Reed shut off the microphone and gave Jason a sideways glance.
‘They won’t know what’s hit them if the weather’s as bad as the METAR suggests. Why not give Iceland Radio a call and see what’s waiting for us?’
Jason nodded in agreement. Although the METAR as given by the automated ATIS service was helpful, there was nothing better than speaking to someone in the control tower and finding out the immediate weather picture on the approach and runway itself. He had just overheard the radio communications of another aircraft that had recently departed Keflavik and knew that they too would have a good idea of what was happening on the ground, and the frequency was otherwise quiet, suggesting few aircraft in the circuit. He keyed the transmit button once again.
‘Phoenix three seven five, request Keflavik METAR, what are we looking at down there?’
Jason held a pen in his hand to take notes and he could see Reed also waiting for the response. The radio remained silent for a long time and Jason wondered if they’d missed his call.
‘Phoenix three seven five, Iceland Radio, requesting METAR update for Keflavik?’
Jason waited a little longer, and then longer still. Then the voice of another pilot broke across the channel, the aircraft that had recently joined the frequency after departing Keflavik.
‘FlyBe two four two, Iceland Radio, request radio check?’
They all listened for a long time, but nothing came back across the airwaves from Keflavik.
‘Flybe two four two, this is Phoenix three seven five, inbound Keflavik, are you hearing anything from them?’
The reply came back almost instantly.
‘Nothing, three seven five, they’re not responding.’
***
III
For a moment Jason sat in silence and wondered what on earth had happened down there. He had heard the controller speaking only moments before and everything had seemed fine.
Captain Reed keyed the microphone.
‘FlyBe two four two, can you still see the airport?’
‘Negative,’ came the response. ‘We’re IFR in the climb at flight level zero eight five, cloud base was below one thousand feet.’
IFR stood for Instrument Flight Rules, meaning that the pilots of the FlyBe aircraft were in solid cloud and could see no horizon. Jason said nothing, automatically letting the two captains speak to each other.
‘We’re fuel critical,’ Reed said simply.
“Fuel critical” was a simple term that meant not that the aircraft in question was necessarily out of fuel, but that it would not be able to turn back and return to the airport from which it had departed. For this reason, aircraft were fuelled sufficiently to reach their destination but were also required to have up to one hours’ worth of extra fuel to account for diversions, delays, adverse weather and other factors that might come into play during the later stages of a flight.
The FlyBe pilot’s response was instant.
‘You should divert to Akureyri or Egilsstadir if you can’t raise either Keflavik or Iceland Radio. Reykjavik doesn’t have long enough runways.’
Jason knew that the airport at Iceland’s capital city was only a little further north than Keflavik, but with its longest runway just five thousand feet, it wasn’t large enough to take an Airbus A318. The Airbus needed just over seven thousand feet to take off again so although they could in theory land, it would be the airplane’s last ever journey. He quickly flipped his notes to the approach chart for the diversion field at Akureyri Airport and kept his finger on it in case it was needed.
‘We’ll do that,’ Reed agreed. ‘Stay on channel and we’ll try to raise them as soon as we can. If we can’t, switch to Shanwick Oceanic or Narsarsuaq and raise the alarm as soon as you’re in range.’
‘Wilco.’
Reed turned to Jason. ‘I need a fuel calculation, real fast.’
Jason snatched his calculator and began tapping in the information he needed. Akureyri was located on Iceland’s north coast and had recently been enlarged to take international traffic, after the famous volcanic eruption at Eyjafjallajokull had produced an ash cloud that had shut down Iceland’s only other international airport at Keflavik.
‘It’s well within range, less than one hundred and fifty nautical miles,’ Jason replied. ‘We can divert from here if we can’t raise Keflavik.’
It wasn’t unknown for the air traffic services at Reykjavik or Keflavik to be occasionally off line, but not during the day and not when in the middle of active transmissions. Either they had suffered a catastrophic technical failure or the weather was disrupting communications.
‘We’ll give Iceland Radio a few more minutes,’ Reed decided. ‘If they don’t reinstate contact we’ll try Keflavik Approach. If that doesn’t work, we’ll head for Akureyri.’
Jason nodded, resigned to the fact that the delay would likely result in them missing their landing slots at Gatwick, and therefore their arrival at Paris–Charles de Gaulle. In the world of aviation such events were part and parcel of everyday life. In his two months with the airline Jason had already been diverted twice, once to Inverness on this very route after a passenger had suffered what had been believed to be a stroke, and once to Frankfurt after Berlin’s main airport had been closed due to a bomb scare.
Captain Reed spent the next five minutes trying to raise Iceland Radio without success, and although he seemed unperturbed by the failed communications Jason felt strangely uncomfortable about the way in which the air control service had gone silent so suddenly.
Captain Reed ceased his attempts to contact the service and instead he turned to Jason.
‘Okay, switch over to Akureyri and we’ll see if we can divert there.’
Jason had already tapped Akureyri’s frequency into the radio’s stand by display, and now he switched them over and hit the transmit switch on his control column.
‘Akureyri approach, Phoenix three seven five request basic service.’
