Chapter 12

The Karoo forms a big part of inland South Africa. In the south of the country, the Karoo is sharply cut off by a land feature, the Cape Fold Mountains, to the south and south-west. To the north-west it fades gradually and imperceptibly into the arid Bushmanland, Namaqualand and the rocky Kalahari Desert. To the north and north-east, it fades into the savannah and grasslands of Griqualand West and the Highveld. The boundary to the east grades into the grasslands of the Eastern Midlands.

The Karoo has been intruded by dolerite sills, creating multiple flat-topped hills, or Karoo Koppies, which are so iconic of the Karoo. The most famous of these “koppies” are the three similar hills, called Three Sisters. Just three identical hills with miles and miles of nothing around them. The N1 highway pass near them.

Vegetation is sparse, with only low growing “Karoo bossie,” and few big trees. Spotted patches of grasslands dominate the landscape, which is otherwise strewn with rocky, crunchy soil.

The N1 National Road traverses the Karoo from the south-west at Cape Town to the start of the Bushveld in the north-east.

It can boggle the mind to travel along the N1 highway with the car air conditioner on full to counter the dry and hot Karoo air, and then seeing the snow-capped mountains of the Winterberg Mountain range far to the east.

From the air at twenty thousand feet above sea level, the Karoo’s features were muted by the height and thickness of the atmosphere, but it was still obvious that we were over the Karoo.

As we were painting a long white contrail behind us through the deep blue sky, I turned to the four girls.

“Okay. There has been a change of plan,” I started to say, and Nadia giggled.

“Okay, Boyfriend, what’s Plan B,” She asked, fluttering her eyelashes.

“NADIA!” Mai-Loan admonished her. “Louis’s not Bobbie’s boyfriend!”

“I beg to differ, ye ‘onner,” Nadia shot back. “Bobbie thinks he is.”

“Sit still and keep quiet. Go ahead Louis...”

“Okay, that was a mister Ashwin Windsor on the line...” I began.

“ ... The Boss!” Leah interjected, smiling.

“Okay! The Boss ... The Big Induna ... The Big Chief ... Whatever...” I retorted, then continued: “He wants us to fake a plane crash.”

“Okay ... So where are we to crash, and where do we get all the wrinkled-up pieces of wreckage to fake the impact?” Nadia asked.

“AND where do we park this beauty? Dave will be so miffed if you dent his pride and joy...” Leah remarked.

“We are to crash in the sea south of Plettenberg Bay...”

“Ooo! We are going swimming with the fishies.” Olivia chuckled.

“Quiet!” Mai-Loan tried to hush them up again.

Okay, this is how we are going to do it,” I explained. “Near the town of Oudtshoorn we are going to switch off the transponder, the radio, and all equipment that can send out a signal identifying us, even the ADSB. (Automatic Dependent Surveillance and Broadcast.) Then we are to drop down to 9000 feet and change course to due south. We will land at an unknown airfield south of the town of Bredasdorp and hide the platypus inside a hangar.”

“Okay. I know the place. It’s an old and abandoned airstrip, bought up by the Foundation, and developed into a discrete hideaway for covert operations,” Mai-Loan enlightened us.

“Geez! This is sounding more and more like a James Bond movie...” I sighed.

“Just we make more kaploeffie with our toys,” Nadia chuckled.

“See! I feel like little Red Riding Hood in the tale of the three piggies!”

“Red Riding Hood did not play in that story! Leah declared.

“Precisely!” I concurred.

“It’s not that bad, Louis. We Go, We See, We Conquer!” Mai-Loan chuckled.

“Just keep the blood spatter pattern on your side of the fence!”

“Aaah ... Louis, we won’t get a drop on you...” Nadia said and ruffled my hair. I was starting to believe the stories about these girls. Little black winged angels!

“So, we splash this bird in the ocean, sort of? And play dead?” Olivia asked. “How is that going to help the war effort?”

