Chapter 5

Year Two: Day Twenty-Nine: Monday

Monday birthed in the midst of an old-fashioned fall thunderstorm. The scarcity of jet contrails and the lack of industrial soot and ozone from the steel plants in Birmingham made the skies appear a deeper blue at times, but the weather followed the same patterns that had existed for millennia in northwest Florida. A panhandle gully washer in early spring or late fall could be such that it caused the rivers and streams to rise and overflow their banks. Whiting was normally immune to the flooding, as it sat on the top of the tallest hill in the area and the military had complemented this high elevation with an excellent drainage system. So this stormy weather only meant that our training and search flights would, at worst, have visibility obstructed during the periods of heavy rainfall.

Logistic flights, on the other hand, were not affected and were to take-off as scheduled and I was listed as the pilot-in-command of a special logistic flight to Hurlburt Town. This flight was to relocate pilots and families so they could begin the long process of searching and securing the areas between our present territory and what used to be the city of Jacksonville on the east coast of Florida. Interstate 10, the main roadway linking the panhandle to Jacksonville, would provide us with one long emergency airfield over that proposed search area. We had dedicated a crew of forty, complete with bulldozers to begin clearing intervals of the roadway for that purpose. It's ironic that an urban legend existed that the interstate highway system was designed to be used as alternate airfields in time of war, and now we were getting set to bulldoze off parts of an interstate for that very purpose.

We didn't think the actual clearing work wouldn't be as laborious as it sounds. Traffic on I-10 wasn't especially heavy on the Sunday of the collapse and when traffic on limited access highways wasn't bumper to bumper, cars tended to travel in herds. Our aerial survey determined that only about 300 to 400 cars needed to be removed in order to provide thirty landing strips between Hurlburt Town and Jacksonville. That would be one strip for each ten miles which should be more than adequate for our mission.

Jim Baxley, our head forager, was in charge of the forty person crew making the trip. Jim was a stubborn old cuss who was still as active as any twenty year-old that I knew. We planned to fly a C-130 daily along the route to provide logistics support for Jim's team. Jim estimated his team would have the job done and be in Jacksonville in a week unless they ran into unforeseen problems. Thirty of the forty people were assigned to provide security and logistics for the ten actual workers that would be clearing the roadways. Later in the year we hoped to use a similar crew to begin completely clearing the main roadways between all of our towns.

All of my wives, with the exception of Kari, mumbled an obligatory excuse as they tried to hunker back down under the covers after I woke them. For some reason Kari, normally the hardest of us to wake seemed eager to rise and get started. We quickly moved ahead of the other wives as we completed our morning bodily preparations for the day's work. I noticed that Irene was still cocooned under the covers as Kari and I left the others and headed towards breakfast.

Breakfast was quicker and quieter than normal due to the early hour. The early morning staff made us eggs to order to go along with the smoked sausage. I had a scoop of grits added to my breakfast fare while Kari, disdainful of that southern mainstay, had a side of hash browns. We noticed many of the other flyers slated for Hurlburt Town scattered about the dining hall eating and reading copies of the small town newspaper.

Kari was the only one of our family that was scheduled to be based in Hurlburt Town during the upcoming week. This seemed strange, as Kari's pregnancy was the reason we had decided to continue living at Whiting. Her explanation was that she decided to take her share of flights out of Hurlburt Town during the early months of her pregnancy. Dr. Wallings said that normal military protocol had been that female aviators could fly up until their 28^th week of pregnancy. He gave us a caveat that nausea and other problems could crop up to make those flights miserable.

Our conversation over breakfast reflected my fears about this. "Kari, honey, I'm going to miss you, even if it is for only a week. Don't take any chances. If you're feeling sick or tired, hand the flight off to someone else."

"Lover, we've been over and over this. I'm not going to take any stupid chances with our child. I won't set a bad example and do something that I'll have to discipline someone else for later. Believe me if I'm sick, I'll get someone else to cover for me."

I smiled and patted her hand. I knew Kari was the most conscientious operations officer the brigade could have. I still worried because she was my wife and it was my nature to worry. We talked about the minutia of the upcoming week and were so engrossed in our conversation that we were surprised when two chairs pulled back from the table and Lana and Laura sat down.

Lana was still half asleep and looked accusingly at Kari. "See what you did!" she exclaimed.

Kari laughed, looked at the twins and asked, "What did I do?'

Then seeing their predicament she quickly added, "I can't help it if you're both wusses. You don't hoot with the owls if you can't soar with the eagles the next morning."

Laura laughed and said, "Listen, bird brain, I'm here aren't I? Besides, that wasn't hooting last night, that was pooter scooting. My pooter is still sore and I don't even want to get pregnant for a couple of years at least."

