LACKING VIRTUES (4 page)

Simmons politely blew his smoke behind him. “The pilot radioed the tower for clearance to land on runway Two Six Right. Clearance was granted. No indication of further trouble until the captain reported a wing fire. The entire flight was visible from the tower.”

Warner took over, his voice several octaves deeper. “Thank you, Simmons. Please put out the cigarette. The visual reports indicate that the fire, which was burning near the point at which engine number one left the wing, grew rapidly. Roughly one mile from the end of runway Two Six Right, the burning wing separated from the aircraft. It is lying in a field several hundred yards from the main body of the wreck.

“The aircraft, I’m sorry to say, slammed into the Ford plant just off Two Six Right. We’re told a late shift was working. You’re going to need a strong stomach for this one. Estimated casualties on the ground will easily make this the worst crash in history.”

“It had to happen sooner or later,” Jack Kendall said. He was the newest, youngest, and most idealistic member of the Go Team, bright and unseasoned. “I told you, chief, we should’ve pushed harder for Congress to set national standards on what can be built along approaches.” 

“Maybe this will get their attention,” Warner said. “Words unfortunately don’t have much impact. Returning to the business at hand, the people from Boeing won’t be here until early morning. The Pratt & Whitney guys have a shorter flight. They should get in soon after us. We’ll convene for a quick briefing, then hit the field.

“Clifton and Ward, take the Pratt & Whitney people, a man from Delta and someone from the Airport Authority out to the engine. I want to know which way it was facing when it hit, if it was rotating, the usual. If it’s positioned in such a way that you have access to the mounting structures, I want a preliminary report. The mounting bolts? The mounts themselves? Any attached remnant of pylon that might indicate a crack, such as the one found on the DC-10 at O’Hare?”

“Right, sir. We’ll get it done.”

“Connors, McCauley and Johnson, the wing is yours.” 

“Frank,” Johnson said. “You’ve indicated it’s out in a field somewhere. Are the authorities making certain it’s not disturbed or are they too involved with the main wreckage and the fire?”

“Good question. Allen, call the Atlanta P. D. and confirm that the cops are protecting the wing. If they tell you their men are all needed at the Ford plant, explain to them what happens to our investigation if the wing is tampered with.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll try to make them understand.”

“Roth, I want you to coordinate the salvage operations. Find someone in the city government who can give you a listing of reliable local operators.”

“Right, Frank. Where are we going with the wreckage? Have you lined up anything yet?”

“No, but the old Eastern hangar at the airport is vacant again. If we can get it, it would be the most convenient place to reconstruct the aircraft.”

“Do you want me to check into that, too?”

“Please. Downey, you book the hotel. We’ll need a place for meetings and eleven rooms – unless some of you are volunteering for double occupancy.”

Jack Kendall said, “How long do you think we’ll be here, Frank? I promised my wife I’d give her my best guess.”

“Don’t get into the habit of doing that, Kendall. Families need to understand that you have no control over the length of an investigation. Clear?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. I want the rest of you to come with me to the Ford plant. It won’t be a pretty sight, so prepare yourselves. I don’t know if this thought helps you at such times, but it helps me: for each body you see tonight, others who would have ended up the same way will live – if we control our guts and do our job.”

Simmons said, “By the way, Frank, I’ve chartered us a few helicopters from Peach-Tree DeKalb over to the main airport. A look at the accident site from the air seemed like a good idea.”

***

Warner stared in silence out a window of the Bell Jet Ranger. If someone had the inclination to loot a shopping mall across town, he thought, there would be no obstacle. Every police car, fire truck and rescue vehicle in the Atlanta metro area seemed to be jammed into the parking lots around the Ford plant.

It had been a direct hit, precisely the sort of thing they had all been dreading since the big jets took to the air. Perhaps the young idealist, Kendall, was right. Perhaps he should have pushed the NTSB to put more pressure on Congress, though he doubted it would have done any good.

Their helicopter flew closer.

The center section of the Taurus assembly line building was a mass of blazing rubble. The fire was still spreading to wings of the plant that had not been hit directly by the plane. Stone and metal were no match for a hundred thousand pounds of aviation fuel.

“Jesus, there’s the tail!” Simmons exclaimed. “Look at that, Frank.”

“Yes, I see it.” The inverted tail section of the 767, with one rudder still attached, loomed like a great wounded beast above the shadows of an outlying lot. The blaze a couple hundred yards away lit up the Delta markings on its aluminum skin. They looked as fresh and reassuring as they did in the TV commercials.

Warner remembered the days when the first people on the site of a crash were the airline paint crews, working in fire and wind to white out the company name. This was a terrible accident, one that would not sit well with the flying public. He imagined the more mercenary corporate souls down in the bowels of Operations scrambling around for paint. They would be too late. He could see at least three separate news crews filming the tail. In 1999 the media beat them all to the punch.

Warner frowned. He had just noticed something that made his blood boil. “Do either one of you see any cops around the tail or the first-impact debris?”

