Skyhook

SEVEN TUESDAY, DAY 2 PROVIDENCE ALASKA MEDICAL CENTER, ANCHORAGE

The fact that George Mikulsky of the NTSB had produced a small tape recorder and asked permission to tape the interview prompted April to pull a tiny five-hour digital recorder from her purse and do the same, a move that sparked a clear flash of anger from the FAA inspector.

“Do you object to my recording the interview?” April asked Harrison. “Especially since you’re recording it, too.”

The FAA inspector forced his expression back to neutral.

“No. Not a problem. No reason you shouldn’t,” he said, his conciliatory tone too forced.

They gathered in the hospital room with Harrison and Mikulsky sitting on gray metal chairs by the right side of Arlie Rosen’s bed, and April sitting on the other side. Both men had shaken hands with Arlie before sitting, Mikulsky making more of an effort to smile and be friendly.

“Okay, Captain Rosen,” George Mikulsky began, “this is not a deposition, it’s an informal interview, but it is on the record, which is why I’m recording it, with your permission. Now, would you just take us through what you recall of last night, beginning with takeoff, and including route, altitude, flight plan, radio calls, et cetera.”

“I’ll do my best, fellows. I’m still pretty fuzzy.”

“Your plane’s tail number was November Three Four Delta Delta, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And it was current on all airworthiness certificates, inspections, airworthiness directive items?”

“She certainly was. I’m also a licensed A and P mechanic. All logs are current, but they’re in the plane — wherever it is.”

Mikulsky made a note and nodded. “Sorry, Captain. Go ahead. How did the flight start?”

Arlie described a routine takeoff from the smooth surface of Anchorage’s Lake Hood, just north of Anchorage International Airport. He remembered a lazy climb to six thousand feet as they flew down the channel known as Turnagain Arm and crossed a low ridge of mountains to fly over Whittier and out to sea.

“It was dusk, and my intention was to make Sitka, and the weather report was favorable for visual flight. In other words, clearly VFR. That was true until we were about sixty miles east of Whittier. Then I had to start descending and cutting more to the south over Montague Island on more or less a direct GPS course toward Middleton Island in order to avoid the cloud layers lying more to the north. Once we’d cleared Montague, I decided to keep stepping down over the water until we were cruising at a thousand feet. I’ve got a great… had a great moving map GPS, so I knew we were clear of any land. But by the time we’d passed Middleton, I realized we were in a sort of trap, and I told Rachel this wasn’t going to work and began trying to raise Anchorage Center for a pop-up instrument clearance.”

“You’re instrument-rated?” Mikulsky asked, drawing a puzzled frown.

“You’re asking if I’m instrument-rated?” Arlie replied incredulously.

“Yes, I believe that’s what I asked you,” Mikulsky said, a slightly officious tone bleeding into his words.

Arlie chuckled. “Son, I’m a Boeing 747 captain for a major airline, with thirty thousand hours and an airline transport pilot rating: Last time I checked, you couldn’t get an ATP without having an instrument ticket.”

“Oh. Yeah,” George Mikulsky said, his face reddening.

“How long have you been with the NTSB, George?” Arlie asked.

April could feel the rising tension in the room as the inspector shifted in his chair and Mikulsky drew back. “I’ve been with NTSB for four months now.”

“Are you a licensed pilot?”

“Captain Rosen, why don’t you let me ask the questions here?” Mikulsky said, his voice taut.

Arlie smiled the characteristic smile Gracie always described as irresistible. He readjusted himself on the bed as if girding for a small battle before replying. “George, the reason I asked you that question is because there are certain things I need to explain in more detail if you’re not a pilot than I would need to explain if you were. I’m sorry you take offense at the question.”

“No, I’m not a pilot yet, but that doesn’t matter,” Mikulsky snapped, making an exaggerated note before continuing. “I’ll tell you if I’m unfamiliar with something. Let’s please get back to your narrative.”

April and Arlie exchanged a cautionary glance.

“Okay,” Arlie said, resuming the narrative. “I’m at a thousand feet, I’m not getting a response from Anchorage Center, the clouds are getting lower ahead, and it’s almost dark. I’ve only got a few coastal lights way off to my left, and I have only one choice left other than turning around, and that is to pull out my satellite phone and try to call Anchorage Flight Service by phone. But the visibility is deteriorating too fast, so I told Rachel we’d better turn around and divert back to the northwest into Valdez, and she agreed. I—”

“You had your sectional maps out and available?” Walter Harrison asked, interrupting.

“Yes,” Arlie replied carefully, fixing Harrison with a none-too-friendly look. “I characteristically use maps when I go flying, in addition to my dash-mounted moving map GPS system, and my backup handheld GPS. Do you want me to list the charts?”

