The President's Plane Is Missing

by Robert J Serling

  “Where’s the conference?” he asked Pitcher. “Auditorium on the third floor.”

  “Why are they holding this at FAA?” Harmon wondered as they entered the building, showed their press credentials to a guard and headed for the elevators to the right of the marble reception desk.

  “It’s an aviation story mostly, I suppose. At least at this stage. And this auditorium will hold quite a mob—which I expect they’ll get.”

  There was quite a mob even at this hour of six thirty-five. The two hundred and ten blue-upholstered seats were filling up except for the last two rows. The aisles were littered with cables and cameras of the television networks, their crews jostling impatiently for the most advantageous positions and occasionally glaring at newsreel and wire service still cameramen trying for the same positions.

  “Grab us a couple of seats,” Pitcher said. “I’ll go find Charlie Alexander and make sure we’ve got a phone staked out.”

  “Who’s Alexander?”

  “He runs FAA’s Public Affairs Office. It’s just down the hall. I’ll be right back.”

  Pitcher found Alexander in his office. The balding FAA official wore the twin badges of a man who had been summoned to work too early—sleepy, slightly bloodshot eyes and a Band-Aid on his chin from a hasty shave.

  “Morning, Pitch. And before you open your mouth, you can use my secretary’s phone—it’s already got a ‘reserved for IPS’ sign on it.”

  “Thanks, Charlie. Looks like a bitch, doesn’t it? Got anything new?”

  “You know as much as I do. We’ll hand out a transcript of the ground-air communications at the press conference but there isn’t a damned clue in it.”

  “Except that he was going into thunderstorms,” Pitcher suggested.

  “I can’t imagine a thunderstorm bothering either that crew or that plane,” Alexander replied.

  “Who’ll be at the conference?”

  “General Coston, the Air Force Chief of Staff. Bettway, of course. Secretary Brubaker—”

  “Brubaker? He wouldn’t know a Condor from a Piper.” Alexander grunted with the resignation of a man who has bowed to an unpleasant inevitability.

  “You said it, I didn’t,” the FAA man growled. Alexander privately shared the press corps’s opinion of this particular Cabinet officer. Harvey Brubaker was an expert on urban transportation problems and, unlike his predecessor, paid only lip service to the problems of aviation except when they involved ground transportation.

  “Will Brubaker be running the show?”

  “Bettway’ll preside. I suppose the Secretary will get into the act somehow.”

  Pitcher laughed. “Disloyalty becomes you, Charlie—in this case.”

  Alexander shook his head sadly. “Just between the two of us, Pitch, the people I hate worst in this town are congressmen who open their fat yaps on subjects they know nothing about, and Uncle Harvey, who also fits that description. I guess we’d better get to the bloodletting.” Pitcher found that Harmon somehow had grabbed a couple of seats near the front. He sat down, whispering, “Phone’s staked out—there’s an IPS sign on it.”

  “Fine. If anyone says anything worth a bulletin, why don’t you run with it and I’ll backstop you here.”

  Pitcher nodded. The principals in the press conference drama were filing onto the small stage facing the auditorium seats. Charlie Alexander stepped to the podium and adjusted the PA microphone in front of him to his own height. “Gentlemen, may I have your attention, please?”

  The noisy room quieted gradually like a school class coming reluctantly to order at the command of the teacher.

  “Gentlemen—and ladies—I’m Charles Alexander of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Public Affairs Office. You all know why you’re here so I won’t waste time on preliminaries. I’d like to introduce the men up here with me. Mr. Harvey Brubaker, the Secetary of Transportation. General Robert D. Coston, Chief of Staff, United States Air Force. Mr. Newton Spellman, Assistant Press Secretary, White House. And now I’ll turn this conference over to Mr. Frank Bettway, Administrator of the FAA.”

  Bettway was a small man with a gamin face, its pixielike qualities rescued from what seemed to be an easygoing personality by his pale blue eyes. They glinted from behind his square-cut glasses, and it was said around the FAA that one cold stare from those eyes could dismantle an erring employee with the swiftness of a lie detector demolishing an alibi.

  “I’ll begin by briefing you on what is known as of 6:45 A.M.,” Bettway started out. “The transcript of communications between Air Force One and its last ground contact, the Albuquerque Center, is still going through the mimeograph machines. Copies will be handed out at the conclusion of the press conference. I can tell you now, however, that there was definite evidence the aircraft encountered some kind of serious emergency.”

  The room stirred with visible interest and tension.

  “First, there was the abnormality of lost radar contact. The target blip, as we call it, moved off the radar screen until it disappeared entirely. Second, while the communications were normal and gave no hint of trouble, Air Force One did send an emergency message just before the Center lost contact.”

  Now the auditorium was gelatin-silent.

  “There appeared on the radar screen, just before the target slipped off the scope, the letters ‘AF-1,’ followed by the numerals ‘7700.’ For those of you unfamiliar with the transponder systems used in Air Traffic Control, most aircraft today are equipped with transponders. These intercept a radio beam aimed from ground radar stations at target planes. The beam is bounced back to radar after picking up an automatic identification code which identifies the aircraft and also transmits its altitude.