“No cops.  TV people and souvenir hunters,” Kendall said. “They’re like vultures.”

“This is unconscionable. The cockpit voice recorder and black box are in the tail. Doesn’t anyone understand we can’t solve a crash without those parts?”

Chapter Three

They entered the terminal building at 11:30 p.m., three hours after the crash. Television news crews roamed the A Concourse like jackals, latching on to anyone who would talk to them. When they recognized Warner and his team, they attacked in a hungry swarm, blocking his progress.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said in his flat but authoritative voice, “show the good judgment you ask of your government officials and move out of the way. The first hours of an investigation can be critical. You are impeding our progress, and hence the safety of future air travel. I can’t imagine that will help your ratings. Step aside, please.”

Miraculously they obeyed. Warner had that effect on people, even reporters.

The throng outside the Crown Room, which Delta officials were using as their crisis center, resembled an angry, grieving mob. Relatives and spouses of workers at the Ford plant had joined those who had lost loved-ones in the crash. Rabble rousers shouted down the Delta spokesman, who fielded all questions but refused to give substantive answers. Warner grabbed a cop, showed his I.D. and asked for an escort to the door.

Inside the elegantly appointed room, Delta executives, attorneys, crash investigators and media consultants had organized into groups to deal with the many-headed monster the crisis had spawned. There were decisions that had to be made quickly. How, for example, were they going to keep Delta reservations from plummeting in the days ahead? How could they best show an empathetic corporate face to those who had suffered loss in the crash without appearing to admit guilt – guilt which, if established, could cost the company hundreds of millions of dollars? How could they speed up their own internal investigation so that, if the crash had been a result of some inadequate or negligent service procedure on the part of the airline, safeguards against a repeat could be put into effect at once? What type of initial posture should they assume toward the Ford Motor Company, whose Taurus assembly plant one of their planes had reduced to rubble, and whose skilled work force it had decimated? A careless decision here could mean the end of Delta.

Into this solemn corporate war council marched Frank Warner and his Go Team. Every airline executive who cared to be honest with himself knew that, without the NTSB, airline travel would be a lot more dangerous than it was. But this didn’t stop them from having a big problem with Warner. He was too harsh; he did not understand the needs of the corporate world; he saw the causes of a crash in black and white when gray would be more appropriate; he was a perfectionist in an imperfect world; and worst of all, he did not understand how to distribute the responsibility for a mishap.

In spite of all this cozying up to him, Warner knew the truth. He was not offended. On the contrary, he considered their dislike the highest compliment they could have paid him. In his view, closeness between the regulators and the regulated was a disease that had greatly weakened the American system. He wanted no part of it.

Reid Allworth, the brilliant, dashing chairman of Delta, came over and warmly shook Warner’s hand. “Hello, Frank. I’m glad you and your men are here. Renaker and the boys from Pratt & Whitney are on their initial approach, so give them another twenty minutes or so. There’s time for us to go over the aircraft’s maintenance records and the pilot bios while we’re waiting.”

Warner stood stiff as a rod. “The records can wait, Reid. The engine boys can join us when they arrive. I need to get my people in the field while there’s still something to examine. By the way, are you aware that the tail section of your aircraft is sitting in the Ford parking lot totally unguarded?”

“What? Why, that’s – ”

“Reid, the CVR and black box are in the tail. If they’re gone, so are our chances of solving this crash conclusively. What about the wing? Do you know for a fact that it’s being protected?”

“Of course. I instructed the police – ”

“I realize you’ve got a company to run. I know this is a very trying time for you. Nevertheless, Reid, your first responsibility as a public carrier is to the safety of your passengers. It’s very difficult for me to conduct an investigation on a wreckage you have allowed the curiosity seekers to contaminate.”

“Frank, what are you talking about? My first priority
was
to secure the wreckage. It’s impossible that either the tail or the wing is unguarded. I gave the police instructions that could not have been more explicit.”

“It’s unguarded, Reid, at least the tail is. We had a good look at it from the air.”

“I’ve got the local FBI,” said Simmons, who had wrenched a phone away from one of the airline’s media people.

“Thank you,” Warner said, still seething. “While I’m talking, get me the Atlanta police.”

The atmosphere in the conference room remained icy as Warner dispatched his teams to examine the engine, the wing and the tail, letting Allworth decide which airline people would work with each group. He would make his peace with the Delta chairman later, when he wasn’t so angry. Right now he had his mind on the black box and the cockpit voice recorder, the CVR, which he hoped were still in the tail.

Chapter Four

Eastern Germany

Paul Delors had driven all night to arrive in the village of Altenhagen, 160 kilometers north of Berlin, before dawn. When he pulled up in front of Claussen’s farmhouse, a few stars still blinked overhead but morning was not far off. A band of steel gray light shone to the east, and he could make out the silhouette of pine forests and banks of fog that lay around like great sleeping beasts.