Final Flight (3 page)

“Captain,” said Judith Farrell firmly,
“I do not appreciate that evasive answer.”

“Mister Tarkington, include Miss Farrell
in your group. “It is ‘Ms.,” not “Miss.”"

“Please come with me, Ms.,” said a drawling
voice at her elbow, and she turned to see a tan
face framing perfect teeth. The grin caused his
cheeks to dimple and deep creases to radiate from the
corners of his eyes. The innocent face was topped
by short, carefully combed brown hair.

“I’m Lieutenant Tarkington.” The captain
was walking away. In the passageway she asked,
“Lieutenant, who is that captain? He’s not the
ship’s commanding officer or executive officer, is
he?”

“He’s the air wing commander, ma’am. We call
him CAG.” Tarkington pronounced “CAG”
to rhyme with “rag.” It was a fifty-year-old
acronym from the days when the air wing commander
had been known as Commander Air Group, and it had
survived into the age of jets and super carriers.

“But let’s talk about you. Whereabouts over here on
this side of the pond do you live, ma’am?”

“The pond?”

“Y’know, the puddle. The ocean. The
Atlantic.”

“Paris,” she said in a voice that would have chilled
milk. “I sure am glad you’re touring this little
tub with me this morning, ma’am. All my friends
call me Toad.”

“For good reason, I’m sure.”

Lieutenant Tarkington smiled thinly at the
other members of his group, all men, and motioned for the
little band to follow him.

He led them through pale blue passageways with
numerous turns, and soon everyone except
Tarkington who frequently looked back over his
shoulder to ensure his five were following
faithfully-was hopelessly lost. They passed
fire-fighting stations with racks of hose and valves
and instructions stenciled on the bulkhead. Above their
heads ran mazes of pipes, from pencil-thin to eight
inches in diameter, each labeled cryptically.
Bundles of wires were threaded between the
pipes. Every thirty feet or so there was a large
steel door latched open. When asked by one of the men,
Tarkington explained that the doors allowed the crew
to seal the ship into over three thousand watertight
compartments. He paused by a hole in the deck
surrounded by a flange that rose about four inches from the
deck. Inside the hole was a ladder leading to the
deck below. Above it a heavy hatch on hinges stood
ready to seal it.

“When the ship goes into battle,” Tarkington
said, “we just close all these hatches and this ship
becomes like a giant piece of Styrofoam, full
of all these watertight compartments. The enemy has
to bust open a whole lot of these compartments to sink this
bucket.”

“Just like the Titanic,” Judith Farrell
muttered loudly enough for all to hear.

“A bucket?” one of the men murmured in a heavy
French accent.

Tarkington led them on. The smells of food
cooking assailed them. They looked into a large
kitchen filled with men in white trousers, aprons and
tee shirts. Each wore a white cap that covered
his hair. “This is the forward crew’s galley.”
Huge polished steel vats gleamed amid
the bustling men, several of whom smiled at the
visitors. “They’re fixing noon chow. The ship
serves eighteen thousand meals a day.”

Beside the galley was a cafeteria serving line with
steam tables, drink dispensers, and large steel coffee
urns. Huge racks of metal trays stood at
the entrance. “The men go through here and fill their
trays,” Tarkington said as he led them into the mess
area, which was filled with folding tables and chairs.
“They find a chair and eat here.” The overhead was a
latticework of pipes and wires. Around the
bulkheads were more fire-fighting hoses and numerous
buttons and knobs to control machinery which wasn’t
visible. Large doors formed the forward bulkhead.

“What are those doors?” Judith Farrell
asked. “Weapons elevators, ma’am.”

“Does the entire crew eat here?” one of the men
asked in an accent Tarkington took to be German.

“Couldn’t be done. There’s fifty-six hundred
men on this ship. We’ve got another galley and
mess area back aft. The crew eats in both
mess areas in shifts. The officers have two
wardrooms and the chief petty officers have their own
mess.” The group just stood, looking. “It isn’t
exactly eating at the Ritz, but the chow is
pretty darn good,” Tarkington added and waved his hand
for them to follow.

He led them outboard from the mess area to a ladder
that rose steeply.

They ascended one deck and followed him through
another open watertight door out into the hangar bay.