“There will be a search and rescue operation conducted and orchestrated by the Foundation. An article in the Cape Times, and the Cape Argus will declare Bobbie dead. Photos of recovered wreckage, and a picture of Bobbie will be in the paper.”

“Okay! That will force the hand of whoever took John and Jenny. There will be no more reason why they need to be held,” Mai-Loan reasoned.

“And we don’t even get to fire a shot!” Leah moaned, then pouted.

“Whoever took John and Jenny will have to release them,” I continued, trying to keep control of the conversation. “Although, I believe it is that Dezz woman. Bobbie’s mother, and I am of the opinion that they won’t kill them, just release them.”

“She’s deranged! Crazy!” Nadia said.

“Loony, cookoo!” Olivia added.

“And, Mister wise guy, how do we fake an aircraft crash in sight of an airport?” Mai-Loan voiced the obvious.

“It’s overcast with a ceiling of four hundred feet. To confuse the ATC and the radar, I’m going to fake a cloud-break manoeuvre just south of Robberg and drop to three hundred feet MSL. The radar will lose us at 500 feet. We will paint no echo return and change course and fly south-west to Bredasdorp.

“At three hundred feet over an angry ocean?” This time Nadia sounded a little more aviation wise.

“Yeah ... Piece of cake! We’ll be in the clear under the scud. We can go back up to four hundred or four fifty, but not higher, else we’ll be back on the radar screen.”

“Sounds dicey...” Nadia remarked. “Okay, Boyfriend! I trust you.”

“Yeah, just don’t let me break a nail!” Mai-Loan chuckled.

“Okay girls! Fasten your seatbelts!” I instructed, then turned back to the front of the cockpit.

“You’ve not switched ON the “FASTEN SEATBELTS” sign yet.” Nadia chimed in.

“I never switched it OFF!” I retorted, indicating the little amber light on the cabin roof.

Plettenberg Bay Airport 15:05 Zulu (17:05 SAST)

The early evening was cloudy, and fog was rolling in from the south-west, reaching out with wet icy fingers and settling down over the landscape. The setting sun was completely blocked out by the dark grey clouds in the sky. To the west and south of the airport, the skeletons of burned trees from the fire a month ago stood black and wet, reaching for the sky with their dead branches.

Harry Flanagan looked up at the big digital clock suspended from the ceiling of the control tower. The flight from Gauteng was overdue.

The flight should have contacted him twenty minutes ago. Damn! Why on his watch? Harry dropped his feet from the desk before him, then sat up and closed the magazine he was reading.

His telephone rang and Harry picked up the receiver.

“Plett Tower,” He answered.

“Cape Town Centre. Can you confirm that ZS-AAW has landed?”

“Nope! We’re still waiting on them. They’re overdue and no transmission from them as yet.”

“The last transmission from them was at 16:15. They reported all well en-route to Plett. We called them at 16:28 to give them the hand-off to you guys, but they did not respond as per protocol. They also changed altitude, and the squawk went offline. They could have had an electric failure.”

“Dammit! Any radar contact?”

“We lost radar contact with them at 16:32. They were heading 279 degrees true, 307 degrees magnetic, as if on final approach to your runway 30, twenty nautical miles out. Altitude 503 feet but was descending fast!”

“Damn! That’s too low for twenty nautical miles away.”

“We lost radar contact at 503 feet MSL, and I don’t want to speculate on what happened.”

“And no trace of them since then?”

Negatory, nothing ... zilch!” The controller verified. “We thought they contacted you without the hand-off and landed.”

“No peep from them, and we are still waiting ... Well, that means only one thing.”

“Yeah, Buddy. I don’t want to think it,” The controller sighed. “I’ll activate search and rescue from my side...”

“It’s getting dark out here, and the sea is high. I don’t think S&R will get anything done tonight...”

