Alex Duncan - Sweating the Metal

We cross the river. ‘Two miles to go, 12 o’clock, you should be visual with the grid on the nose.’ Good, I’m on target. My spine is tingling for some reason. I remember this feeling…

‘One and a half miles to go,’ calls Waldo, as we start to cross the Green Zone with its abundant crops, trees and compounds – all of which provide boundless cover for Taliban forces.

Straight ahead, I see a motorbike. It’s stationary and I see two fighting-age males dressed all in black looking at us; no sign of weapons though. The tingling sensation increases; all my senses are on overdrive. I put my thumb over the USL release switch on the cyclic just in case. We fly over the motorbike.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

‘Fucking hell,’ shouts Waldo.

‘What the fuck was that?’ asks Mick, sticking his head in the cockpit.

BANG!

Almost simultaneously, there’s a huge explosion just outside the port door, which caves in under the force of some kind of blast, shards of paint and metal hitting Waldo and Mick in the face. The aircraft lurches to the right.

‘Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!’ I think. ‘Not again.’

I throw the cyclic hard left and hit the USL release button; immediately, the load pings away and becomes a dumb bomb, falling to earth and who gives a fuck where it lands. My only priority is the cab and my crew; I need lightness and manoeuvrability.

I hear Waldo on the radio: ‘CONTACT, CONTACT, Ultimate Two One, small arms hit 3km south-east of PB3. Turning east. Wait out.’ Good lad, I didn’t even have to prompt him. In fact, I couldn’t have done it myself – I have problems of my own to deal with.

‘Shit, we’ve lost an engine!’ I say as I watch the N2 drop like a stone. I look at the torque. ‘What the fuck? Shit, we’ve lost both…’ This all happens in a millisecond. ‘Hang on, we’re still flying, we still have power. Fuck it, turning left,’ I say, manoeuvring out of the engagement zone and shrinking in my seat to make myself as small a target as possible. The lead’s flying and I don’t want to get hit.

We take another round in the engine.

I get the aircraft to the eastern edge of the Helmand River and we’re still flying. I pull power to get further away from the enemy. Height is safety. ‘Right, time to assess what’s going on,’ I say to myself.

I’m struggling. Nothing makes sense. We’ve taken rounds, that much I know; an RPG has exploded outside the port door; we have no torque on either engine, which indicates how hard the engine transmission is working. I scan the engine instruments checking the Ts and Ps. We’ve got an N1 reading for both engines, meaning there’s power going in, but the N2, which measures power coming out, reads zero for the No.1 engine, meaning its turbine isn’t turning. What the fuck? It doesn’t make sense.

All the pressures on the five gearboxes are showing zero PSI, but the caution advisory panel is clear; there are no warnings for low pressure in any of the gearboxes. The fuel gauge is showing 9,900 – the needle’s spinning like my bedroom after a night on the lash. Bollocks! I can’t even tell if we have a fuel leak. The list goes on…

I need to get a grip; first things first. ‘Guys, check yourselves. Are we all ok?’ They all check in with no injuries reported. ‘Okay, let’s have a look outside to ensure we’re not pissing fuel.’ Both Mick and Dave look and confirm we’re not. I explain what we’ve got at the front. Everyone is baffled, but we all concur that some of the malfunctions must be gauges or sensors affected by whatever hit us.

‘All the forward hatches have been blown open by something,’ says Mick.

‘There’s an increase in vibration in the back,’ Dave reports.

I make a decision. ‘Okay guys, I’m going to fly us north so we pass FOB Price and if the aircraft’s still flying nicely, we’ll push on to Bastion. I’m loath to land at Price because the logistics for repairing the cab are going to be a nightmare. If it comes to it, the area between Price and Bastion is benign enough for us to land on. Happy?’ They are.

We’re still flying level so I decide against calling ‘Mayday!’ I make the next call: ‘Pan Pan, Pan Pan, Pan Pan, Bastion Tower, Ultimate Two One, Pan Pan.’

‘Ultimate Two One, Bastion Tower, Pan acknowledged, pass your message.’

‘Pan, Ultimate Two One, CH47 with four POB eight miles east. We have taken multiple hits with multiple system failures. She seems to fly okay but many of our instruments have been knocked out. Request HALS 19 and Runway 19 if we can’t make it to the HALS. Request emergency services.’

‘Ultimate Two One, Bastion Tower, all copied. Let us know if we can be of further assistance.’ How nice to deal with somebody who understands not to ask too many questions; someone who isn’t trying to get in our cockpit, who knows implicitly we are running at maximum capacity.

‘Ultimate Two One, Bastion Tower. All air traffic held; you have priority on the approach. Good luck.’

Despite the vibration, the lack of functioning instruments and the damage and destruction caused in the attack, ZH891 holds out and responds to my every input as I fly us to the HALS, performing a precautionary running landing. As in any Hollywood airport disaster movie, fire engines follow us until we come to a halt. I taxi the aircraft to the nearest parking slot and stop.

‘Ultimate Two One, Bastion Tower. For your information, there is a suspected IED at the PHF, request you move further up.’

I look to my left and see a line of Hesco blast walls, another Chinook, another blast wall and then the PHF.

‘Bastion Tower, Ultimate Two One. Passed the point of caring, shutting down. Thanks for your help.’

And we shut down. We are flying in the same area again tomorrow – at night! I can hardly contain my enthusiasm.

We were supposed to be flying home on the 17th, but the weather in the UK that saw Heathrow, Gatwick and countless other airports buried under a mountain of snow, and the coldest December for 300 years, also affected those of us stuck in the sandbox. The TriStar that was supposed to fly out from Brize Norton to pick us up stayed where it was, with the knock-on effect that we also stayed where we were. The homecoming curse that had somehow managed to blight every single one of my previous Dets returned with a vengeance!

Eventually, the greatest minds in the MoD and RAF conferred and a way was found for them to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory – instead of arriving back in England on the 18th, we got back to a wintery white RAF Odiham late in the afternoon of the 22nd – just in time for Christmas, but minus our luggage. I don’t think I’ve ever been so pleased to see Ali and the kids.

Not long after Christmas, I called into work and found a report on my desk detailing the conclusions from the inspection of ZH891. Among its findings, I learned that we’d taken a 7.62mm round through the nose of the aircraft, which narrowly missed Waldo’s leg and lodged itself in the instrument panel. On its way, it severed thirty-six wires leading from various instruments, hence the bizarre and inexplicable readings we received.

The round that missed Waldo’s leg was to prove lucky for us all; although it severed the wires leading to the engine instruments and others, they proved its undoing, as the loom stopped the round in its tracks. When the trajectory was worked out, it was discovered that had it carried on travelling, the round would have lodged itself in the control closet where all the aircraft controls are situated. I prefer not to think about the implications of that particular scenario.

Another round hit the area where Dave Wray should have been sitting, had he not been busy looking at the USL. And as I manoeuvred away, another one went through the engine mount from behind, embedding itself in the mouth of the engine. I’ve no idea how, but – miraculously – it wasn’t ingested into the engine itself. Had it been, it would more than likely have resulted in a fire. Ordinarily, that wouldn’t necessarily prove particularly troubling, except for the fact that among the thirty-six wires severed by the round hitting the wiring loom were those controlling the fire extinguisher and fuel shut-off valve.