The hangar was a two-acre cavern crammed with
aircraft. The group threaded their way around the
myriad of chains that secured each plane to a clear
walk area that meandered down the center of the hangar between the planes. Tarkington stopped and the visitors
gawked.

“Sort of takes your breath away, doesn’t it?”

“All these planes … the Frenchman marveled.
F-14 Tomcat fighters, A-6 Intruder
attack bombers, and FirstA-18 Hornet
fighter-bombers, all with folded wings, were crammed
in so that not a square yard of space was empty.
Tarkington led them to a clear area that divided the
space laterally.

“Now this space right here is always kept open, so
we can close these big bombproof doors.”
Massive doors that were as tall as the bay was
high-about twenty-five feet-were recessed
into each side of the bay.

“There are two of these doors, this one and the one
back aft. By closing these we can separate this bay
into three compartments and isolate any fire or bomb
damage. Up there,” Tarkington pointed at a
small compartment with windows visible near the ceiling,
“is a station that’s manned twenty-four hours a day.
The man on duty there can close these doors from up
there and turn on the fire-fighting sprinklers at the
first sign of fire or a fuel spill. You will
notice we have three of these stations, called
CONFLAG stations, one in each of the three bays.” In
the window of the nearest CONFLAG station, the face of the sailor on duty was just visible. He was looking
down at them.

One of the reporters pointed at some racks
hanging down from the ceiling which held large white
shapes pointed at both ends. “Are those bombs?”

“No, sir,” said their guide. “Those are extra
drop tanks.” When he saw the puzzlement on the
reporter’s face, he added, “Drops are fuel
tanks that hang under the wings or belly of an
airplane that the pilot can jettison if he has
to.” The lieutenant stepped to an A-6 and
patted one that hung on a wing station. “Like this
one, which holds a ton of fuel.”

The German pointed his camera at the
lieutenant. Tarkington shook his head and waved his
hands. “Please don’t take any pictures in
here, sir.

You can get some shots up on the flight deck.
I’ll show you where.” He shepherded them
around the planes to a large opening in the side of the
ship. A greasy tire on stanchions was the only
safety line. About twenty feet below them was the
sea. On the horizon the group could see the city of
Tangiers and the hills beyond. The spring wind, still
raw, was funneling into the hangar through this giant
door. Above, a large roof projected out over the
sea and obstructed their view of the sky.

Tarkington nodded to a sailor on the side of the
opening and instantly a loud horn began to wail.
Then the huge projecting roof began to fall.

“This is one of the four aircraft elevators that
we use to move planes and equipment back and forth
to the flight deck. We’ll ride it up.” As the
platform reached their level, the safety stanchions
sank silently into the deck. When all motion
stopped, Tarkington led them out onto it.

The elevator platform was large, about
four thousand square feet, and was constructed of grill
work. Several of the journalists looked down through the
grating at the sea beneath them as the elevator rose with
more sounding of horns, and several kept their eyes
firmly on the horizon after a mere glance
downward. The wind coming up through the grid swirled
Judith Farrell’s dress. As she fought to hold
it against her thighs she caught Lieutenant
Tarkington looking at her legs. He smiled and
winked, then looked away.

On the vast flight deck, they walked around a
row of aircraft to a clear area. Their guide
stopped at a giant hinged flap that projected out
of the deck at a sixty-degree angle. “This is
a jet blast deflector, aJBD.

The plane on the catapult sits in front of
it,” he gestured forward to the launching area, “and this
thing comes up and deflects the exhaust gases up and
away from the planes behind. The JBD’S are cooled
internally by salt water.” He showed them the water
pipes on the back of the unit, then strolled forward
to the catapult hookup area.

He pointed out the slot in which the shuttle
traveled. The slot ran forward to the bow of the ship.
“The catapult is about a hundred yards
long and accelerates the planes up to flying speed.”

“What moves the shuttle?” a Frenchman
asked. “It’s driven by steam.

See, the catapult is right here under these steel
deck plates. It’s like a giant double-barreled
shotgun. There is a piston in each tube and they
are mated together,” he sneaked a glance at
Farrell, “and the shuttle sticks up through this slot.
The airplane is hooked to the shuttle. Steam
drives the pistons forward and tows the plane
along.”

