Code Black (8 page)

“You seem to know your way around a 737.” Donovan knew she’d been around airplanes for the better part of the last two decades, but he had a vested interest in keeping up the thin charade that they’d just met.

“My husband, Henry, is the chief pilot for Wayfarer Airlines. We used to fly a lot together, so I guess it goes with the territory.”

Donovan pictured the man she was talking about, though he hadn’t seen or spoken with Henry in eighteen years—he’d known the man well. In fact, he’d known Henry longer than Audrey had. Seeing her had somehow released a floodgate of memories.
Be very careful
, Donovan warned himself.

“I’m going to take his mask off,” Audrey said as she searched the medical kit. Moments later, she found what she wanted and broke the capsule in two. She slipped off the oxygen mask and held the smelling salts under the captain’s nose until the man’s head jerked and twisted to the side. She reached across him and waved the vial once again. His eyes fluttered open and he immediately flailed at the offending odor.

“Can you hear me?” Audrey questioned as she gazed at the man’s face.

“What the…where are we?” The captain’s words came out thickly as he shook his head to escape the pungent odor.

Audrey and Donovan watched as the captain struggled to pull himself out of the black hole he’d been in. Audrey leaned over him, trying to gauge his recovery.

Suddenly, the man jerked upright as if scalded by boiling water. His expression filled with terror. “What in the—oh shit!”

“Stop him! Get him off!” Donovan yelled as he fought to override the dangerous inputs. “Get him off the controls!”

Audrey reached in and fought to pull the captain’s hands free. She lost her leverage as the airplane banked hard to the left, then climbed. She still held the capsule in her hand and forced it back under his nose. He twisted his head violently and swung an elbow toward her ribs. Audrey avoided the blow, found her balance, and used all her strength to slap him hard across the face. She’d aimed for the bandage she’d so carefully affixed to his forehead and the effect was immediate. The man cried out in pain as he released his grip, then cradled his head in his hands, rocking back and forth as he moaned.

“Captain. Listen to me. The airplane is under control.” Audrey spoke reassuringly. “You’ve been out for a little while. Take a few deep breaths, but don’t touch anything.” Her voice softened. “Sorry I hit you. How do you feel? Look at me.” She put her hand around his and squeezed. “Do you know where you are? Do you remember what happened?”

The captain let out another moan as his eyes tried to fix on the person in front of him. His voice was weak but clear. “God, my head hurts.” His fingers went to his head and he touched the bandage. “What in the hell happened?”

“We were hit by another plane.” Donovan leaned forward to assess the man’s condition.

“Where’s Jeff?” He asked, his voice stronger this time. “Where’s my first officer?”

Audrey averted her eyes for a moment, looking behind her to where the copilot’s body was still laying on the floor. “He didn’t survive.”

Confusion clouded the captain’s face. “Jeff’s dead?” He turned toward Donovan, his voice filled with bewilderment. “A midair? You saw it happen?”

“I saw the plane only a few seconds before it hit us. It looked like a military plane, maybe a KC-135. It came from our two o’clock position.” Donovan pointed out the right window to indicate the angle. “It was in and out of the clouds. Didn’t you get a warning from Center, or a TCAS alert?”

“Nothing. Last thing I can recall was—” he paused and fought through the pain as he searched his clouded memory. “I remember now. I was attempting to talk to Air Traffic Control, but we weren’t getting an answer. That’s all I remember. I never saw a thing.”

“What’s TCAS?” Audrey asked.

“It’s a system that allows two airplanes to talk to each other electronically,” Donovan explained. “It’s a system designed to prevent midair collisions. Normally, there should have been multiple warnings up here in the cockpit that there was another airplane. It should have also given them the correct resolution to the conflict, told them to either climb or dive.”

“You said the other plane was military?” the captain asked, as he struggled to piece together the information.

Donovan nodded. “From where I was sitting, it looked like we were shooting through a small gap in the line of thunderstorms. That’s probably what the other airplane was doing, too. But if you didn’t get a warning from Center, or a TCAS warning, I doubt you could have reacted even if you’d seen them.” He could tell the man was processing the information. “We’ve lost the entire electrical system. Shouldn’t the ship’s main batteries be providing us with at least standby power to the essential instruments? I need your help in trying to get some of this back.”

