest lifting. Already, more aircraft missions - as many as 100 on some days - are being launched from this carrier than from the other two in the region. That's largely because the Constellation's operating hours are from dusk to dawn, the best time for carrying out missions undetected.

Cmdr. David Maloney, the Constellation's executive officer, says the carrier has the capability to launch and receive fighters around the clock. "We are trained to ramp up to 24 hours. You can't keep it up indefinitely because eventually you run out of people," he says.

Woods says he and other pilots are tired of waiting for war.

"The general sense is there's a job to do. Let's get it over with so we can go home," he says.

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