Sojourners of the Sky (25 page)

It turned out the two children loved flying and Bill loved teaching them. Even if his unmarried stockbroker son, his know-nothing daughter and the federal government didn’t approve, he didn’t care. The aging aviator was bound and determined to share his rekindled passion for flying with the ones he loved. Spending valuable time with his grandchildren was all he had left. “The summer of fun,” as he called it, had been one of the best summers of his life. Indeed, Bill hadn’t felt so full of energy in years. Even Lynn, his wife of over forty years, rediscovered her love of cooking and baking for a family.

Lucy’s stomach hadn’t yet fully settled down, so she taxied the aircraft much slower than normal. She pulled the airplane up to the barn door and shut it down. Lucy remained attentive until the small black propeller spun to a stop and silence filled the cockpit. She then closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths to calm her tattered nerves.

Jack was waiting for them, hoping to hear the details on how her lesson went. In contrast to his sister’s dark hair, Jack’s hair was so light many of his friends called him Whitey. He was slightly shorter than Lucy, but the gap was closing on an almost daily basis. He was also much less reserved than his sister, allowing himself to smile for nearly every waking moment of the day. And unlike Lucy, Jack found stalls and spins to be quite invigorating. He couldn’t wait to practice some more.

The three worked together securing the airplane for the night. They laughed and talked about their most exciting lesson so far. It was almost time for dinner, and both of the children were eagerly looking forward to telling their grandmother all about the day’s events.

As the three aviators strolled toward the house, totally immersed in the moment, the car that had been parked at the end of the driveway, motored the rest of the way up the one lane gravel path. They each knew instantly who it was.

“You kids go on ahead. Tell Grandma I’ll be right in,” advised their granddad.

“Oh, it’s your neighbor, Mr. Tacker,” said Jack flatly. His grandfather didn’t respond verbally, he simply motioned for them to keep walking. He then turned to face the approaching vehicle.

John Tacker climbed out of his car, but stood tentatively behind the opened door, intending to use it as a shield if necessary.

“What can I do for you, Tacker?” asked Bill.

“I see you got your Cessna flying again, Bill,” said John.

“Yup, we sure did. What business is it of yours?”

“As far as I know, Bill, you don’t have permission from the FAA to use this field as a runway,” barked the former government employee. “You can’t just land an airplane any old place you feel like, you know.”

“You don’t work for the FAA anymore, John, so buzz off,” said Bill, with anger in his voice. Lucy’s grandfather didn’t get angry often, and it generally took a great deal to get him there, but John Tacker had been a thorn in his side for far too long.

“That’s right, I don’t. But I still have plenty of friends there. Friends that will be more than happy to take this little Cessna of yours off your hands before you kill someone.”

“Get off my land and don’t ever come back,” ordered Bill. “And tell your FAA friends that they had better not show up here unarmed.” He then wheeled toward the house, waving a hand of dismissal to his nemesis.

John Tacker climbed into his car. “If I see that thing over my house again, you can expect a call from the FAA.”

Bill Pratt walked up the creaky wooden steps of the front porch where his two grandkids stood. They’d watched the confrontation, but couldn’t hear clearly what was said.

As they entered the large country kitchen, Lucy asked, “What did he want, Grandpa?”

“Oh, don’t worry about him. He’s got a boat-load of anger inside and he wants to take it all out on me,” he said as he closed the screen door behind him.

“What’s he so mad at you for, Grandpa?” asked Jack.

Bill looked at his grandson briefly before turning to watch the car leave his driveway. The moment his neighbor’s car was gone, the old man replied flatly, “I killed his wife and he never got over it.”

Both grandkids stopped dead in their tracks and stood in shocked silence.

Detroit to Tokyo

Northwest Orient B747-200

Courtesy of the John Wegg Collection

B747-400 Cockpit

Twenty Six

Detroit to Tokyo

July 15, 1992

(Ten years earlier)

N
orthwest Orient flight twenty-one slowly inched toward runway two-one right at the Detroit Metropolitan Airport. The Boeing 747-400 was full to the gills, tipping the scales at 870,000 pounds: the airplane’s maximum gross weight. All four hundred passenger seats were full, as were all eight fuel tanks, for the planned eleven hour and ten minute flight to Tokyo’s Narita Airport.

“Ok, guys, it will be my takeoff. We’ll use standard company procedures for initiating an abort prior to V-one. After V-one, if we have a problem, I’ll fly ‘till we get to one thousand feet and then I’ll give the airplane to you, Doug,” stated Captain Bill Pratt, with absolute authority. Then turning to the second copilot sitting in one of the jumpseats behind him, Captain Pratt added, “Mark, if we lose one, don’t wait for the order, reach up and start dumping fuel right away.” Then, after resuming his scan of the taxiway ahead, Bill said to Steve Hotchkiss, the second captain sitting directly behind him, “Steve, I’ll count on you to keep our passengers and flight attendants in the loop.” He waited for an acknowledgment before adding, “For now, guys, we’ll plan to come back here when we’re light enough and land on runway two-one right. If we lose two engines, we’ll plan on landing overweight. Now, I’m not a rocket scientist so keep an eye on me and don’t hesitate to speak up. Remember, we’re all old and tired; egos don’t exist here. Anybody have any questions or additions?”