  “In the case of a scheduled airliner, the code transmits the assigned flight number along with the current altitude. In the case of the President’s plane, the designation ‘Air Force One’ would show on the radar screen. Transponder identification is accomplished by the simple process of the pilot pressing his transponder button upon request by Air Traffic Control.

  “However, in addition to the codes for flight numbers, every airborne transponder incorporates an emergency signal in the event a pilot cannot transmit through normal radio channels. That signal is seven-seven-zero-zero, which was the last thing we received from Air Force One. Its significance, the nature of the emergency encountered, the reason why the commander of Air Force One felt it necessary to send the code, all are unknown at this time.

  “As you will see from the transcript, the only possible hint of potential difficulty was the pilot’s request to climb from his assigned altitude of forty-three thousand feet to avoid thunderstorm activity in his path. That request was granted instantly. The last verbal communication from Air Force One, prior to the emergency code signal, was that the aircraft was approaching Winslow, Arizona, and climbing. “I will now throw open this meeting to questions.” Pitcher glanced hastily at where the AP and UPI men were sitting and cursed softly. Two of them already were heading toward the rear of the auditorium, notebooks in hand like swords carried by charging soldiers. He hated to leave the press conference at this point but that disclosure on the emergency signal was hot.

  “They’re running with that transponder stuff,” he said to Harmon. “I’d better phone in a bulletin.”

  “Go ahead,” Chris replied. “I’ll catch this till you get back.”

  Pitcher was racing out the door as the first question came from a New York Times man.

  “Mr. Bettway, could you give us any details on what’s being done to find the plane?”

  “I’ll turn that question over to General Coston,” the FAA chief replied. “General?”

  Coston had achieved what apparently lies in the exclusive province of doctors, high-ranking military officers and airline stewardesses—the ability to look wide awake and freshly scrubbed with virtually no sleep the night before. A stocky man with a florid complexion, white hair and the usual kaleidoscope of campaign ribbons below his
silver wings, he rose and somehow managed to march rather than walk to the podium.

  “I think it’s safe to call this the most intensive search and rescue mission on record,” he began in a surprisingly soft voice.

  “The search primarily is under the direction of the Air Rescue Service of USAF, which administratively is assigned to the Military Air Transport Service. Aircraft from three ARS groups are at this moment being deployed from Air Force bases at Ellington, Texas; Lowry at

  Denver, and from Hamilton, California. Assisting in the air search activities are planes from the following Air Force installations—Luke, Williams, Nellis, Edwards and Holloman.

  “Also being utilized are aircraft from the Naval Air Station in San Diego. The search mission is under the overall command of the Hamilton ARS unit, with field headquarters established in Winslow. Approximately seventy-five helicopters are engaged in the operation, but fixed-wing aircraft are being used as well. I would say that the total number of military aircraft involved is about two hundred. These do not include Civil Air Patrol planes from CAP units in Southern California, Arizona, New Mexico and Nevada. The latter, plus equipment from the Forest Service, add up to at least another hundred aircraft.”

  “How about ground search, General?” asked the Washington Evening Star.

  “These are almost too numerous to tally. State police, local police and sheriff units from Arizona, California, New Mexico and Nevada. The Army is sending all available mobile ground forces into a hundred-square-mile area approximating Air Force One’s last reported position. I was informed just before arriving at the FAA that the Army units alone will approach more than ten thousand men with approximately five hundred vehicles, including halftracks capable of moving over pretty rough country. Both air and ground units, I might add, are carrying special communications and survival equipment, along with complete medical facilities. Every helicopter, for example, has medical supplies aboard and personnel trained in first aid.” A UPI reporter asked, “Can you tell us anything about the terrain where the plane might have gone down?”

  “Rugged,” said General Coston with devastating simplicity.

  “Does that mean a forced or emergency landing would have been impossible?” the Washington Post wanted to know.

  “No. There are many areas where an emergency landing might have been made, just as there are areas where no such landing would be possible.”

  “Would you say that the lack of any communication from Air Force One since fuel exhaustion time eliminates the possibility of an emergency landing?” the Post pressed.

  “It reduces the possibility,” Coston said dryly.

  The press paused to digest that remark.

  “General,” said the AP, “do you think the plane has crashed?”

  Coston put his words on a delicate scale of military caution before answering.

  “Naturally, we have not and will not give up hope that the President and all aboard have survived but that, for many reasons, have been unable to communicate their, uh, circumstances.”

  “In other words,” the AP man snapped, “it has crashed.”

  The general stared at the reporter as if wishing he could file insubordination charges.

  “That Air Force One has crashed is a very unhappy possibility,” he said finally. “But this does not mean there is no hope of finding survivors. All crashes are not fatal. Weighing in favor of optimism are such factors as the skill of the crew, the structural strength of the aircraft with its many safety features . . . I believe the chances of finding the President and his party alive are at least as great as finding, uh, some fatalities.”

  Pencils and pens scribbled away frantically in a couple of hundred notebooks.

  The New York Times again. “General, wasn’t Air Force One equipped with a crash locator beacon? I’m referring to that device which I understand can be ejected from a plane in trouble, and that it automatically sends a locating signal.”

