The President's Pilot

by Robert Gandt

  Or so they had promised.

  It was taking all DeWitt’s self control to hide his anxiety. As a Capella member he was duty bound to carry out this mission. But another side of him—the flight engineer whose unblemished twenty-four-year career had been rewarded with the assignment to the Presidential Airlift Squadron—was repulsed by what he was doing. Sabotaging the airplane you were trusted to protect was a violation of everything he believed.

  I’m a patriot, DeWitt reminded himself. I’ll do what I have to do to remove the traitor from the White House.

  Still, he didn’t like it. He would be glad when it was over.

  “How much longer with the tanking?” Brand asked from the left seat.

  “Almost there,” answered Switzer. “Another twelve-thousand pounds.”

  DeWitt was surprised to see that Brand was doing the flying. A new aircraft commander usually turned over the refueling to an experienced pilot like Morganti. Especially a night operation. DeWitt could see Brand’s hands making tiny movements with the yoke and throttles. He was keeping the 747 in precise position behind the tanker. The guy acted as if he knew what he was doing. Even Morganti seemed impressed. He kept glancing at Brand as if he was seeing something he hadn’t noticed before.

  Two minutes ticked past. “That’s it,” Switzer announced. “Eighty-eight thousand pounds, flow stopped.”

  “Signal the boomer to disengage,” said Brand.

  Morganti toggled the signal light. Seconds later, they heard the clunk of the mechanical toggles releasing the boom nozzle. The refueling boom retracted from its receptacle in the 747’s nose.

  And then it happened.

  First a buzzing sound—zzzzzttttttt—rising in intensity like a gathering storm. Then a flash, followed by a crack. A blackness as dark as the night sky engulfed Air Force One.

  <>

  “What the hell happened?”

  It was Morganti’s voice. Brand couldn’t see him in the darkness. Not even the flight instrument display was visible. He was blind, no outside reference.

  “I don’t know,” said Brand. “Maybe a static discharge when we separated from the tanker.”

  He didn’t believe it. There were too many safeguards against static discharge.

  In the next moment, a beam of light fixed on the cluster of standby flight instruments on Brand’s panel. It was coming from Switzer’s flashlight behind him at the flight engineer’s station.

  “I see the flight instruments,” said Brand. “Get the power restored.”

  “I’m working on it,” said Switzer. Brand could hear him resetting circuit breakers, throwing switches on the electrical control panel.

  Seconds later, the emergency cockpit lights flicked on. They provided just enough light to see the instrument panels.

  “Look at this,” said Morganti. He was punching the keyboard on his display screen. “The data link is gone, both sides. So are the GPS navigation displays. Hey, wait a minute—” He selected a radio on the audio panel, then keyed the transmitter. Then another. “The radios are out. Every damned one of them, dead as a stone.”

  “Can’t be,” said Switzer. He ran his hand over the circuit breaker panels. “Nothing is tripped back here.”

  Brand’s mind was racing. With no radios and no satellite navigation, they were in trouble. The tanker, he thought. They had to stay joined with the tanker. The tanker was like a mother ship. All they had to do was stay in formation and the tanker could guide them to a safe base.

  The tanker was gone.

  Brand peered into the darkness ahead. He saw only the empty night sky.

  Morganti was looking too. “Where’s the tanker?”

  Brand didn’t answer. There was no way a big, lumbering KC-135 could move out of visual range in the space of two minutes. He couldn’t be further than a mile or two away. His lights ought to be standing out like beacons in the sky.

  Brand was hearing an inner warning. It was ringing in his subconscious like an alarm bell. The KC-135 was invisible because its lights were extinguished. There was only one reason for that. They didn’t want to be visible.

  Why?

  Brand pushed the question to a corner of his mind. Forget the tanker. They had to get themselves out of this mess.

  He glanced back at the flight engineer station. Switzer was still at his panel. DeWitt was behind him, wearing a frozen expression. “Sergeant DeWitt, get down to the avionics bay. See if you can get our radios back.”

