Retired from the Marine Corps, Kevin was the old man of the group. Not sure he fit in yet. On probation for another ten months. He watched Joe . . . everything by the book. Their preflight checks were quick and methodical, cargo doors secured, waiting for him to complete the takeoff data. No pressure—just make it fast. Joe never said it, but he could see it in Wendy’s eyes. Kevin avoided her look as he passed the data forward. He went to the back to review the hazardous materials document.
Global relied on its customers to declare anything hazardous, so there was no way to know what they were really carrying. The cargo deck was a sea of containers, a foot along the fuselage walls for a crawl space. The
Joe nodded; flipping through his binder for an approach plate he knew wasn’t there. Whiteman wasn’t a normal alternate. He would have to rely on Approach Control for frequency and guidance information. Whiteman’s bright lights in the distance were reassuring.
Wendy shallowed her descent preparing to level at four thousand feet. “Gear up,” she said.
“Let’s leave it down,” Joe said. Her stare prompted an explanation, unnecessary as it was. “No point in taking chances. It won’t hurt our airspeed and we’ll burn more fuel.” Ready to brief the approach, something caught his eye. Is that condensation or is smoke coming out of the air vents? Did the fire burn through an air conditioning duct? He checked Kevin’s panel. No manifold failure light—must be condensation. But his instruments were disappearing. “Kevin—turn off the packs and pull the ram air.”
Kevin recalled the Ram Air T-handle was located under a floor panel behind Joe’s seat. When he unstrapped and reached for the cover, his oxygen hose jerked his mask over his chin. In the time it took to swap with the observer’s mask, his eyes and throat were burning. Without the air-conditioning packs on, smoke and fumes were seeping into the cockpit. They hadn’t noticed with their masks and goggles on, but the toxic vapors reinforced their predicament. He found the T-handle and pulled, but nothing happened. Jesus— doesn’t maintenance ever check this stuff? He braced himself and yanked with all his might. Dusty air filled the cockpit, but it cleared quickly. Why did Joe want the packs off, anyway? Caught in the moment, Kevin realized he’d forgotten about his fuel dump. Thankfully the automatic shutoff worked. “The dump’s secured,” he said.
Confident that all was under control, Joe assumed aircraft control. Wendy raised her hands to confirm he was flying the jet. “Wendy—call the company. Make sure they’re sending trucks.”
Kevin was dumbfounded. With all that was going on, how could Joe be concerned with delivering freight? Kevin was beginning to wonder about him. Why have Wendy call Ops when his only job was running checklists? Kevin slid his volume lever up to monitor Wendy’s call.
“GlobeEx Operations, 3217’s diverting with an inflight emergency.” She repeated the transmission several times with no answer. “Must be out of range.”
“I’ll try while you fly,” Kevin said.
“Go ahead,” Joe said, reengaging the autopilot and autothrottles.
For the first time since the amber Master Caution light came on, the plane was under computer control, level at four thousand feet, two hundred thirty knots. Kevin tapped Joe on the shoulder. “I got in touch with flight ops. They have a plan for the freight—the safety reps are on the way.”
Joe raised a thumb, smiling under his mask. He could make out individual buildings now. Unless something else happened in the next four minutes, they had it made. “Call the field in sight.” Wendy relayed the information. Approach Control advised there was no other traffic, and passed them to Tower on 132.4. “Flaps 15.”
Wendy lowered the flaps to fifteen degrees while keying the mike. “Tower, 3217’s with you.” Her voice was steady. Hopefully no one noticed her hands shaking. She had been fine flying the plane, her hands on the controls. She expected Joe would take over, but being a spectator was difficult. The airfield was alive; every piece of emergency response equipment awaited them.
Joe glanced over his shoulder. The manual pressurization outflow valve was full open. The airplane was depressurized; they shouldn’t have any problems evacuating. He called for the Approach Checklist.
Kevin caught the tension in Joe’s voice. Now or never, do or die, hours of boredom interrupted by moments of sheer terror, all the clichés—which in flying were all the time. He’d been remarkable controlling his emotions, but was having doubts. He knew all hell would break lose once they stopped. The only thing keeping the smoke out was the flowing outside ram air. Without that, all bets were off. They weren’t safe until they were out of the aircraft and on the tarmac.
Joe briefed a visual approach to Runway 19. “We’ll stop on the runway and evacuate out the windows,” he said. “We don’t know what’s going on back there and I don’t care to find out. Kevin—if there’s time, read the Emergency Evacuation Checklist. If anyone sees something you don’t like, tell me early ’cause we’re not going around.”
Kevin tightened his lap belt and called the Approach Check complete.
Joe disconnected the autopilot and dipped the wing to turn base leg. “Flaps twenty-two, gear down,” he said.
“Gear’s still down, flaps twenty-two,” Wendy said, rechecking the three green lights on the panel, sliding the flap lever into the next detent.