Chapter 2: Boots and Saddles
The alert tones fired off in the alert barracks. The tone guaranteed to wake even the heaviest sleeper brought the entire forty man barracks awake. “For the Alert Force! All crews man your landing craft! We have a damn break north of Trena. Launch when ready!”
The crews moved towards their landing craft, as they did a company of marines ran with them to their landing craft also. It took five minutes for the landing craft to be loaded and sealed. As they went light on gear the pilots called for their assignments.
“Tango five is light on gear, loaded with twenty five marines, five litterbugs, and a life saver. Requests assignment!” the pilot called as the indicators for his landing gear indicated they were no longer taking the weight of the LC 10.
“Tango five go directly to the west bank of the Grant. You are to deploy your personnel and equipment along the west bank, then head for the EVAC hospital you are to load patients and go for the hospital ship Bethesda!” The air controller called,
“Engineer; sound the alert tone! AI set the coms to guard!” The pilot called then yelled “Lifting now!” He pushed the throttles to full military power pulled the stick into his gut and the immense landing craft jumped off the ground like scalded cat. In minutes he was making his run over the west bank of the Grant. He passed over what had been the Grant River Dam. There was nothing left of the dam, just a wide chasm where the damn had stood. The reservoir was still draining as he came in low over what had been the reservoir.
“Crew chief to pilot,” The fifty year old female crew chief of the landing craft called. “I can see the river it’s out of its banks big time. It has wiped out Galloway. There isn’t anything left of Galloway and it’s headed for Trenaport.”
“AI, send our video to the Mountain!” the copilot called from her post. “AI, connect me with the Trenaport Emergency Services Dispatcher.”
“Done,” The AI called.
“Tango five what is your traffic?” The live human voice called from the Trenaport Emergency Services dispatch center.
“Emergency! I say again Emergency! The Grant River Damn north of Galloway has failed! The town of Galloway has been destroyed, the water is moving toward Trenaport at maybe twenty miles an hour. You are going to lose homes in northern Trenaport.”
“Copy all!” the dispatcher returned. Tango Five was the first report other than the hospital on the scope of the disaster. He called, “City push! All channels! Attention in Trenaport, and surrounding country side. General Emergency! Flood Warning! Flood Warning! All persons in northern Trenaport should seek safety immediately. Raising flood gates now!” he uncapped a switch and pressed a button. There was a flood wall that surrounded the northern part of the city channeling water away from the town. This raised the flood gates across the major highways and breaks in the wall. It should help.
The expert system controlling the flood gates waited until it could raise the gates without killing anyone then lifted them up in place. It isolated the city’s northern suburbs from the rest of the city. It also isolated Fire Station 45. When the station was first built the fire department wanted it inside the flood wall. But politics raised its head and the powerful city councilman for the district got his way. But the fire department also got its way. The station was put on a piece of property that was above the one hundred year flood mark, and they put a river rescue squad in station 45. When the flood walls went up the river rescue unit went into full alert. They thought they had fifteen minutes before the water reached the flood walls. That wasn’t much time, but it was enough for the duty patrol on the river to make a fast run down the river to see if anyone was out on the river. This late at night there usually wasn’t anyone out there. The patrol found one lonely fisherman who had heard the sirens and was wondering who the patrol was after. When informed of the damn break; the man dropped his fishing rod climbed into the patrol. As the patrol boat sped away they could hear the roar of the approaching water. The patrol boat skipper made a radical right turn, spinning his hovercraft about its air cushion. He raced for the nearby bank with his throttle all the way open and as much lift as he could get on his cushion. The bank was a quarter mile away, and nearly vertical.
“Jamal!” the pilot of a Mounty landing craft running the river to back up the river patrol saw the river patrol hover craft running for safety yelled to his copilot. “Get the camera on that river boat.”
Jamal swung the sensor pod to track the river boat and saw its mad race for shore. Its race to safety was recorded. It made the shore just as the wall of water swept around the bend in the river. The bank’s incline was nearly seventy degrees the hover craft was not designed to handle more than a forty five degree incline. Both pilots thought it would be a hopeless effort on part of the rescue boat. But as they watched, the boat began climbing the bank. To their astonishment the boat made it to the top of the bank and to safety.
The captain of patrol boat when he got the craft settle down on its skirt looked at his crew and simply patted the side of his boat and said “thank you River Lady. You did well!”
“I wasn’t about to lose my friends to that shit,” River Lady replied. “I’ve spent too much time training you jerks to lose you to that shit!”
“Aye,” The crew said together.
Every Last Mother's Child Page 108