  DeWitt stared as if he hadn’t heard. Finally he mumbled, “I really don’t think it’ll . . .”

  “Just fucking do it,” snapped Switzer.

  DeWitt blinked. He turned and opened the cockpit door. Then he lurched back into the cockpit as if he’d seen an apparition.

  <>

  Libby Paulsen stared at the sergeant.

  He was staring back, eyes wide as Frisbees. The Commander-in-Chief was obviously the last thing he expected to see when he opened the cockpit door.

  The sergeant called to the front of the cockpit, “Ah, sir . . . we have a visitor. It’s the, uh. . .”

  “President of the United States,” Libby announced and brushed past the sergeant as she entered the cockpit.

  She knew it was a breach of protocol. By tradition the President didn’t visit the cockpit of Air Force One without being invited. But something was going on with the airplane. Something that was scaring her to death. She needed to hear it from Brand.

  Brand didn’t seem surprised. He was watching her from the left seat. “Come on in, Madame President.” He motioned for her to take the jump seat that Batchelder had just evacuated as if he’d been ejected. Batchelder was quivering at attention behind Morganti’s seat. Morganti was flying the airplane.

  Libby gripped the back of the jump seat. “What’s going on, Colonel Brand? Do we have a problem?”

  “Yes, ma’am. We’ve experienced an. . . electrical failure.”

  “What does that mean? Like a power outage?”

  Brand nodded. “Something like that. We’ve restored the lights and essential electrical supply, but we’ve lost all our communications capability.”

  “I don’t need a technical explanation. Are we in trouble or not?”

  Libby saw the other men in the cockpit watching them. Their eyes flicked between her and Brand.

  Brand said, “We’ll have to divert. Go to an airport where we can get maintenance and re-establish communications.” A moment’s pause, then, “With your concurrence, of course.”

  Libby recognized the inflection in his voice. With your concurrence, of course. She guessed that was for the benefit of the others in the cockpit.

  “Which airport?”

  The crewmembers’ eyes swung to Brand.

  “I suggest Goose Bay.” Brand held up a navigation chart. “It’s here, on the northeast coast of Labrador.”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” said Morganti. “You didn’t ask me about that.”

  Libby kept her eyes on Brand. “Why Labrador?”

  “The weather forecast is clear. And because there’s a U.S. Air Force facility at Goose Bay.”

  She gave it a moment. “You’re the pilot. You’re sure that’s our best option?”

  Brand nodded. “I’m sure.”

  She saw Morganti’s face harden. She could feel the hostility between him and Brand. What was that about? She’d find out later.

  Libby turned to Brand. “What caused this electrical failure?”

  Another moment’s pause. The ice blue eyes were boring into her. “We don’t know yet.”

  Libby gnawed on her lip for a moment. This was one of those moments when she was supposed to remind everyone that she was the Commander-in-Chief and she expected a straight answer. But she didn’t. She recognized the look in Brand’s eyes. Something was going on. Libby felt another jolt of fear stab at her. First the news about Lyle Bethune. Then, after they left Tehran, the report that General Greeley was dead, killed in his helicopter. What next?

 
In the next three seconds she found out.

  “Hey!” said Switzer. He was staring at the engine instruments on the forward panel. “Number one just flamed out.”

  Brand and Morganti swung back to the panel. “Igniters on,” said Brand. “Run the check list.”

  Libby watched, holding her breath. Why would an engine flame out? Nothing was making sense.

  “This is crazy,” said Switzer. “Now we’re losing number two.”

  Libby felt the airplane decelerating. The nose was yawing to the left. She had to grab the back of the jump seat to keep from falling. “What’s going on?” she blurted. It came out like the cry of a frightened child.

  No one answered. Brand took control of the airplane form Morganti. He was busy trying to straighten the jet’s sickening sideways yaw. Switzer was throwing switches on his panel. DeWitt was standing behind him, an expression of disbelief frozen on his face.

  The nose was slanting downward. Libby knew without being told that they were losing altitude. They had to, with half their engines no longer running. How far would they descend? Would they have to—

  “Number three flaming out,” said Brand. His voice was flat, without emotion.