The three other pilots looked at their captain and shook their heads, uttering a “no” practically in unison.

Bill had been a captain on the B747 for nearly ten years, but had only been flying the -400 variant for a little over a year. Northwest Orient was the launch customer for the B747-400, placing it in commercial service in early 1989. The B747-400 held more passengers and was far more technically advanced than the older models Bill was accustomed to flying, making his new ride seem like a totally different aircraft.

One area of difference between the B747-400 and the older versions of the Boeing 747 was the instrumentation itself. Whereas the airplanes Bill had flown previously were staffed with a flight engineer and equipped with old style “round dials,” the -400 instrument panel had just six flat panel screens used to display all navigation, flight condition and on board systems information to the two flying pilots. The advanced level of automation allowed the flight engineer position to be eliminated completely.

They were number three in line for takeoff, and with the pre-takeoff briefing complete, Captain Pratt called for the before takeoff checklist. There was a small jet in front of them, its fuselage barely visible beneath the nose of their red-tailed Boeing. And as he responded to Doug’s checklist challenges, after actually confirming that each item was accomplished, Bill had to remain vigilant with his outside scan so as not to overrun the tiny jet. Since the cockpit of a B747 is located thirty feet above the ground, taxi speed is difficult to judge. And as a seasoned wide-body pilot, Bill knew that if the small jet ahead stopped suddenly, he would have precious little time to react.

Captain Pratt momentarily glanced to his left while silently exhaling. The long flights across the dateline were slowly wearing the aging aviator down. He wasn’t sure how much longer he’d be able to take it. In his younger days, the five-foot-eleven, fair-haired pilot possessed the physique of an athlete. But those days had been ever so slowly slipping away. Bill had sciatica in both legs, a nearly non-stop pain in his lower back and was slowly losing his hearing. The big Boeing was a wonderful airplane in many ways, but the constant wind noise in the cockpit had taken its toll on his eardrums. Even worse, at least as far as Bill was concerned, he’d begun to notice that whenever he looked in the mirror his light blue eyes saw his grandfather staring back at him. The mature image forced him to wonder where his hair had gone and where all the wrinkles had come from. Bill knew his days of flying the “six-pacs” (a trip consisting of six crossings of the Pacific Ocean) were behind him. He only hoped he could hang on until retirement. There was also a secret, one that he kept to himself. Bill had a medical problem, serious enough that if anyone learned the truth his career would be over. It was one of the very few things that even his wife was not privy to.

*

Nestled comfortably in a first class seat on the upper deck, thirty feet behind Captain Pratt, sat John Tacker. Neither knew the other was near. If they had, there most assuredly would have been a maelstrom of fireworks.

John closed his eyes. A vacation in Asia with his wife, Liesel, was indeed a dream come true.

*

Bill rolled the giant aircraft toward the runway with a smoothness that only a twenty-five thousand hour pilot could deliver. It took quite a bit of thrust to keep the massive four-engine aircraft moving, and Bill had to constantly remind himself to watch his speed. Allowing his aircraft to accelerate unchecked created a potential for calamity.

Using the touch of one finger per engine and the feeling in the seat of his pants, the airplane’s master smoothly adjusted the four power levers to maintain a taxi speed that was well below the recommended maximum of forty knots.

“Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy, are you ready?” queried the Metro Tower controller.

Bill looked at Doug Fordham, his six-foot, sandy-haired copilot and asked, “All set?”

Doug nodded affirmative while keying the microphone attached to his headset, “Yup, Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy is ready.”

“Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy, traffic is a company DC9 departing the parallel; wind calm, runway two-one right, cleared for takeoff,” advised the tower controller.

“Twenty-one heavy, on the roll,” said Doug.

Bill rounded the turn onto the runway and announced, “It will be a full thrust takeoff. We’ll be climbing to ten thousand feet on runway heading, and the transition altitude is eighteen thousand.” He then pushed all four thrust levers to the forward stop.

Acceleration was slow. The small green arrow on their airspeed displays, indicating where their airspeed would be in ten seconds, moved as if it were stuck in molasses. Though the four Pratt & Whitney jet engines were producing nearly fifty-seven thousand pounds of thrust each, a jet fighter-type, full afterburner, kick-in-the-butt takeoff it was not. But the pilots, sitting high in the air while still on the runway, knew all was normal and felt completely at ease.

“Eighty knots, throttle hold, thrust normal,” announced Doug.

“One hundred…one twenty…one forty…V-one…rotate thirteen degrees,” stated Doug in a matter-of-fact tone, as the airplane lumbered down the runway, slowly building speed.

Nine thousand feet of concrete was behind them before Bill began to slowly pull the giant airplane’s nose into the air. The controls were heavy. Bill could feel the sheer mass of the machine under his feet as the nose slowly rotated skyward. The two tires on the nosewheel gently lifted from the pavement, but the airplane would use up another thousand feet of runway before the airliner’s other sixteen tires made it into the air.