“Yeah, but still, let’s call up procedures and do what has to be done. I’ll be in touch shortly. The two of us are going to be busy tonight ... Goodbye.”

Harry hung up the telephone and got up, looking out the window of the control tower as if he wanted to will the PC-12 to just materialise out of the fog. But there was nothing.

“Shit, shit, shit! Why on my watch?” he swore and looked at the clock above him. The big red digital numbers read: 17:12:23 ... ZS-AAW was twenty-two minutes overdue with no communications from the aircraft or radar contact.

Plettenberg Bay, A farmhouse along the Keurbooms River.

Aaron DiCaprio Turned back from the window, replacing his cell phone in his shirt pocket. He looked at his watch. It was 17:24.

“Well, have they landed?” Dezz McGee asked.

“No! They’ve gone missing.”

“Missing? How can they just go missing?”

“Cape Town centre lost contact with them. Last radar contact was at 16:32, twenty nautical miles out from Plett.”

And they have not landed?”

“Nope! Cape Town started a search and rescue operation out at sea. They think they crashed into the sea.”

“CRASHED!” Dezz shouted. “How can that be? They must come here, bring my baby!”

“Dezz, let’s wait. Harry will keep us posted.”

“But how can they crash? Aircraft just don’t fall out of the sky?”

“Yes, Dezz, they do. It is low visibility out there. The last radar contact with them was at 500 feet above the ocean. That’s too low. They should have been at 2500 or 3000 feet.”

“NOOOOO!” Dezz screamed.

Aaron dropped onto a camping chair. “What now, Dezz? What do we do now?”

“I ... don’t know ... My little girl is missing ... maybe DEAD!”

“Let’s wait! They can still be found. That type of aircraft is equipped with emergency locator beacons. It also has life rafts aboard...”

“You say ... there’s a chance ... that she might be still alive? Hurt, but alive?”

“Yes, it is maybe so...”

Somewhere 165 nautical miles to the south-west of Plettenberg Bay.

It was somewhat of a relief to find that the unfamiliar airfield near Bredasdorp was free of cloud cover. Two runways crossed each other, but neither had a runway designation. The one runway runs roughly east/west and equipped with an ILS, (Instrument Landing System.) of which the frequency was only known to Leah, Mai-Loan and Olivia.

The airfield is marked on a local map but designated as “closed” with the NOTAM (Notice To AirMen, as still used by many pilots, male or female.) that cows roam the cracked and overgrown runway. It is listed as “Abandoned,” and therefore considered unsafe and not usable.

I found the two point six five kilometre (8695 feet) runway to be in perfect order with hardly a crack in the smooth surface. It looked like a well-maintained runway. On final approach even the PAPI lights shone bright in the gloom of the setting sun, with even the runway flare-path brightly lit up.

“Hmm ... ain’t the flare-path a bit bright?” I asked.

“I’ll ask them to dim it...” Olivia replied and opened a compartment in the panel marked; “Dog Biscuits.” Perplexed, I watched as she extracted a headset and switched on a radio receiver. “High frequency satellite radio communication via the Iridium Satellite network...” Olivia explained, smiled and then called up the phantom airfield:

“Hey, Sticky-icky! Dim your car lights, if you please.”

“What? Too bright for your tender eyes?” Came a female voice reply, but the runway lights dimmed in intensity. “That better?”

“Yip! Standby ... we’re coming in from the east.”

“Got you painted! Beware, the runway may be wet. We had a shower pass by about a half hour ago.”

“Rodger that. Brew the dark stuff. We’re thirsty.”

“That was done when we spotted you. Now the usual garbage. Wind light at 4 knots, bearing 268 magnetic. Visibility twelve miles. Expect runway wet.”

“Copy you. Bye!” Olivia signed off, replacing the funny looking gadget and closed the “Dog Biscuits” compartment.

I chuckled.

“What?”

“You two just set back radio communications by fifty years!”

“Did not! Nobody heard us and that frequency is heavily modulated and garbled.”

