by Akart, Bobby
Cort turned his attention back to his girls. “Ladies, I hope you two are ready to party. I can feel my second wind kickin’ in, and there will be smooches covering your cheeks in just a few minutes.”
“I’ll take ’em!” exclaimed Hannah.
Meredith added to her daughter’s sentiment. “Me too, darling. I’ve missed you more than—”
Then complete and utter darkness swept over Delta 322.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Delta Flight 322
As Delta Flight 322 cruised toward an uneventful landing, a continuous supply of conditioned air kept the temperatures inside the cabin at a comfortable seventy-two degrees. Outside the aircraft, it was a different story. Temperatures at a plane’s cruising altitude can drop to well below zero, especially when factoring in the windchill. Even in balmy climates like the Gulf Coast, the temperature differences were remarkable. The only thing separating the passengers of Delta 322 from this stark contrast in temperatures was a thin metal tube and a few inches of insulation that would soon prove to be no match for the fifty-degree waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
Mobile tower personnel reported the conditions as they advised Captain Hasselbeck on his final approach. “Delta 322, you’ve got winds at three to five knots. Ceiling is twenty-five hundred, scattered. Visibility is four to five nautical miles.”
“Roger that,” replied Hasselbeck. “Straight into runway 15-33?”
“Affirmative,” replied the tower. “Delta 322 is clear on approach to runway 15-33.”
Hasselbeck spoke aloud as he made his adjustments. “Altitude down to three-eight on approach. Wilco.”
“I’ll advise the flight attendants,” said his first officer. He reached for the intercom switch and addressed the main cabin. “Flight attendants, prepare for landing.”
The pilot continued. “Speed set, one-quarter flaps.”
His first officer repeated the instructions as the two pilots worked in tandem to coordinate the routine landing. “Speed set, one-quarter flaps.”
“Gear down.”
“Gear down.”
“Altitude two-eight.”
“Confirmed.”
The men rode the next sixty seconds in silence as the lights of Mobile came closer into their view. Hasselbeck pressed his face against the window and looked down to the hundreds of oil rigs that dotted the gulf waters to their left. The lights twinkled like thousands of Christmas trees floating on buoys. He turned his attention back to his instrument panel as the MD-88 continued its slow, gradual descent. Then the panel went dark.
“What the hell?” exclaimed the first officer.
“Where are the emergency lights?” asked Hasselbeck as he began to frantically flip switches, attempting to force a reaction on the instrument panel.
“We’ve got nothing! Absolutely no power!” The first officer became panicked.
Hasselbeck took a deep breath and recalled his training. Modern airplane engines were very robust pieces of engineering, and only rarely did a pilot encounter a dual flameout, the term given to the loss of both engines.
Hasselbeck’s mind raced as he focused on trying to keep the aircraft in a glide while he ran through the emergency procedures to regain power.
“Pull the guides out,” ordered Hasselbeck. “Now!”
The reference guides for an aircraft provide guidance and checklists for a wide variety of operational situations, including the loss of power on all engines. But this was different.
“I can’t see!” exclaimed the copilot.
Hasselbeck kept his composure but was nonetheless firm with his frenzied copilot. “The flashlight is attached to the right side of your seat. Hurry!”
Hasselbeck leaned up in the seat and looked for landing options. He recalled their altitude, which was now dropping rapidly. Mobile was still too far away. He began mentally preparing himself for putting the plane in the water.
Normally, if a ditching of the aircraft was imminent, it was preferable to be at a higher altitude, allowing for a smoother approach to the water below. The higher altitude would give the pilot the ability to force the plane into a pronounced nose-down attitude in order to maintain enough airspeed to prevent the aircraft from stalling. Their low altitude on approach did not allow for this emergency procedure.
There was an additional consideration to factor in. He had no instruments and no communications with the tower to tell him his precise altitude and speed. He was truly flying blind and unable to see the water. He only had the oil rig platforms below him to use to guide him.
He also had to consider whether to hit the surface with the gear locked in position or tucked inside. The recommended position was to ditch with the gear in the up position. However, Hasselbeck recalled from a conversation with a senior Boeing 777 captain that having the gear down might prevent the aircraft from skipping along the water, which leads to multiple impacts against the fuselage.
All of these things were running through his mind in those seconds before the aircraft began to lose airspeed and plummet toward the water. The chaos taking place behind him was beginning to enter his mind as a combination of flight attendants shouting and passengers screaming penetrated the security door.
Brace! Brace! Brace!
Hasselbeck couldn’t advise them, as their communications were down. Everything was dark and unresponsive.
The first officer was holding the flashlight in his mouth, frantically thumbing through the pages of the manual. “Nothing works. There’s nothing in here about a total blackout!”
Hasselbeck remained calm. “It doesn’t matter. We’re too low to initiate any engine restart procedure.”
His copilot was not calm. “What are you gonna do?”
“I’m going to keep flying this plane and do whatever it takes to drop it safely in the water.”
The first officer finally became helpful. “I’ll get our life vests.”