Harrison quickly shook his head no.

“Very well. I punched Valdez into both GPS units, which gave me a course of something like three three zero, which won’t work because of the mountains, so I headed northwest to fly up the channel and decided I was safe for about ten miles north before I’d have to either climb in clear conditions, or turn back to the west toward Anchorage to stay visual. Just to make sure I had the required clearance below the clouds, and since I was over open water, I descended to a hundred feet on the radio altimeter. The sea state was fairly choppy. I’d estimate the waves at five to seven feet, and I didn’t want to land in rough conditions like that in open water.”

“You could still see?” Mikulsky asked.

“Yes. It was still dusk, and I was in the clear beneath the cloud layer. That’s why I could see the waves below. This is open ocean, you understand, in international waters.”

“Okay.”

“So, we’re motoring along on a course of about two hundred ninety degrees and it looked a bit clearer to the right, so I came right to about three-twenty, and we’re getting close to the decision point, with a cloud deck still overhead, when all hell broke loose for no apparent reason.”

“How much fuel did you have?”

“Nine hours’, George. Fuel’s not an issue here.”

“Okay.”

“I’m holding the controls steady at a hundred feet and a hundred forty miles per hour when I unexpectedly run into a fog bank that seemed to come out of nowhere. Everything goes gray outside and I, of course, transition to the instruments and am just starting to climb and turn around to get out of it when there’s this loud metallic snap, or clang, or something, and I lose a prop blade on the right side. At least, that’s what it felt like, because the ship instantly starts shaking, which it would with a missing prop blade. Not only that, it must have just missed the cockpit as it broke away, because there’s this incredible whooshing noise along with this instant, horrible shaking.”

April watched her father as he spoke, his eyes far away, his mind reliving that terrible moment as he talked.

“The controls suddenly feel like they’re going to beat me to death, they’re shaking and rattling so bad. Only a split second has passed, but it’s clear I’m going to be fighting for our lives. The old girl heaves to the right, and I yank the yoke back to the left and hit the left rudder, working to maintain my instrument scan at the same moment the right engine comes off its mounts. Somehow there’s a huge ball of flame on the right, probably from a breached fuel tank. I figure we’ll explode before I lose control, but there’s just this raging orange glow. I yank the feather knob for number-two engine and try to get the fuel cut off as Rachel yelps and turns to look. ‘We’re on fire!’ she reports to me like she’s trained to do, and I’m thinking it’s damned lucky she’s a pilot, too. I don’t need panic at a moment like this, I need all my efforts to keep the airplane in the air and level, which is getting to be a real challenge. I goose the left engine up to max power and I’ve got almost full left rudder, when we hit something… I don’t know… probably low-level mechanical turbulence off the mainland several miles to the northwest. Whatever it is, it’s the last thing I need because it just flips us to the right like a toy, despite full left aileron and full left rudder. I’m just hanging there in an impossible position with ninety degrees of bank and no lift, for just a heartbeat, but it’s enough to lose most of my hundred feet of altitude. I’ve almost got her back to wings level when the right wing or the right pontoon digs into the waves, and I can’t pull her out. Suddenly we’re cartwheeling and there’s water and cold and screaming metal and the most amazing noises. When the motion stops, I’m still conscious, and, incredibly, there are still lights glowing in the cockpit, although we’re filling with water. I look to the right to find Rachel, and thank God, she’s conscious, too, and wide-eyed and working to release my harness. It’s obvious the bird is sinking, not floating. I mean, I’ve got cold water to my knees. Somehow Rachel gets herself and me out of the seat belts and opens the hatch in the top of the cockpit, and we swim out just as the bird goes down.”

“You mean, sinks?” Mikulsky asked.

Arlie nodded. “I can tell you, the icy cold of that water is beyond description. We were both instantly wide awake. And there was another small miracle: One of the emergency life rafts had apparently worked as it was designed to do and popped out of the wing locker I’d engineered. The raft came up right next to us, and we pulled ourselves in and got the survival kit aboard — I bought the kind with the survival suits — and we somehow wiggled into them, soaking wet and freezing. I tried to find the emergency radio, but we were struggling and thrashing around so wildly to get the suits on, my guess is I knocked the damn radio overboard. The wind was cutting, the waves were mountainous… much higher than I expected… with the spray blowing everywhere. The wind… my God, the wind was howling like a monster, and I remember thinking that the satellites would at least pick up our ELT, emergency locator beacon, within ninety minutes. I could hang onto that, you know? I just assumed the ELT was working, but I didn’t know for sure. I did know that we were okay for a while in the survival suits, but then, we got them on while wet and cold, and I knew we couldn’t hold out indefinitely. I tied a line between Rachel and myself to make sure we didn’t get separated. I told her our ELT would bring help fast, but the night got deeper, the fog got thicker, and we tried to huddle together and maintain warmth, but we were both shaking so hard and getting numb, and then… then there were a bunch of weird dreams, and I guess now that some of them may have been the helicopter picking us up.”