He held up a hand and slammed it with his fist.
“Pow!”

“What is that?” Judith Farrell pointed to a
glassed-in compartment between the two bow catapults that protruded eighteen inches out of the deck.

“I’ll show you.” Tarkington led them over and they
looked in the windows. “This is the bow catapult
control bubble. The cat officer sits at this console
facing aft and operates both bow cats. That console
facing forward is where the man sits who monitors
all the steam and hydraulic pressures and
electrical circuits. He’s sort of like a
flight engineer on a jetliner.”

The group proceeded to the bow where they
looked back down the length of the ship. The view was
spectacular. The island superstructure over two
hundred yards aft looked like a goat herder’s
cottage. Here, Tarkington suggested, was a good
place for photographs. Everyone except
Judith Farrell began snapping pictures. She
turned and stared forward, out to sea.

“That’s east,” Tarkington told her. “You can’t
see it, but not too far in that direction is the
Strait of Gibralter, the entrance to the Med.

We’ll be going through there in a few days.”

“I know my geography.”

“I’ll bet you do, ma’am. Just where in Paris do
you live?”

“The Left Bank.”

“Where all those ol” hippies and crackpots
hang out?”

“Precisely there.”

“Oh.” He was silent for a moment. “Is this the
first carrier you’ve been on, ma’am?”

“Yes.”

“Well, what do you think of her?”

“It’s a waste of billions of dollars when there
are people in the world starving.”

“You may be right, ma’am. I always
figured that maybe somebody said something like that
to Joshua when he was standing there looking at the walls
of Jericho and thinking about tooting his horn. But my
suspicion is that the folks in Jericho were thinking
they hadn’t spent enough bucks on the walls. I
reckon it all depends on your point of view.”

She glanced at him with her brows knitted, then
turned and began walking aft. Tarkington followed
slowly, and the rest of the group lowered their cameras and
trailed after them.

They passed the bow catapult control bubble and the
upright JBD and approached the island. It had
looked small and unobtrusive from the bow, but as they
neared, it took on the aura of a ten story building
festooned with radar dishes and radio antennae.

The lieutenant led his five through an oval
door-they had to step over the combing-and into a ladder
well. Their footsteps echoed thunderously against the
metal walls as they trudged up flight after
flight of steep stairs (ladders, the sailors
called them), swimming against a steady stream of people
trooping down. The ship was so stupendously large,
yet the passageways and ladders were narrow, with low
ceilings, and crammed with pipes and wires and fire
fighting gear; the ship’s interior was
incongruously disconcerting to visitors unfamiliar
with warship architecture. Some people found themselves
slightly claustrophobic inside this rabbit warren
of bulkheads and ladders and people charging hither and yon
on unimaginable errands. Toad paused on several
landings to let his charges catch up and catch their
breath.

Six stories up they exited onto a viewing
area their guide quaintly referred to as
Vulture’s Row. Several other groups of
journalists were also there. Everyone with a camera
snapped numerous photos of the planes parked
neatly in rows on the deck below and the junior
officers answered technical questions as fast as they were
posed. Several of the tour guides were pilots who
expounded with youthful enthusiasm on the thrills
associated with flying off and onto the carrier.

“Are you a pilot?” the Frenchman with a
Japanese camera asked Lieutenant Tarkington.

“No, sir. I’m an RIO’-THAT means
Radar Intercept Officer-on F-14’s.

Those are the sharky-looking jobs down there with the wings that move backwards and forwards.”

The Frenchman stared. “The wings?”

“Yeah, the wings move.” Tarkington pretended
to be an airplane and waggled his arms
appropriately. Out of the corner of his eye he
saw Judith Farrell roll her gaze heavenward.

“Oui, oui. Formidable!”

“Yep, sure is,” the irrepressible
Tarkington agreed heartily. When their turn
came, Tarkington led his followers into
“PriFly,” a glassed-in room that stuck out of the
top of the island over the flight deck and offered a
magnificent view. Here, he explained, the air
boss, a senior commander, controlled the launch and
recovery of aircraft. As Tarkington drawled
along a helicopter came in to land, settling
gently onto the forward portion of the landing area.
Several of the group took pictures of the air boss
standing beside his raised easy chair with all his radios
and intercom boxes in the background.