The reply came back within moments.
‘Phoenix three seven five, pass message.’
‘Phoenix three seven five is an Airbus three one eight, Gatwick to Keflavik, currently one hundred nautical miles south of Keflavik at flight level three seven zero, request basic service and radio check with Iceland Radio as all contact lost.’
There was a pause as the controller jotted down their detail and digested what Jason had said.
‘Phoenix three seven five, basic service, maintain current heading and altitude. Confirm time that contact lost with Iceland Radio?’
‘Fourteen twelve hundred hours,’ Jason replied as he checked his watch. They had been without an air traffic service for almost ten minutes.
‘Stand by,’ the controller replied.
Jason and Reed waited for what felt like several minutes as they cruised toward their destination. They could hear no other traffic on the frequency, despite the airport being a local hub for domestic aircraft and even capable of handling short–haul from Europe.
Then, the radio crackled into life once again.
‘Phoenix three seven five, we’re confirming Iceland Radio is unresponsive, likewise Keflavik. We have people trying to contact them by phone right now. Maintain current course and altitude and await further instructions.’
Jason clicked to reply. ‘Wilco. Is Akureyri available as a diversion?’
Jason glanced across at Captain Reed, who had begun to shake his head as he listened to Akureyri’s ATIS details on the other channel.
‘Negative, three seven five. Surface winds forty knots with gusts of fifty, visibility less than one mile and severe wind shear off the mountains. QNH niner niner eight millibars and falling fast. The runway is closed to traffic at present. We’ll try Egilsstadir for you and see if they can bring you in. Stand by.’
Jason leaned back in his seat. Akureyri had only a single runway, orientated roughly north to south, so the violent gales and winds now rushing across Iceland from the Atlantic would be producing turbulence
off the mountains to the west of the airfield known as “mountain waves” that could produce dangerous downdrafts and had rendered the airport closed. The falling air pressure indicated that conditions would likely worsen in the short term. Egilsstadir was located on Iceland’s far east coast but was almost twice as far away and might also be suffering the same weather conditions as Akureyri.
‘The runway is only six and a half thousand feet,’ Jason pointed out as he checked the approach plates for Egilsstadir.
‘It’s enough to land on,’ Captain Reed pointed out, ‘and enough to leave with a light fuel load and make the crossing to Kelfavik once the airport’s open again. A major pain in the rear end but it’s our only option remaining.’
Jason rubbed his eyes as he found himself looking at the aircraft’s fuel load.
‘Just less than seven thousand pounds now,’ he said out loud, ‘about an hour’s flight time.’
Captain Reed nodded silently. They both knew that if their main diversion fields were all out of action they would have to land at their destination whether the air traffic service was available or not. That would mean contacting another service in the hopes of a talk down, or connecting to the tower at Keflavik by some other means in order for them to land safely.
‘We can orbit the field in an overhead join in emergencies,’ Jason said as he checked the approach plates. ‘If the cloud base is high enough we could identify ourselves to the tower visually and join the circuit to land.’
Reed nodded but Jason could tell that, given the rough weather and limited visibility reported by FlyBe two–four–two, he wasn’t keen to start descending without at least a deconfliction service from air traffic control. Moments later, Akureyri came back to them.
‘Phoenix three seven five, contact Narsarsuaq Information on one one niner decimal one zero zero for diversion. You’ll have to land there. Egilsstadir is also closed due to extreme weather.’
Jason stared at Captain Reed in disbelief.
‘Narsarsuaq? That’s in Greenland! What the hell is going on down there?’
***
IV
Captain Reed gestured with a nod to Jason’s flight computer once again.
‘Give me a fuel endurance calcuation to Narsarsuaq,’ he suggested. ‘Can we make it there?’
A quick glance at the flight computer gave them the distance to Narsarsuaq Airport on Greenland’s south coast. A large enough field to accommodate the A318, and often used as a diversion field by trans–Atlantic aircraft that ran into problems, it would be their only option if something had happened at Keflavik that really did prevent them from landing there.
Jason worked the computer furiously, and all was looking good as he replied jubilantly.
‘We’ll need six thousand pounds of fuel, and we have seven. We can make it there.’
Captain Reed did not look at Jason as he replied. ‘Now factor in the headwind, it will be different from Akureyri’s heading.’
Jason cursed silently as he realised his error. He quickly added in the headwinds that would oppose them if they turned west for Greenland. Although their cruise speed at altitude was Mach 0.85, the airplane’s speed over the ground was slightly different and was used to calculate their actual time of arrival. This speed was affected directly by the fifty knot headwinds and the vagaries of the high–altitude jet streams that could either help or hinder a flight. Jason’s heart sank inside his chest as his calculations came up short.
‘Just under nine thousand pounds of fuel needed,’ he replied. ‘We can’t make it.’
Captain Reed nodded, apparently unperturbed by the news but detecting the concern in Jason’s voice.
‘Don’t worry,’ he said, ‘just because Keflavik’s tower is down doesn’t mean we can’t land there. We’ll contact Narsarsuaq and hope that they can relay the information to Keflavik by phone, enough to get us safely down on the ground.’