“What did she mean by ’painted’ us and ’spotted’ us? I’m too low for radar to see us.”

“Oh, but the satellite sees us!”

“What? Satellite surveillance in real time?” I asked, stunned.

“You are running with pros, Buddy! Get used to it!” Olivia chuckled. “You did switch off the ADSB system, but there’s a secondary little old transmitter in the tail that no ATC know about. Only us knows about it ... Company secret!”

“Oh brother! Let me concentrate on getting us down in one piece...”

“Rodger, Cap’in! Speed eighty knots, Flaps 20!” Olivia smirked and selected the flaps to 20 degrees.

“We’re one nautical mile out. Drop the undercarriage.”

“Wheels going down,” Olivia replied, and a few seconds later: “Wheels down and locked! Three greens.”

There was no centre line or runway edge markings, only the flare-path that dimmed out as our wheels touched and squealed. I selected beta mode and then advanced the throttle back to reverse. The PC-12 dropped her nose, and decelerated down to a crawl, sending a spray of foggy water from her wheels. I took the throttles back to ground idle with just a notch above to give us taxi speed.

Olivia doused the landing lights and left just the taxi lights on. We turned off the runway at just past the midpoint and followed a short taxiway to a nondescript building on a medium-sized concrete apron.

After shutting down, we five climbed out to be met by a skinny brunette dressed in jeans, leather boots and a t-shirt under a leather jacket. Her age could have been anything from twenty-five to forty.

The Angels all hugged her and then introduced me to Lauren Stringer, A.K.A. Lorie. Two more girls joined us, and I was introduced to Darya and Roxy. Apparently, the full complement of Angels was at hand: all seven of them.

Seven? I thought there was only five but was shortly informed that indeed there were seven. Damn, here a guy could get swamped, if one is not careful.

“Well, let’s put up the bird and get her out of sight. Then ... supper! I hope you guys are hungry. Roxy and Darya prepared a feast!” Lorie announced, and I got the impression that here, on this field, she’s the big induna; the Boss Lady; Queen of the Airfield.

Another thing that hit me was that this airfield, except for being visible but apparently derelict from the sky if you look carefully, was totally screened from eye-level with a forest of huge trees all around; perfect for covert and discrete operations.

Well, let’s get settled in and await developments. All is now in the hands of the Angels.

I was surprised again as the only building I saw was a steel-constructed rusted hangar with flaking dark-green paint and a broken window. Inside, however, it was totally different than the derelict appearance it projected to the external world. Overhead LED lightning shone so brightly that I had to screw up my eyes to get used to their intensity. The hangar walls were painted bright white, and the concrete floor was covered in a non-slip covering that is only found in hospital hallways, passages, and wards.

After settling the PC-12 inside and closing the hangar doors, we exited out the back. A well-maintained garden greeted us with a two-story farm style house under the towering trees.

Just before supper was served, I begged off to call Bobbie. Nadia searched in her backpack and produced a slip of paper.

“Here, this is Bobbie’s new number. Save it on your phone and destroy the slip of paper.”

“You leave nothing to chance, I see...”

“That’s how we survive.” Mai-Loan remarked.

I stepped to a quiet spot and dialled the number. It was picked up in three rings.

“Hello Louis! How was your flight?”

“Startling and surprising,” I replied.

“Why, so? Did the girls attack you?” Bobbie chuckled.

“Nope! They kept their distance and behaved themselves. But I need to tell you something. There was a development.”

“I know ... and if you are now speaking to me, it means the plane is safe and secured, but ... we both are dead.”

“Presumed missing, at the moment.”

“Oh, yeah. Louis?”

“Yes pumpkin?”

“Was it necessary to go to all this trouble?”

“The ones that took over are calling the shots, and I think it’s a brilliant idea.”

“So, you are okay with this?”

“Absolutely! We wait until tomorrow to see the sparks fly...”