  A wave of raw fear surged through Libby’s veins. Her fingers gouged the fabric of the jump seat. She felt her heart thumping like a jackhammer. As if in a dream, she heard the pilots reciting the check list. They sounded businesslike, talking in matter-of-fact voices. She knew it was an act. They were trained to speak that way, even when things were going to hell. She wanted to shout at them: Do something, damn it. Get the engines restarted.

  The engines weren’t restarting. Over Brand’s shoulder she could see the digital altitude indicator. The numbers were ticking downward too fast for her to read. Red and amber lights were flashing on the center instrument panel. Some kind of aural warning was going off, warbling like a sick parrot.

  A sense of inevitability swept over Libby. They were down to one engine. She had a sure sense of what was coming next.

  It took ten more seconds.

  “There goes number four,” she heard Brand say in the same emotionless voice. “We’ve lost all four engines.”

  Libby felt the nose of Air Force One tilt further downward. Through the windshield she could see the black void of the Atlantic Ocean.

  Libby didn’t want to see any more. She stepped backwards, walking uphill on the tilted cockpit deck, past the flight engineer station, until she’d reached the aft bulkhead of the cabin. She sensed the presence of someone else. In the darkness she could make out the profile of the sergeant—the one named DeWitt—whom she’d encountered when she first entered the cockpit. He was breathing rapidly, muttering to himself. “The bastards,” Libby heard him say. “They didn’t tell me they’d do this.”

  Libby gripped his arm. “What are you talking about? Who didn’t tell you? Tell you what?”

  Suddenly aware of her presence, the sergeant stared at her in shock. He snapped out of his trance. And said nothing.

  Chapter 5

  Silence.

  In his years of flying, Brand had never heard this sound. No whine of turbines, no assuring engine rumble resonating through the airframe. Only the eerie whoosh of air flowing over the bulbous nose section of the Boeing 747. The magnificent four-engine transport had become a six-hundred-thousand-pound glider. Air Force One was in a death plunge to the ocean.

  Brand glanced over at Morganti. The sour expression on the copilot’s face was gone, replaced by a look of bewilderment. Behind them Switzer was still reading off the items of the engine restart checklist.

  The digital altimeter was counting down. They were descending through 11,000 feet. Brand said to Morganti, “Tell the cabin to prepare for ditching.” It was futile, he knew. Ditching Air Force One on a tossing sea in the blackness of night had a survivability chance of nearly zero.

  “The interphone’s not working,” said Morganti. “The P. A.’s not working. Nothing’s working on the audio panel.”

  Brand turned in his seat. He saw Sergeant DeWitt in the back of the cockpit looking bewildered. Standing next to him was the President of the United States, looking just as bewildered. “Sergeant DeWitt,” Brand yelled, “the PA’s not working. Get back and tell the cabin crew to prepare for ditching.”

  DeWitt didn’t move. He stared back at Brand, his face etched with confusion.

  “Go!” Brand ordered. “Get the passengers ready for ditching.”

  DeWitt blinked once, then a look of comprehension came over him. He whirled and left the cockpit.

  Brand swung his attention back to the instrument panel. Through the windshield he saw only blackness. The relentless scrolling of the digital altimeter showed that the surface of the Atlantic lay less than 10,000 feet away. Fewer than four minutes to impact.

  “What the hell’s going on?” said Switzer. He had the checklist in his hand. “What did we miss? Let’s do the check list over again.”

  “Forget the check list,” said Brand. Checklists were for standard, logical scenarios. There was nothing standard about this problem.

  Brand switched his gaze to the blackness beyond the windshield. He forced himself to shut out the stream of check list items and procedures. Think. What are we missing? He let his mind drift. Sift through the possibilities.

  What could cause all four engines to fail, one after the other? What was common to all the engines?

  From somewhere deep in his subconscious, a thought was making its way to the surface. It came to him in a flash.

  Fuel. The engines were okay until we took on the fuel from the tanker.