For the next twenty seconds, neither man spoke a word. The continuous chants of Brace! Brace! Brace! and the passengers’ screams permeated the aircraft, barely drowning out the high-pitched whistle created by the plane dropping rapidly out of the sky.
Hasselbeck tried in vain to keep the nose of the aircraft up in an attempt to glide onto the surface of the Gulf. His eyes darted to his left. They were eye level to an oil rig. He took a deep breath.
“It’s now. Hold on!”
The wing’s flaps were the first thing to come in contact with the water. The left-wing tip caught the top of a wave first, and the plane yawed to the left. Then the fuselage slammed hard into the water. The first officer let out a bloodcurdling scream as they were slammed forward in their seats upon impact.
Likewise, the passengers let out primal expressions of emotion and pain as the sudden deceleration threw them forward in their seats. Hasselbeck could hear galley equipment being tossed around behind them and overhead bins dropping luggage on top of the passengers.
The MD-88 shook violently for several seconds; then it got eerily quiet. The vibration stopped and the plane seemed to be weightless as if it were floating in space.
Inside the cockpit, it was pitch black. Hasselbeck regained his composure and pressed his hands against the windows. Then he heard them. The sound was imperceptible at first. Yet unmistakable.
Bubbles.
Bubbles were rising upward around the windows of the aircraft, and the faint trickling of water could be heard. The plane was underwater.
Hasselbeck tried to get his bearings and orientation within the cockpit. His first officer had fainted and was dangling slightly above him in his protective harness. He surmised they were banking to the left because the left wing had caught the water first. Instinctively, he pulled the yoke to the right. Incredibly, the aircraft responded ever so slightly. The wings leveled, but they continued to sink.
A loud crack caught his attention, and he immediately assumed the cargo hold had been breached on impact. Suddenly, reassurance swept over his body as the nose of the airc
raft seemed to make a slow ascent toward the surface.
Water began entering the cockpit. It dripped from the windows and rose around his feet from the floor panels. Hasselbeck studied the rise of the water. It wasn’t pouring in, but it was rising fast enough to have an impact on the buoyancy of the aircraft.
He looked over to his first officer, who didn’t appear to be physically injured, but only limp as a result of fainting. Hasselbeck used the rising water to revive his copilot.
“Hey! Wake up!” he shouted, scooping water out from around his feet and splashing the man in the face. The cold water worked to revive him.
“What? What?”
“Get out of your harnesses,” ordered Hasselbeck as he flipped the toggle on his instrument panel to unlock the cockpit security door. “We need to help our passengers get out. Hurry!”
Hasselbeck was already unstrapped and making his way to the security door separating the cockpit from the galley. The rising water would make it difficult to open.
“Come on, help me!”
His copilot climbed around his seat and moved alongside Hasselbeck in the notoriously cramped cabin of the MD-88.
“Turn the handle while I get my fingers in the crack to pull it open.”
“Okay, got it.”
Hasselbeck prepared himself to pull the door inward against the weight of the water around his legs, which now rose to his knees. As the copilot released the latch, they were both surprised by what happened.
The door swung open violently and slammed into the head of the first officer, driving him backwards in a daze. Before Hasselbeck was struck by a wall of water rushing through the opening, he saw that the rest of the aircraft was gone.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Delta Flight 322
Cort, like everyone else on board Delta 322, suddenly grew deathly quiet. While everyone’s reaction to a traumatic situation is unique, there are certain common reactions innate to all humans. A trauma leaves its imprint on the human brain. The intense sense of fear causes the body to freeze as it processes the threat. Then it reacts. And the reaction aboard Delta 322 was almost uniform—panic, followed by crying, screaming, and praying.
Initially, Cort assumed, like others on the flight, that this was a temporary glitch and would be remedied within seconds. When the emergency light strips along the floors failed to illuminate and none of the overhead signs lit up, he knew they were destined to crash.
His mind raced as he tried to recall the preflight safety instructions given by the flight attendants. He silently cursed himself for not paying attention, and then he considered the fact that the two drunks sitting in the exit row in front of him certainly didn’t know what to do.
The flight attendants tried to yell over the mayhem, but because they were all shouting instructions at the same time, the passengers became increasingly panicked. When the oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling, full-blown chaos ensued as passengers scrambled for oxygen.
“Hey, nothing is coming out!” shouted a man to his right.
“They’re not working!” hollered a lady from the back of the plane.
“Neither is mine!”
The flight attendants stumbled through the aisles as the plane began to drop in altitude, looking for their seats. Cort reached for his oxygen mask, which also failed to function.
No power. At all. Not even emergency backup generators.
Finally, one voice took over for the entire crew, shouting over the mayhem, “Everyone, please fasten your seatbelts and tighten them around your waist. Think about your seat assignments. Remember where the exit rows are. They are located at the front of the aircraft where you boarded. Also, they are above the wings in exit rows twenty-four and twenty-five. At the right rear of the plane, there are exit rows at thirty-two and thirty-three.”
