James Deegan - The Angry Sea

At which point, one of them vanished inside the boat.

‘One of them just went below,’ said the co-pilot.

‘Seen,’ said the pilot.

‘Keep going!’ shouted the left-hand sniper.

What happened next happened very quickly.

The Lucky Lady suddenly slowed, meaning that the helicopter shot forwards relative to the boat.

Both snipers temporarily lost her, as the controlling pilot throttled back, lifting the nose to avoid getting within 7.62mm range.

At the same moment, the terrorist who had gone below now reappeared, carrying something long and black in his right hand.

In one smooth motion, he hefted it onto his shoulder, braced his feet, and looked up.

‘Oh, shit,’ said the pilot, instinctively breaking right, away from the contact.

Unfortunately, the manoeuvre simply made the roaring engine – and its heat signature – more visible to the missile’s infra-red sensors.

Below him, out of the pilot’s eyeline, there was a flash, and the Russian-made 9K38 Igla MANPAD released its projectile.

The pilot had pushed the Eurocopter hard right and down, desperately trying to throw the SAM off, but, with no countermeasure capability on the aircraft, they were dead and he knew it.

The missile detonated a little over a second after being fired, igniting the 280 litres of avgas still in the tanks and turning the front of the aircraft into an inferno.

As the disintegrating helicopter started to spin and descend, the snipers could hear the pilots screaming over their headsets.

The left-hand man unbuckled himself and leaped out, breaking his legs and back when he hit the water two hundred feet below, and knocking himself out.

He drowned shortly afterwards.

The other three men lived only until the aircraft itself smacked into the surface and exploded.

By which time, the Lucky Lady was already back up to top speed, and powering south through the choppy Mediterranean Sea.

26.

THE LOSS OF THE Cuerpo Nacional de Policía helicopter was not immediately confirmed, but there is only one obvious reason why such an aircraft might have both suddenly dropped below the radar horizon and lost radio contact, and the controllers in Seville were immediately alarmed.

They made contact with the amphibious assault ship SPS Juan Carlos I , which had a section of marines aboard a long-range NH Industries NH90 some twenty minutes away and closing in on the Lucky Lady , and asked for a local SITREP.

In London, Justin Nicholls and the rest of the MI6 leadership watched the situation develop.

The Policía chopper had disappeared at 14:24hrs BST, and repeated radio messages had gone unanswered.

At 14:40hrs, the Juan Carlos aircraft arrived at its last known location and reported debris and at least one body in the sea.

It then departed in pursuit of the yacht, which was by now some thirty-five kilometres off the coast of Morocco.

The Royal Navy of Morocco, meanwhile, had a French-built VCSM fast boat and a Floréal-class frigate, the Hassan II , out on exercise to the east. After liaising with the Spanish, those craft were now steaming west to try to intercept the terrorists. The Hassan had had its Panther helicopter up, but the ship’s captain now recalled it, understandably wary of letting it get within shooting distance of the yacht, which was heading at maximum speed towards Morocco’s northern coast.

‘What’s their game?’ murmured C. ‘They must know they’re going to be caught.’

‘They don’t care, do they?’ said the head of the Spanish desk. ‘They’re hoping to ram something and go out in a blaze of glory.’

‘So why go to the trouble of taking hostages?’ said Justin Nicholls. ‘Why not just kill them on the beach?’

27.

AT THE VERY moment Nicholls said that, the Lucky Lady slowed temporarily to thirty knots, and Argun Shishani and the man in the Manchester United shirt pushed the three women – all roped together and wearing flotation jackets – into the water, and jumped off after them.

All five of them got ears and noses full of water, and surfaced, winded and choking, to see the white boat powering off into the distance.

In the open water behind it, a small green RIB – a rigid inflatable, its shape picked out by a rubber buoyancy tube – had been bobbing in the gentle swell, a sea anchor holding it on station.

Low profile, invisible to radar.

The single man aboard it pushed the throttle forward, spooling up the big outboard Yamaha motor, and made his way over.

Shishani hauled himself aboard, and then leaned out to pull the first of the women in after him.

She struggled, at first, but when he punched her in the face she gave in. The others obeyed, meekly.

As the other man clambered into the dinghy, Shishani turned to the women.

‘Lie down!’ he said.

They did as they were told, huddling together in the bottom of the small boat. Shishani bent down, unfolded a dark tarpaulin, and spread it over the women.

Then he crawled under and lay down alongside them, the other terrorist following him.

Anyone looking from above would now see a small boat with – apparently – one person aboard.

The guy at the helm turned the inflatable and headed south-east.

Under the tarp, Argun Shishani smiled to himself.

One of the women started crying.

28.

TEN MINUTES LATER, the NH90 from the Juan Carlos finally caught up with the Lucky Lady .

Aware that another aircraft had gone down in the vicinity of the yacht, its crew were wary. Being military, they were at least trained to deal with MANPADs, and their helicopter was better-equipped with counter-measures, but still they stood off some 500 metres, the sensor operator observing the vessel’s progress on his screen.

After a few moments, he said, ‘No sign of the hostages on the rear deck. Take me to the side.’

The NH90 had a hundred knots on the boat, so it took a matter of moments for the pilots to get alongside.

The operator took his time, zooming in close on the yacht’s narrow, darkened windows.

‘Nothing,’ said the operator. ‘Front.’

The helicopter pulled ahead, the underslung camera swivelling to keep the speeding white craft in sight.

‘Nothing. Other side… Nothing. They must have taken them below.’

The pilot keyed his microphone to talk to the capitán commanding the marines in the back, who had been listening in.

‘You heard all that, Ramos,’ said the pilot. ‘What do you want to do?’

Capitán Ramon Ramos thought for a moment.

Fact was, he wasn’t sure what to do.

His orders were to recover the three women and take the terrorists alive, if possible.

But Ramon Ramos knew that there was no way these guys were coming quietly – he’d known from the moment he climbed aboard the aircraft that this was going to end in tears for someone.

His best hope had always been that his blokes could see and take out the bad guys.

But if everyone was below deck…

‘Ramos?’

‘Get back alongside, close enough so I can see the fucking thing.’

The pilot did as requested.

Ramos tugged on his harness and edged closer to the open door of the chopper.

Below him, the gleaming white yacht smashed and bounced its way inexorably through the shining sea.

He turned to the man next to him, Cabo Primero Jorge Fernández, who was sitting with his legs dangling in thin air, his Accuracy International .50 cal rifle cradled in his lap.

‘What do you reckon, Jorge?’ shouted Ramos, nodding at the rifle. ‘Can we stop him with that?’

Fernández shrugged. ‘How the fuck should I know, boss?’ he shouted back. ‘If I hit the engine, yeah. But just firing blind into the damned thing – who’s to say I won’t hit the fuel lines and barbecue the lot of them?’