  Brand snapped his attention back to the cockpit. Why would fuel from the tanker be contaminated? Another answer flashed into his mind. Just as quickly he shoved it aside. He had to deal with this problem first if he wanted to save the airplane.

  Brand turned to Switzer. “Feed all engines from the reserve tanks.”

  “Reserve tanks?” said Switzer. “That doesn’t make sense. Why would—”

  “The reserve tanks were still full when we took on fuel, right?”

  “Ah, yeah . . .”

  “So that fuel wouldn’t have been contaminated.”

  “Contaminated?” Switzer’s eyes widened as his brain processed this new possibility. “Oh, sweet Jesus . . .” The sergeant’s hands went to the fuel control panel, opening valves, closing others. “Okay, all engines feeding from the reserves. Holy shit, talk about a non-standard procedure.”

  They waited. Each pair of eyes was glued to the standby analog engine data monitor. Seconds ticked past.

  Nothing was happening. The exhaust gas temperature gauges, the first indication of an engine restarting, hadn’t changed.”

  “It’s not working,” said Morganti. “So much for your great idea.”

  Brand said nothing. Unlike commercial 747s, Air Force One’s unique fuel system was capable of feeding fuel directly to the engines from the reserve tanks. If his theory were correct, the fuel controllers would be receiving fuel from a fresh source. The engines had to relight. In theory.

  They weren’t relighting. Morganti was right. So much for his great idea.

  “Three thousand feet,” called out Morganti in a raspy voice. “This is it. We’re going in the water.”

  Brand adjusted himself in the seat and fastened his shoulder harness. He had to switch his focus. Forget the non-starting engines and get ready to do what no one had ever done before. Ditch a loaded jumbo jet at night on the high seas.

  Through the windshield Brand saw flecks of white. Whitecaps. They were close. Less than two minutes from the surface of the ocean. The radio altimeter, which would give them a precise height above the surface, was blanked out. Another casualty of the electrical outage. They had only the barometric altimeter, which Brand knew wasn’t accurate enough to gauge their exact altitude. He could fly straight into the blackened ocean without leveling off. Or he might flare the Boeing a hundred feet too high, which would cause them to stal
l and plunge straight down. Either scenario was fatal. Even if he somehow timed it right and flared just above the tossing ocean, the airplane would shatter like an egg carton when it hit the water.

  He heard something. From somewhere below, a low whine. Steadily increasing in pitch.

  “Number one!” blurted Switzer. “I think . . . yeah, no shit, we’re getting a relight on number one.”

  Brand was already easing back on the yoke, reducing airspeed to configure for ditching. Even with one engine running, they wouldn’t be able to remain airborne for long. They had to have—

  “Number two,” called out Switzer. “Number two’s spinning up.”

  Brand could feel it now, the soft rumble of the big fanjet engines accelerating. As number one spun to idle power he slid the throttle forward. With all the thrust coming from the left side, he had to step on the left rudder pedal to keep the jet straight

  “Number three,” said Switzer, and then a few seconds later, “and here comes four. We’re getting them back.”

  As each engine came up to idle speed, Brand brought the respective throttle forward. He glanced at the altimeter. Three hundred feet. The whitecaps were clearly visible against the black surface of the Atlantic. The Boeing’s descent had stopped. With all four throttles advanced, Brand nudged the yoke back. The jet’s nose tilted upward.

  Climbing. The whitecaps slipped from view in the windshield. Brand could make out the blue-black horizon line between the sea and the sky and, above, the twinkle of stars.

  For nearly a minute the cockpit was quiet. All four engines were running. Brand didn’t know for how long.

  It was Morganti who broke the silence. “Does anyone know what the hell’s going on?”

  <>

  Libby knew.

  The knowledge had been growing inside her since they were on the ground in Tehran. Since she heard about the deaths of the vice president and the chairman of the joint chiefs. At first she attributed her suspicions to simple paranoia. She was overreacting to a sequence of untimely accidents. Then the engines of Air Force One failed, one after the other like cheap light bulbs. Libby knew.