“Who are you?” the captain asked.

“My name is Donovan Nash. I’m a corporate pilot.” Donovan simplified the task of explaining. “I fly Gulfstream jets out of Dulles. This is Audrey.”

“What’s your name?” Audrey asked the befuddled captain.

“My name is John. John Thornton.”

“We were lucky Donovan was with us, John,” Audrey added. “He saved all of us by managing to make his way up here and fly the plane.”

John grimaced as he began to survey the wrecked remains of his cockpit, squinting from the pain. “I think I’m okay; just give me a second. How long—” his words came out muffled and strained. “How long was I out? Where are we?”

Donovan glanced at his watch. “You were out at least twenty minutes. We’re down at 10,000 feet. We had an explosive decompression so we had to descend. My guess is we’re about 70 or 80 miles northwest of the line of thunderstorms.”

John’s eyes widened as he assessed the situation.

“John, we need to figure all this out.” Donovan watched as the man surveyed the cockpit. He hoped John was making sense of what he found. “Anything obvious? I don’t know anything about 737s. Like I said, I fly Gulfstreams.” Donovan’s hopes sagged as John looked at him in confusion.

“I don’t even know where to start,” John said. “We must have been hit from above?”

“That’s right. Can you tell if we have any power available?” Donovan urged. He started with the basics common in all aircraft. “Check the amps and the volts. Find out what we have.”

John pulled his attention to the overhead panel. His head swayed slightly as he fought to understand. He reached up and rotated two knobs. A perplexed look clouded his face.

“Anything?” Donovan continued flying the airplane, but kept a close eye on what John was doing, grateful that Audrey’s full attention was focused on John and not himself.

“It just doesn’t make sense. Nothing. We’re reading nothing. No power at all.” John lowered his head and held it in both hands.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Audrey asked, hovering close. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

John raised his head and smiled weakly at Audrey, then struggled to sit upright. “We need to check the circuit breaker panel. Are the people in back okay? What about the rest of my crew?” John tried to pivot all the way around toward Audrey, but wasn’t quite up to the effort. His shoulders slumped and he exhaled heavily.

“We have some casualties. One of the flight attendants survived, but she’s injured.” Audrey hesitated for a moment. “I’ll bring you up to date on all of that later. I think you need to help Donovan get some of the instruments back.”

“Okay, right. The panel behind me, it’s one of the electrical sub-panels. Can you see anything?”

Audrey looked directly behind where John sat. “I see rows of what look like little buttons. A whole bunch of them seem to be popped out.”

“Okay. Good, those are the circuit breakers. Look for the ones with larger numbers written on them; they’ll be the ones carrying the most amperage. Can you read them to me?”

“It’s too dark to see the labels,” Audrey replied.

“Here,” John said, his voice came across a little stronger than before. “Use this.”

Audrey switched on the flashlight John had pulled from its bracket. “That’s better, I can see them now. I found some with 30 written on them. AC Bus. DC Bus. One says UNSW, the other says SW,” Audrey called out after a quick search. “You want me to keep going?”

Donovan guessed she had found some of the more important ones. Thirty-amp breakers served the larger systems. The other letters probably stood for switched and un-switched, but he wasn’t sure what the significance was. “John, what does that mean?”

“Uh, hang on a second.” John paused for a moment as he thought. “If those are out, the power from the generators isn’t getting to the main bus. We need to push all of those in.”

“Not yet, Audrey,” Donovan warned. “I don’t think we can just start resetting breakers. We have so much damage we could easily start a fire.”

“Generator Bus one.” John looked at Donovan as if suddenly remembering. “We need to reset it; that’s the one we want.”

“Audrey, can you find that one? It’s probably marked GEN BUS 1.” It made sense. Donovan felt encouraged by John’s small, yet significant recovery.

It took her a moment to read the small labels. “I found it. Yes, it’s out.”

John pulled himself upright; he clamped his jaw tightly at the pain, but only for a second. He released the air slowly from between his teeth. “Donovan. Over on your side should be the emergency checklist. Let me have a look at that before we do anything rash.” He pressed his eyes shut again.

