Arthur Hailey - Runway Zero-Eight

Janet had lifted her eyes momentarily from the instrument panel to ask in a small voice, “How is it?”

Spencer tried to grin, without much success. The thought passed through his mind that this was rather like his days on the Link trainer all over again, only then nearly sixty lives did not hang in the balance and the instructor was not more than a few feet away in the same room. “Tell him I’m on manual and doing gentle turns, coming back on course each time,” he said.

Janet gave the message.

“I should have asked you this before,” came Treleaven’s voice. “What kind of weather are you in up there?”

“It’s clear where we are right now,” answered Janet. “Except below us, of course.”

“Uh-huh. You’d better keep me informed. Now, George, we have to press on. You may hit some cloud layer at any time, with a little turbulence. If you do, I want you to be ready for it. How does she handle?”

Spencer looked across to Janet. “Tell him — sluggish as hell, like a wet sponge,” he said between clenched teeth.

“Hullo, Vancouver. As sluggish as a wet sponge,” repeated Janet.

For a few brief seconds the tension at Vancouver Control eased and the group standing round the radio panel exchanged smiles.

“That’s a natural feeling, George,” said Treleaven, serious again, “because you were used to smaller airplanes. You’ll have to expect it to feel even worse when you really throw her around up there, but you’ll soon get used to it.”

The dispatcher cut in, “I’ve the radar chief here.”

“He’ll have to wait,” said Treleaven. “I’ll talk to him as soon as I get a break.”

“Right.”

“Hullo, George,” called Treleaven. “You must avoid any violent movements of the controls, such as you used to make in your fighter airplanes. If you do move the controls violently, you will over-correct and be in trouble. Is that understood? Over.”

“Yes, Vancouver, we understand. Over.”

“Now, George, I want you to try the effect of fore-and-aft control on your air speed. To start with, adjust your throttle setting so as to reduce speed to 160 and cruise straight and level. But watch the air speed closely. Keep it over 120. The elevator trim is just to your right on the control pedestal and the aileron trim is below the throttles, near the floor. Got it? Over.”

Spencer checked with his hand, holding the plane steady with the other and with braced legs. “Right. Tell him I’m reducing speed.”

“Okay, Vancouver, we’re doing as you say.” Time ticked away as the speed slowly dropped. At 160 George adjusted the trim tabs and held up his thumb to Janet.

“714 here, Vancouver. 160 knots on the indicator.”

Treleaven waited until he had struggled out of his jacket before speaking. “Right, George. Try a little up and down movement. Use the control column as carefully as if it were full of eggs and watch the speed. Keep it at 160. Get the feel of the thing as you go along. Over.” He put the microphone down. “Where’s the radar chief?”

“Here.”

“At what range will this aircraft show on your scope?” queried Treleaven.

“Sixty miles, thereabouts, Captain.”

“That’s no good for a while, then. Well,” said Treleaven, partly to himself, partly to Burdick, “you can’t have everything at once. I’ve had to assume that he’s still heading in a general westerly direction. Next call, though, we’ll check his heading.”

“Yeah,” said Burdick. He offered a cigarette, which the pilot refused.

“If he’s stayed on the same heading,” continued Treleaven, looking at the wall map, “he can’t be that much off course, and we can straighten him up when he gets in our radar range. That Air Force check is a help.”

“Can’t he come in on the beam?” asked Burdick.

“Right now he’s got enough to worry about. If I try to get him on the beam, he’ll have to mess around with the radio, changing frequencies and a lot of other stuff. I’d sooner take a chance, Harry, and let him go a few miles off course.”

“That makes sense,” Burdick conceded.

“Here’s how we’ll handle it,” said the pilot. He turned to the radar chief. “I’ll do the talking. He’s getting used to me now.”

“Right, sir.”

“As soon as he shows up on your scope, you can feed me the information and I’ll relay it. Can you fix up a closed circuit between me and the radar room?”

“We can take care of that,” said the dispatcher.

“How about the final approach?” asked the radar chief.

“We’ll handle that the same way,” said Treleaven. “Directly we’ve got him on the scope and he’s steady on course, we’ll move to the tower. You report up there and we’ll decide on the runway and plan the approach.”

“Yes, sir.”

Treleaven picked up the microphone but waited, his eye catching that of the controller, who was replacing a telephone in its cradle.

“Dr. Davidson is downstairs,” the controller told him.

“What does he have to say?”

“From the information we’ve got he agrees with the diagnosis of the doctor in the plane. Seemed to wonder at first if it could be an outbreak of botulism.”

“What’s that, for Pete’s sake?”

“Some very serious kind of food poisoning, apparently. Shall we get the doctor up here and put him on the air?”

“No, Mr. Grimsell. It’s more important right now to fly this airplane. We’ll leave it to them to call for medical advice if they want it. I don’t want Spencer’s mind distracted from the job if I can possibly help it. I should have Davidson stand by in case he’s needed.” Treleaven spoke into the microphone. “Hullo, George Spencer. Don’t forget that lag in the controls. Just take it steadily. Do you understand that?”

There was a pause. Then, “He understands, Vancouver. Over.”

To Spencer it seemed as if the airline captain must have read his thoughts. He had moved the column slowly forward, and then back again, but there had been no response from the aircraft. Now he tried again, easing the stick away from him. Imperceptibly at first, the nose of the aircraft began to dip. Then, so suddenly that he was momentarily paralyzed with shock, it plunged downwards. Janet bit hard on her lip to avoid screaming. The ASI needle began to swing round… 180… 190… 200… 220. Putting all his weight on the column, Spencer fought to bring the aircraft back. In front of him the instrument panel seemed alive. The climb-and-descent indicator quivered against the bottom of the glass. The little facsimile of a plane on the artificial horizon had depressed its port wing and remained in that position, frighteningly. On the face of the altimeter the 100-foot hand whirred backwards; the 1,000-foot hand less quickly but still terrifyingly fast; while the 10,000-foot needle had already stopped, jammed at its nadir.

“Come on, you slug, come on!” he shouted as the nose at last responded. He watched the three altimeter needles begin with agonizing slowness to wind up again, registering gradually increasing height. “Made it!” he said in relief to Janet, forgetting that he was overcorrecting.

“Watch it — watch the speed,” she exclaimed.

His eyes flicked back to the dial, now rapidly falling again. 160… 150… 140. Then he had it. With a sigh the aircraft settled down on to an even keel once more and he brought it into straight and level flight.

“Jeeze, that was nasty,” he muttered.

Janet was still checking the ASI. “160. That’s all right now.”

The door to the flight deck opened behind them and Dr. Baird’s voice called, “What’s wrong?”

Spencer answered loudly, not removing his eyes from the panel, “Sorry, Doc. I’m trying to get the feel of her.”