Another flight attendant shouted from the rear of the aircraft, “We all need to prepare for an emergency landing. Please remove your life vest from the pouch beneath your seat. Slip the open end over your head, pull the straps around your waist, and adjust the tabs at the front. To inflate the vest, pull firmly on the red cord, but only—”
“Red cord! We can’t see anything. Where are the lights?”
Cort shoved his iPad into the seat pocket in front of him and felt underneath his seat for the life vest.
The flight attendant continued. “Pull the cord to inflate your life vest after we land. If you can’t find the cord, blow into the mouthpiece next to your shoulder. There is also a whistle that can be used to attract attention. Remember, don’t inflate your vest before landing! It might puncture upon impact.”
“Impact? Are we gonna crash, Dad?” A young boy clearly couldn’t grasp the gravity of the catastrophe they were facing.
Cort found the pouch, but the strap holding it together was stuck. He quickly unbuckled his seat belt and dropped to his knees to wrestle with the straps. He retrieved it and then noticed the elderly women next to him were dazed and confused.
He tried to remain calm, for his sake and theirs. “Ladies, don’t mind me, but I’m going to pull out your life vests. We’ll figure them out together.”
Cort could feel the plane take a sudden turn downwards, and the flight attendants began to yell, “Brace! Brace! Brace!”
Cort put on his life vest and assisted the women. He told them to tighten the strap, but not too tight. They didn’t need to feel constrained while swimming.
He then positioned their arms to illustrate how to maintain the brace position.
“Lean forward like this,” he began, bending at the waist as far as he could. He turned his head to the side, although he could barely make them out in the dim light provided by passengers who were using their phones to video the impending disaster. “Then clasp your hands behind your head, interlocking your fingers. Try to tuck your elbows against your thighs. Okay?”
He could barely hear their responses between their crying and the other panicked passengers.
Brace! Brace! Brace!
Cort closed his eyes and prayed to God to take care of his family in the event he didn’t survive. He repeatedly told Meredith and Hannah that he loved them, hoping that somehow the universe, which had dealt him this bad set of cards, would deliver the message on his behalf.
While others prayed or screamed in panic, Cort’s body relaxed and he smiled, allowing the memories of his family to fill his consciousness. He was at peace with his fate.
That was when the plane plowed into the water.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Mercedes-Benz Stadium
Atlanta, Georgia
“Ethan! Ethan!” Skylar screamed for her brother as chaos engulfed the stadium. At first, the young girl was confused by the sudden turn of events. Three security personnel ran in front of her between the barriers and the stage and then quickly climbed the stairs to interrupt the performance. They ushered Beyoncé and Jay-Z off the stage first, and then the other dancers followed close behind.
Dumbfounded, Skylar looked around for her brother to see if he knew what was going on. That was when the announcement to evacuate came. At first, the people around her were quiet, and then they became angry. They started shouting at the stage despite the fact that nobody was on it.
The hostility began to frighten her. One moment, the crowd was cheering, swaying back and forth to the beat of the music. The next moment, the stage was emptied, the concert was cancelled, and the fans were told to leave.
Those on the floor in front of the stage, both high and drunk, immediately took exception.
“Come back out here!”
“Hey, I paid for a full concert!”
“I want my money back!”
The mob was pressing toward the stage, mashing those along the steel barriers to the point they were screaming in agony. Skylar was one of them. She was the youngest and smallest of anyone else around her. Most of those who were waving their fists in anger and inching forward didn’t see her. Her attempts to scream for Ethan went unanswer
ed.
Skylar didn’t know what else to do, so she found a way to climb over the barrier. Using the back of a man who’d fallen over next to her in a vomiting fit, she stood on his back and hoisted herself onto the barrier and flopped over to the other side, landing on her back with a thud.
The impact knocked the breath out of her for a second, but then she recovered just as a huge push from the crowd shoved the barriers forward a foot or more. Skylar scrambled out of the way and crawled toward the black skirt that covered the underneath structure of the stage. She stood and looked in the direction of where she last saw Ethan.
Everyone was pushing and shoving as those at the front of the stage wanted to exit the building, but many others were pushing forward to voice their displeasure at the concert’s cancellation. It was a massive scrum that was being won by the angry mob.
Skylar recognized one of the girls who had approached Ethan earlier by her purple hair. She ran toward the group of girls and then noticed Ethan’s black locks. Skylar cautiously approached the rail and screamed his name again. This time he heard her.
“How did you get in there?” he shouted.
“I had to climb on top of a man and then jumped over. Can you jump over?”
Ethan looked around and started to wedge his way through a group of four young men when they got mad and pushed him back.
“Check yourself, man!” one of them yelled angrily.
“I need to get to my sister. Let me through.” Ethan was determined.
“Let me help you, boss man,” the man said threateningly. He grabbed Ethan by the shirt and pulled him forward, throwing him downward until his head struck the post of the steel barrier. Blood immediately gushed from his forehead and streamed down his face.