Jason’s spirits lifted and he quickly found the frequency for Narsarsuaq, dialling it into the radio and switching the frequency. He waited for a few seconds to confirm the channel was clear before he transmitted.
‘Narsarsuaq control, Phoenix three seven five, request oceanic clearance.’
To his relief he heard an immediate reply.
‘Phoenix three seven five, pass message.’
‘Phoenix three seven five is an Airbus three one eight, Gatwick to Keflavik, overhead BASLU at mach decimal eight five, flight level three seven zero, we’ve lost all contact on the ground at both Keflavik and Reykjavik.’
There was a pause. This time the controller did not bother with any of the standard aviation preamble.
‘All contact has been lost with both towers? Are you squawking seven–six–zero–zero?’
An aircraft’s squawk code was a transponder system that allowed air traffic controllers to assign codes to air traffic, or for aircraft to transmit information when radio communications were compromised or discretion was required. The code seven–six–zero–zero signified an aircraft’s loss of radio.
‘All contact,’ Jason confirmed. ‘We’re not squawking as a second call sign has confirmed it’s not our radio at fault. Request that you attempt to contact Keflavik on our behalf for further instructions. Weather conditions mean we do not have sufficient fuel for diversion to Narsarsuaq, and our diversion fields at Akureyri and Egilsstadir are closed due to weather considerations. Akureyri sent us to you.’
‘Roger, wilco, stand by.’
The frequency went silent as Jason leaned back in his seat and stared ahead at the ranks of towering thunderheads marching from west to east before them, like the parapets of some immense white castle wall stretching across the sky. In the northern hemisphere, the leading edge of such developing cumulonimbus clouds were filled with rising updrafts of warm air, while the trailing edge was where the savage downdrafts of virga were to be found, as well as the torrential “rain curtains” that often trailed behind them. The huge rising and falling currents created the immense cloud formations one after another.
‘They’ve probably lost power and the generators are playing up,’ Captain Reed offered.
Jason nodded but said nothing. The safety measures protecting a control tower against power failure were many for obvious reasons, and even in the event of a complete power failure at Keflavik they should have been able to raise Iceland Radio. To have the power go down at all three locations was unthinkable and…
‘Phoenix three seven five, we can’t reach them on any line or frequency. Repeat, we cannot raise either Keflavik, Reykjavik or Iceland Radio at all.’
Jason looked at Captain Reed, and for the first time he saw the older man’s expression change. The calm and controlled visage remained, but his eyes darted briefly across the array of instruments before him and Jason knew precisely what Reed was thinking, because the same dreadful realisation was beginning to dawn in his own mind.
‘Understood,’ Reed replied to Narsarsuaq control, his voice even and revealing none of the torment that must be coursing through his brain. ‘Please contact Shanwick and London Information and inform them to suspend or divert all flights inbound to either Keflavik or Reykjavik, Phoenix three seven five.’
‘Wilco,’ came the reply, and then after a moment; ‘What are your intentions, three seven five?’
Again, Reed betrayed no emotion as he replied.
‘We’re working on it, three seven five.’ He clicked off the transmit switch and turned to Jason. ‘Try our fuel for Vagar, back at the Faroe Islands.’
Jason made the calculations, tapping in fuel burn and winds aloft, headings and the most fuel–efficient throttle settings he could devise, but despite the advantage of tail winds he came up short.
‘Ten thousand eight hundred,’ he replied, ‘it’s almost the same distance as Narsarsuaq, too far.’
Captain Reed stared thoughtfully ahead, frowning as he tried to find a solution to the crisis that was enveloping the cockpit. Behind them sat over one hundred passengers
who had absolutely no idea of what was happening.
‘So, Narsarsuaq’s out, Vagar is too far which means that Inverness and Stornoway are also a no–go,’ Reed said, ‘Akureyri and Egilsstadir are closed due to crosswinds, and none of Iceland’s other runways can handle an A318.’
‘That’s about the sum of it,’ Jason said as he checked the charts of airfields available to them. ‘Most of Iceland’s other fields are all for general aviation and are way too short.’
Jason knew that there was no way they could attempt to land on a runway too short for the A318. To stop seventy tons of airliner moving at two hundred miles per hour, even under full braking and reverse thrust, required a given distance known as the LDA which was dependent on weight and configuration. None of the other airfields offered any hope of the aircraft being even close to stopping when it hit the end of the runway, and with the weather being so poor the accuracy required to even locate, let alone attempt such a landing, at a small airfield as a last resort would be hard to achieve.
He glanced down out of the cockpit window at the vast sheets of rumpled cloud and thought of the fearsome black ocean churning somewhere beneath it, seven miles below their aircraft. Ditching in the middle of a North Atlantic storm, where the weather conditions would preclude any kind of rescue, was as good as suicide. Despite the serene blue sky, Jason knew that the temperature outside the airplane was averaging forty degrees below freezing on this flight at this altitude. All around them, and below them, were environments where human beings simply could not survive.
Altitude (Power Reads Book 1) Page 2