  “Affirmative. There is such equipment on Air Force One, as well as on many of our planes. It is catapulted from the rear of the aircraft either manually or automatically on impact.”

  “I take it,” the Times said, “that no such signals were sent this time or the plane would have been located by now.”

  “That’s a pretty good assumption,” Coston conceded.

  “Could I ask why?”

  “You can ask, but I can’t give you a definite answer. The beacon hasn’t always worked as well as we hoped. Most of its failures have been traced to severe impact damage which prevented catapulting and did not permit the sequence of transmitting operations to get started. Manual activation, of course, would depend on the condition of the flight crew.”

  “I’d like to ask Mr. Bettway,” said a reporter from the

  Kansas City Star’s Washington bureau, “if the FBI has been called into this business.”

  “Yes,” Bettway said. “Or at least the FBI has been notified and presumably is ready to enter any subsequent investigation if necessary. I forgot to mention, by the way, that I have just received a call from John Taylor, the president of the Air Transport Association, who advised me that telegrams have gone out to all scheduled carriers asking their flight crews to be on the lookout while flying over the route followed by Air Force One.”

  Chris Harmon caught Bettway’s attention by waving his hand.

  “If the plane has crashed, what agencies or agency would be in charge of the investigation?” Harmon inquired.

  “I’d like to answer that,” General Coston said quickly. “All presidential aircraft are assigned to the Air Force, including the Condor. So the Air Force would have investigative jurisdiction over any accident or serious incident. But the Air Force would welcome the assistance of the Department of Transportation’s air safety experts.”

  Secretary Brubaker, sitting rather forlornly off to one side, lunged at this remark with the eagerness of an actor picking up a cue for his only line on an opening night. He quickly stepped forward to the bank of microphones.

  “Speaking for the Department of Transportation, gentlemen,” he said with a smile totally out of focus with the occasion, “I can assure the Air Force of our complete cooperation. As you know, when the Department was organized during the Johnson Administration, the CAB’s very able Bureau of Safety became part of the DOT’S National Safety Board. The Bureau stands ready and willing to offer the Air Force all possible aid. However, speaking for myself as a member of President Haines’s Cabinet, I have not despaired of our leader’s safety.”

  Brubaker hesitated, as if he wanted to say more now that he had the center of the stage, but he could almost feel Bettway’s steely eyes boring twin holes in his back. He sat down, sublimely confident that he had given his boys some juicy quotes.

  His boys got back to Bettway and the general with alacrity, having dismissed Brubaker’s juicy quotes as an unwelcome interruption. Pitcher and his two competitors sailed back into the auditorium at this point, drawing sympathetic glances from colleagues who didn’t have to match wire service demands for speed.

  “Did I miss anything?” Rod asked Harmon.

  “Not much. A halfway admission that it’s probably crashed—which is fairly obvious. If nobody else heads for a phone, I’ll hold up until this is over.”

  Nobody was heading for phones at this point. A UPI reporter raised his hand.

  “General Coston, could you speculate on what might have caused the emergency that prompted that . . . that transponder signal?”

  “No, sir, I can’t. It’s too early for any speculation. We haven’t even found the plane yet.”

  This prompted a question from Pitcher.

  “General, the only possible clue is the report that Air Force One was climbing to avoid thunderstorms. Would you care to comment on the stability of the Amalgamated Condor in severe turbulence?”

  Coston stared suspiciously at Pitcher. His reply was made with tiptoeing care.

  “The aircraft was thoroughly tested and
met or surpassed all military and civil airworthiness requirements for the transport category,” the general replied. “I might add that Colonel Henderson, the command pilot of Air Force One, was exceptionally skilled as well as exceptionally cautious.” The Los Angeles Times representative managed to raise his voice above a volley of voices. “General, will the Pentagon be the chief source for further developments or will future announcements come out of FAA or the White House?” This prompted a brief huddle, from which Newt Spellman emerged to call the signals. “To facilitate your own work and keep all information flowing from a single, readily available source, it has been decided that the White House will make all future announcements,” Spellman said.

  Brubaker looked disappointed. Alexander whispered something to Bettway and the FAA chief nodded, grabbing a microphone stem.

  “I’m informed that the copies of the communications transcript are ready for distribution at the door, together with biographies of the Air Force One crew and the passenger list, if any of you haven’t obtained the latter material. Frankly, General Coston would like to get back to work and so, I suspect, would all of us. I’ll entertain one more question. You, sir.”

  It was a Chicago Tribune reporter. “General, is there anything you haven’t told us yet which might indicate the possibility of sabotage?”

  “Nothing whatsoever. When the, ah, plane”—he nearly said “wreckage”—“is found, all possibilities that might have contributed to the emergency will be considered. Sabotage naturally will be included.”

  Several reporters clamored for attention, but Bettway, Coston and Spellman broke up the press conference by the simple expedient of leaving the platform and ignoring questions hurled at them as they moved up the aisle. Brubaker trailed behind them and actually succeeded in easing their departure by stopping to answer some of the nearest questioners. By the time they realized he had nothing new to offer, the trio had escaped.