Джозеф Хеллер - Maximum Impact

Five hours later, NTA2464 would be sent back into service with a clean bill of health.

Steve Pace made the long drive out to Dulles Airport for what he hoped would be the last time on this story. Mitch Gabriel called before 7:00 A.M. to say Vernon Lund would hold one final press briefing at 10:00. Pace couldn’t fathom what more Lund had to say, and Gabriel professed not to know.

The trip took fifty minutes, time he spent thinking about his evening with Kathy. The night that began in a misery of soul-searching concluded with the realization that they were something special and they owed it to themselves to be together. They promised each other they wouldn’t let their schedules come between them again. They even toyed with the notion of throwing over both their careers and heading south to Islamorada in the Florida Keys to run a bed-and-breakfast and a charter fishing service. “Our Hemingway thing,” Kathy called it. “He lived in Key West,” Pace reminded her. “Picky, picky,” she said.

When she left for her townhouse before midnight, she promised to return the next evening with enough personal belongings to move in at least for a trial period, long enough to be certain that what brought them together again was more than temporary mutual need. She would be a resident when Melissa arrived for spring break on Sunday.

They discussed the impact on Sissy of finding the two of them living together, but Pace insisted nothing be kept from her. It would be a deception for Kathy to wait to move in until Sissy returned to the West Coast. They wanted to be together. Why play games?

Ordinarily, Gabriel’s 6:45 A.M. call would have awakened Pace. This day, however, he was up at 5:30 and busy making room in the bathroom and in the bedroom closet for Kathy’s belongings when the phone rang. Although he’d had fewer than six hours’ sleep, it was sound, sober sleep, and Pace felt more rested than he had in a week.

He parked his Honda in the hourly lot in front of the main terminal and was in the briefing room ten minutes early.

Vernon Lund appeared exactly on time.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I’ll make this brief,” Lund said. “The overwhelming evidence at this time points to a bird strike in the starboard engine as the probable cause of the crash of ConPac Flight 1117 at Dulles on Thursday, seventeen April, this year. At this time, we have not identified the species. Although a good deal of the evidence was burned during the post-crash fire, identification as a bird is positive. We have also identified secondary damage within the pod that we believe occurred when said engine dislodged from its pylon and impacted with the concrete runway. Our investigation, of course, is continuing, and full public hearings will be held on completion of the investigatory process.”

Lund stopped and was deluged by questions. His eyes darted from one reporter to another, unsure whose question to take, settling on no one. Finally one reporter’s decibel level prevailed, and his colleagues ceded the floor to CNN’s Tom Petterhoff.

“Can you provide some elaboration on the damage done to the engine when the bird strike occurred and give us a sequence of events during the takeoff roll?” Petterhoff asked.

“I can do neither with any assurance of complete accuracy at this time,” Lund replied. “Data taken from the flight data recorder are still being analyzed. It isn’t clear yet what sequence of events led to the destruction of the aircraft. As far as damage to the engine, we have a number of broken fan blades, which is consistent with a large bird strike and runway impact. There is additional damage within the turbine compartments that we suspect is due to the runway impact. It is possible some broken blades were ingested, although we aren’t certain why that might have occurred. Earlier-generation power plants tended to suffer this type of damage, but the Converse Fan is designed to divert virtually all ingested debris—fan blades, birds, rocks—around the turbine compartments into the air bypass and out the rear of the pod. These are questions we still have to answer, if we can. It is possible we’ll never be able to say we’re positive of anything.”

“But you are certain at this point that a bird was the primary cause of the disaster and not any sort of flaw in the Converse Fan?” The question was from Russell Ethrich of The Washington Post.

“That is correct,” Lund replied.

“What steps will y’all take if you find broken fan blades were sucked into the turbine compartments?” asked Justin Smith of the Times.

“I can’t answer that question until we determine that such a thing happened, and if it did happen, why,” Lund said. “I already told you that.”

Smith had a follow-up question, based on his own exclusive. “You able to confirm that durin’ the final moments of the takeoff roll, after the failure of Number Two engine, the crew attempted to take off on the remainin’ engine?”

“Not at this time,” Lund replied.

It was Steve Pace who got to the heart of the matter. “Mr. Lund,” he asked, out-shouting a local TV reporter for the floor, “should the 811 fleet be grounded until this investigation is completed, in case any sort of redesign is necessary for the C-Fan?”

“Absolutely not,” Lund thundered, animated for the first time that morning. “So far as I’m aware, there is no way to design an engine to protect it fully against a bird strike. Converse never gave a hundred-percent guarantee the engine would afford such protection. The company claimed only that the C-Fan design would improve the chances of the engine’s survival. Furthermore—”

“I wasn’t talking about protection against a bird strike,” Pace broke in. “The engine is designed so any debris would be blown out the back of the pod, going around the turbine compartments without breaching them. You just described that. If, in fact, one or more compartments were breached—”

“I’m well aware what you’re asking, and my answer is the same.” Lund continued. “I don’t know a way to design an engine to fully protect it from ingestion of any foreign matter. Metal fan-blade debris would be even more difficult to deflect than a bird. I’m also well aware your paper has been trying for days to make some sinister mystery out of this tragic accident. I’m not going to help you do that, Mr. Pace. There is nothing sinister about the circumstances surrounding the crash of Flight 1117, and there is no reason the traveling public should have any concern whatsoever about flying the Sexton 811. I can’t say it clearer than that.”

“No, sir,” Pace replied. The other reporters ceased trying to interrupt, knowing the exchange between Pace and Lund would make good copy. “And I’m not trying to make anything sinister of this tragedy. But if you recall, TransAmerican had a turbine disk shatter in Seattle some months ago, and in that case, no ingested debris was involved.”

“What’s your point?” Lund snapped.

“That perhaps there’s something about this engine we don’t know. That it might be prudent to put them on the ground until we find out.”

“I disagree,” Lund said. “In any event, that’s not the NTSB’s decision. It’s the FAA’s.”

“The NTSB can make the recommendation.”

“Not this board member,” Lund said with a tone of finality.

Lund started to look away, but the insistent tone of Pace’s voice drew him back. “Last question,” the Chronicle reporter said. “What’s the purpose of this press conference?”

Lund looked startled. He glared at Pace. “To announce our tentative findings,” he said. “You’ve been demanding to know for more than a week. Now you know.”