Arlie stopped talking and looked at the two men, who were sitting transfixed and breathing hard.

George Mikulsky suddenly realized the narrative had ended. His body jerked slightly as he sat up. “Ah… okay. The emergency transmitter. The emergency transmitter beacon was never picked up, Captain.”

“Really?” Arlie responded. “Then how…”

“The tracking unit, Dad,” April said. “It dutifully sent me your position just before you went in. When I woke up, I checked my computer readout and realized you’d never arrived anywhere. The tracking unit saved you.”

“Mr. Rosen,” Walter Harrison began.

Mikulsky turned to the FAA inspector and held up an index finger. “Captain Rosen,” he corrected, flinching slightly at the murderous look Harrison flashed at him.

“Very well, Captain Rosen,” Harrison continued, “let’s talk about the absence of a flight plan, your weather briefing, and your altitude.”

“Excuse me, but I filed a visual flight plan with Anchorage Flight Service by cell phone before departure.”

Harrison had been leaning forward in the spartan metal chair. He sat up with an expression of extreme skepticism. “Did you, now?”

“Yes.”

“Well, did they acknowledge that it had been filed?”

It was Arlie Rosen’s turn to cock his head in disbelief as he looked at Harrison in silence and cleared his throat. “Mr. Harrison, when a senior airman tells you he’s filed a flight plan, visual or instrument, it’s usually a pretty good bet he knows the difference between just discussing it and filing it. You’re not talking to a student pilot here. Yes, I got confirmation verbally. That’s how we do it.”

“I’m well aware of the procedures, since I helped write them,” Harrison snapped back. “Point is, Captain, there was no flight plan in the computer at Anchorage Flight Service. There’s no record you even called them.”

“I assume you searched for not only our tail number, but under any other possible variations in the number in case the briefer made a mistake entering it? You do realize, don’t you, that they don’t list their calls in the computer by pilot name?”

Harrison ignored the verbal slap. “There was no flight plan in the computer, Captain, which is why no one missed you until your daughter figured something was wrong.”

April had been listening to the exchange with rising alarm. Mikulsky’s extremely stiff questioning had been bad enough, but Harrison was openly hostile. April rose to her feet and noisily scooted her chair back to interrupt.

“Okay, Mr. Harrison, you know what? My father’s just been brought in from a near-death experience, and if you can’t even question him with respect, I think we’d better end this.”

“That’s okay, honey,” Arlie said as he gestured to April to sit. “Mr. Harrison is an FAA inspector, and it’s his job to be openly skeptical to the point of perceived hostility. Right, Walter?”

Harrison had been doing a slow burn in silence. He made a small snorting sound and shook his head. “I do not attempt to be purposely skeptical, Ms. Rosen,” he said, glancing suddenly at April, then back at Arlie. “Nor am I hostile. But a fact is a fact, Captain, and the fact is that whatever calls you say you made, they do not show up on the record, and Anchorage had no flight plan on you.”

“Which, if true, would mean a major failure on their part,” Arlie interjected. “Which, by the way, is anything but unprecedented. Flight service stations lose flight plans every day, and you know it. And that’s aside from the fact that, as you also well know, a VFR flight plan is not required, merely recommended. I always file one if I’m not going on instruments. Always. No exceptions.”

“When you’re flying privately, Captain, and you don’t have an airline dispatcher to do things for you, do you often depart without a weather briefing?”

April was on her feet again. “Okay, that’s it. The interview’s over.”

Arlie turned to April and shook his head slightly. “Honey…”

April froze, reading her father’s resolve, then nodded reluctantly but remained standing.

“Now, Walter,” Arlie began again, “before you get your knickers in a knot over this flawed assumption, I would assume you’re aware that cell phone companies keep records, too. Have you bothered to check to see whether there’s a record of a call to flight service, which there will be?”

“No.”

“Well, perhaps you’ll want to be judicious enough to stand down on your tone and your very hostile attitude until you do. Fact is, I got my weather briefing, filed my visual flight plan in great detail, and followed all the FAR’s and normal procedures.”

“And you lost your aircraft because you lost a propeller while dragging the waves at less than a hundred feet.”