Once the massive airplane was free of the ground, Bill began trimming the elevator to help reduce the amount of back pressure he was holding on the control yoke. As planned, Bill held the pitch at thirteen degrees. Then, when it was safe to do so, he lowered the nose slightly to allow the aircraft to accelerate.

The airspeed slowly inched its way higher. With the airplane as heavy as it was, it would take quite a while for the airspeed to reach the airplane’s minimum safe maneuvering speed of two hundred and sixty knots. Mishandling the airplane at such a critical time could very easily stall the wing, resulting in an immediate loss of control.

Holding the flight controls steady required a great deal of muscle, but even so, the captain knew he had to be gentle with the beast. Finessing the big Boeing was a skill learned over time.

“Twenty-one heavy, over to departure. Have a good trip,” advised the tower controller.

“Twenty-one heavy, see ya,” said Doug. He then quickly changed frequencies. “Departure, Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy is out of one thousand five hundred, climbing to one-zero thousand.”

“Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy, radar contact; climb and maintain one-zero thousand,” ordered the departure controller.

“Up to ten, Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy,” said Doug.

The captain rapidly glanced at all of his engine and flight instruments to confirm what he already knew. Once satisfied, he shifted his focus back to the airspeed display.

They’d taken off with the flaps set at twenty degrees. Watching as the speed reached each milestone, indicating that it was safe to retract the flaps to the next lower setting, Bill called, “Flaps ten…flaps five…flaps one…flaps up.”

Doug dutifully checked his airspeed display when he heard his captain’s orders, confirming that a flap retraction was safe. Satisfied, the first officer then did as he’d been told.

A moment before the flaps were fully retracted, they stopped. A flap sensor detected the malfunction and instantly sent a caution message to the cockpit. Two amber lights illuminated and a rapid-fire tone could be heard throughout the flight deck. All at once, four sets of eyes fixated on the cockpit systems display, but before any of them had a chance to consider the problem, it corrected itself. All eyes then shifted to the flap display to confirm that the control surfaces on the trailing edge of the wings were indeed operating again.

“Did you catch what it was?” asked Bill.

“No, I noticed it said ‘flaps,’” said Doug, “but it fixed itself before I had a chance to read the whole message.”

“Huh,” muttered Bill, as he looked at the screen to once again confirm that the flaps were up. A moment later, he allowed the anomalous fault to slip from his mind.

“Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy, turn right direct Layne and proceed on course; climb and maintain one-three thousand,” ordered the controller.

“Direct Layne and up to thirteen, Northwest Orient twenty-one heavy,” responded Doug.

Bill slowly banked the airplane to the right, while keeping a very close eye on his airspeed display throughout the turn. He knew he must maintain at least a speed of “flaps-up plus twenty knots” in order to preserve a safe margin above stall speed.

The huge four engine airplane turned north. It would take nearly thirty minutes for the heavy B747 to climb all the way to their initial cruise altitude of twenty-eight thousand feet. At measured points enroute, they would climb when they could in order to get into the thinner air above. But it would be a long while before they’d burned off enough fuel to make the airplane light enough to initiate a climb above twenty-eight thousand feet. Their plan was to eventually climb to thirty-nine thousand feet and fly at a speed equivalent to eighty-five percent of the speed of sound or, Mach .85. That was, of course, unless the powers controlling the winds and turbulence had other ideas. Men make plans, God laughs.

*

Safely airborne, John Tacker, who firmly believed in the old adage, “If it ain’t a Boeing, I ain’t going,” allowed himself to drift off. As his breathing and heart rate slowed, he told himself to remain on guard. After all, he was a pilot, and there was always a chance that he might be needed up front.

“The weather looks a bit rough on the other side of Layne,” noted Bill, after studying the radar display located near his left knee.

“Yeah,” agreed Doug, after a brief glance at his own display. “What do you want to do?”

“Tell the controller we’d like to go ten degrees left of course,” said Bill.

“I don’t think ten degrees is gonna cut it, Bill,” suggested Doug. “My scope is showing an awful lot of heavy precip.”

The line of heavy precipitation Doug was referring to did indeed stretch from one side of their radar displays to the other. Though heavy rain is indicated on a radar screen as a bright red blob, it does not indicate turbulence. Rain, regardless of its intensity, is rarely a threat to aviators, but turbulence can be. There are a number of tricks-of-the-trade that pilots use to interpret what the radar is showing them. These lessons learned over time can help them avoid the worst of the bumps.

“I’m looking at the thinnest spot,” said Bill.

“I don’t know, Bill, I think it might be attenuating,” said Doug. “How about if I tell them you want thirty degrees left? That should give you some room to maneuver.”

“Sounds good,” replied Bill.

Doug tried repeatedly to obtain permission from the controller to deviate, but the man on the ground was so busy handling other airplanes the copilot could not get a word in edge-wise.

The Boeing approached the ominous looking gray clouds doing two hundred and ninety knots, the minimum speed for their current weight and configuration, as well as the recommended speed for flying through rough air.

Both Bill and Doug knew they could have completely circumnavigated the weather, but doing so would have required flying a great many miles out of their way, burning precious fuel in the process. But as the colossal airplane nibbled at the outer edge of the weather, they both regretted not doing what their instincts had told them.