Kari chuckled, "You better make sure you stay away from any of hubby's potent love cream then because I took my little pill every morning just like I was supposed to. I'm glad it happened, though, even if I'd have rather not stolen Irene's thunder."

I looked about and asked, "Speaking of our favorite nurse; her ass must be really dragging. I know she has first shift at the dispensary."

Lana spoke up and said, "She said she was going straight to work; said she had some bagels and juice in the reefer at the office."

Laura looked over at Kari and moaned, "I wish someone hadn't talked me into teaching ground school this quarter. I could go back to bed and get another couple of hours of sleep."

Kari smiled at Laura and answered her with a 'Hoot, hoot, ' and then burst into laughter.

I could see that Kari was much more amused than my twin wives. I looked at my watch and announced, "I've just got time to catch the shuttle down to the hangar and get started on my pre-flight. Anyone want to ride down with me?"

All of them smiled at me while waving me off. I took time to kiss each of them before I took my tray up to the scullery. The building was just starting to come alive as I caught the shuttle for the hangar.

Mike Eagan, our maintenance officer, was ahead of me at the hangar. He was standing inside the hangar in apparent deep concentration, scowling out at the sheets of rain. I put my hand on his shoulder and asked, "What's got you in such a foul mood?"

Mike jerked as I spoke and looked back at me seemingly still deep in thought. He replied, "I'm just trying to figure out how I can get a high power test on a couple of TF34s (turbofan engines) that the mechs in my training class just overhauled. I need to check out the power settings so the bird can get a test flight out this week."

I whistled and asked, "When did you start rebuilding engines? I thought we decided it would be years before any of our mechs had enough experience to attempt that."

Mike grinned sheepishly and replied, "I picked up a couple of guys that had spent some time doing depot level maintenance on jet engines when they did that sort of thing over at Pensacola. These engines are a test to see if they still have what it takes. If they do, they'll be promoted to teaching the class they're in."

I looked at my watch and headed off to operations. Looking back at Mike I said, "Good luck, let me know how it turns out."

I checked out the logbook of the old C-9 Skytrain and found that nothing had changed since my flight in the same bird the week before. There was no indication on the maintenance sheet that the pressurization leak had been fixed; the problem was signed off as 'Can not duplicate on the ground.' I swore at the book but noticed that Ron Simmons had added a note that read, 'Needs an in-flight check.'

I called over the student manning the maintenance control desk and said, "Call Ron Simmons' room and have him meet me down here in 20 minutes ready to do an in-flight check on this aircraft."

The nervous student almost stammered as he replied, "He's here already, sir. He told me to let him know when you got here."

I grinned at him and said, "Well, do it then. I want to get out of here on time."

The rest of the preflight went smoothly. Kevin Grayton was my co-pilot for the flight along with one of the new flight students acting as crew chief. All of the freight had already been loaded and the passengers were scheduled to board just prior to flight time. My luck was running good, as the rain lightened up just as I departed the taxiway for the end of the duty runway. Ron Simmons was strapped in the navigator's seat as we transitioned to full power and began our takeoff roll down the runway. Although there was some hydroplaning of the tires just as the nose wheel left the runway the engine power was sufficient to keep the plane headed straight as it lifted off. Once we were in the air Ron began checking circuit breakers, trying to track down the pressurization problems.

Fifteen minutes after we took off we were lining up for the landing. Ron was frustrated as the pressurization problem hadn't reoccurred. Kevin laughed and remarked, "I'm glad I didn't listen to you and become a maintenance geek. Operations and training keeps me busy enough when I'm not flying."

Ron answered, "I'd much rather be checking for intermittent electrons than wiping the snotty noses of some of your cadets. Come to think of it, it wasn't too long ago that you were praising me for fixing the heater on your training aircraft. I can still talk to your boss, Kari, and get you switched over to the wash rack and corrosion detail for a few weeks to give you a better appreciation of those of us who have to work for a living."

I had a hard time not laughing at the friendly banter between the two friends. Both had graduated from the third class of cadets and both were excellent pilots who loved to fly, and spent many of their waking hours at the hangar in one capacity or another.

The landing was routine and I spent the morning clutching a cup of coffee and speaking with Terry Cooper, the mayor of Hurlburt Town, as Kari organized the support flights for the rest of the week. Terry was telling me about a recent weekend fishing trip out into the gulf with Tracy Adams, a former Coast Guard small boat commander.

"Steve, it was like the grouper and red snapper were begging for someone to catch them. I've gone fishing dozens of time before and never had the luck that we had on that trip. There were ten of us and we brought back enough large fish to feed the town for a week."