Donovan found the manual John wanted and passed it over to him. In doing so, Donovan couldn’t help but notice how much John’s hand was trembling.

“I’m sure that’s the one we need to reset,” John said emphatically, as he quickly flipped through the pages of the checklist.

Donovan was relieved that John had actually made a decision, though whether or not it was the right one remained to be seen. “Okay. I’m with you on this. Let’s give it a try.”

John looked up from the checklist, shrugged, and put it aside. “That’s got to be it—that breaker is as good a place to start as any. To be real honest, the checklist doesn’t really cover midair collisions.”

Donovan grinned inwardly at John’s comment, more because it showed the man was regaining his faculties than for the humor. “I think we have to give it a try. We can’t do anything with what we have now. But I’ll tell you, the overhead panel really worries me. It’s already shifted once from the turbulence. There’s so much damage, I’m worried about a fire. I’d say a major short is a very real possibility. It’s probably why all those breakers popped in the first place.”

“If that’s the case, they should just pop out again,” John explained. “Then at least we’ll know.”

Donovan nodded. “Okay, let’s give it a try. But as an extra precaution, I think we should have a fire extinguisher handy before we do this.”

“There’s one right here,” Audrey said, and pointed. “Hang on, I’ll pull it out.”

“Perfect. Set it right up here and either one of us can grab for it if we need to.” Donovan looked at John. “I’m ready whenever you are, captain. Audrey, are you set?” Adrenaline rush through Donovan’s body, perking his senses; if this worked, they were moments away from having functioning instruments.

“Just tell me what you want me to do,” Audrey said, her eagerness accompanied by uncertainty.

“On my mark, just push in the breaker,” John replied. “But don’t lose sight of it; we may need to pull it out again in a hurry. Everyone ready?” John paused for a moment. “Push it in, Audrey, and then take your hand away and watch for flames or any other breakers to pop.”

“It’s in.” Audrey did as she was instructed.

“I don’t see anything happening,” John said quickly. “Are you sure it’s in?”

“Oh my God! We’re on fire!” Audrey screamed and pointed up above them.

“Pull the breaker out!” Donovan reached for his oxygen mask. Dense white smoke began to pour out of the overhead panel. He knew that breathing even a small amount of the noxious vapor could kill him. An electrical fire could engulf the entire cockpit in minutes. He pictured being burned alive, trapped in his seat as he piloted the doomed 737.

“I got it! It’s out,” Audrey called, her voice a mixture of both terror and triumph.

The three of them sat, helplessly waiting for the smoke to get worse, or flames to fill the cockpit.

“We’re in deep shit,” Donovan said finally, as he watched the diminishing smoke drift aft toward the cockpit door. There appeared to be no residual fire. “We know we have at least one working generator, but there must be a massive short on the bus.”

The very real threat of fire had served to bring John completely out of his haze. “Jesus Christ! This is so screwed up. Let me think for a moment, there has to be something else we can do.”

“What about the other side?” Donovan said, referring to the opposite generator, but as soon as the words left his mouth, he knew it wasn’t a very good idea.

“Same song, different verse, I’m afraid.” John slowly shook his cherubic face as he studied the overhead panel, taking in the odd angle at which it hung from the ceiling. “This is just one huge electrical fire looking for a place to happen. How is it flying?”

“Not great. But then, I don’t know how a healthy one flies.” Donovan replied. “It’s been a little tricky. I’m pretty sure the tail is damaged, but for now it’s manageable.”

“This whole thing is a mess.” John sunk and let out a breath while he gazed out the side window. “Memphis was our alternate, so I think we need to head this plane back to the south. The weather in Chicago was going downhill fast. We’ll have to find some decent weather or we’re not going to get this airplane on the ground in one piece.”

“We can’t go back that way,” Donovan cautioned. “Those thunderstorms are between us and Memphis. The storms were still building. There weren’t any breaks as far as I could see, north or south. Besides, I don’t think the airplane would take the turbulence if we tried to punch our way through a soft spot. We know we can’t fly above them, there’s probably not enough oxygen left if we even tried to climb to a higher altitude.” Donovan had already thought through the scenario. “How far to the west did the system stretch?”