Arlie Rosen took a deep breath. April could see his jaw muscles twitching as he tried to maintain control of his temper, which was approaching his personal red line.

“Walter—”

“Excuse me,” Harrison interrupted with a snort, “I’m doing you the courtesy of using your formal airline title. Kindly do me the courtesy of calling me Mr. Harrison. You don’t know me, and I resent first name usage.”

George Mikulsky shifted uncomfortably in his chair, wondering how to regain control, but Harrison was ignoring him.

“Why don’t I just call you Inspector Harrison, then?” Arlie asked, as sarcastically as he could manage. “Or would you prefer ‘Your Excellency’?”

“Mister will do fine. Here’s what I want you to answer. You say you kept dropping lower to stay in visual conditions. You were operating under part ninety-one of the Federal Air Regulations, right?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. So how far above you were those clouds, Captain? I assume you know the regulations for visual flight.”

“The clouds were more than the required five hundred feet above me,” Arlie shot back, his voice hardening. “And, yes, I know the regs, as I’m sure you do, Inspector Harrison. Under FAR part ninety-one point one fifty-five, the rules for visual operation are that the requirement for cloud clearance when flying in visual conditions at or below twelve hundred feet is a minimum of five hundred feet below, one thousand feet above, and two thousand feet lateral clearance, with a nighttime visibility requirement a minimum of three statute miles, all under the new Class G airspace. I miss anything?”

“No… other than how it was that you could have been so close to the water in deteriorating conditions and still think you were in compliance with the FARs when it was dark and you admit you couldn’t see anything.”

“What? I certainly did not admit — or say — that I couldn’t see anything, until I entered that fog bank at the last second. That was unanticipated. I had full legal visibility until then.”

“Well, Captain,” Harrison continued, “you say you think you lost a propeller blade, but isn’t it possible the clouds were just pressing you down and you kept descending and didn’t realize how low you were until you dug a wing into the water?”

“Hell, no!” Arlie Rosen snapped upright in the bed, wincing at the pain in his head as he fixed the FAA inspector with his eyes and leveled a slightly shaking finger at him. “Get this straight, Harrison. I was doing precisely what I said I was doing, where, when, why, and how I said I was doing it! Who the hell do you think you are to come in here and throw some cockamamy accusation at me without the slightest foundation to back it up?”

Harrison chuckled and began closing the small steno pad he’d been holding. There were no notes on the page.

“Good offense is always the best defense, eh, Rosen? Don’t worry. I’ll get the facts if you were scud-hopping, as I believe you were.”

“Scud-hopping?”

“I’ve seen it a thousand times. Overly cocky airline pilot in a private plane pushing the visual limits. You were in a seaplane, after all, and the FAA’s nowhere around, and you want to get to your destination, and you don’t give a damn how low the clouds overhead are as long as you can stay airborne and see the water below.”

“That is absolutely not true! Not to mention the fact that if you’re so damned experienced, you know that pilots who do that do it because they aren’t instrument-rated and have no alternatives. I had an alternative!”

“Yeah, well, I understand you have to cook up a good cover story for your insurance company, but it won’t wash with the FAA.”

“What?” Arlie said, his face reflecting shock.

April moved toward the bed and into the line of fire between her father and the FAA inspector, her palm out to the man in a stop gesture. “That’s enough out of you, sir! Get the hell out of this hospital room.”

“Miss Rosen, I wasn’t talking to you,” Harrison replied, his eyes on Arlie.

“You watch your tone with my daughter, buster,” Arlie said. “And, like she said, get the hell out of here.”

George Mikulsky had stood up in obvious confusion, his eyes wide as he tried to figure out how to disengage himself as quickly as possible from the extreme discomfort of the mess his FAA companion had made of the interview. But Harrison moved to the end of Arlie’s bed, physically blocking Mikulsky, his finger leveled at Arlie Rosen.

“Hey, chew on this, Captain Rosen. I don’t give a damn how big an aircraft you fly or how many hours you’ve logged sitting in an overstuffed armchair eating first-class meals and pretending it’s real pilot time, nor do I care about your obscenely inflated paycheck. But here’s a news flash, hotshot. You still have to comply with the rules, or we take your license away. And you want to know what I think?”

Arlie shook his head. “Not bloody likely, asshole!”

“Dad…” April cautioned, but it was obviously too late.

“Yeah, good, let’s start with the name calling,” Harrison sneered. “Very mature response for a thirty-thousand-hour cappie making five times what he’s worth.”

“Five times… Okay, you rancid, pontificating little windbag. This is a jealousy thing with you, isn’t it? What the hell happened, United turn you down for a pilot job twenty years ago, so you joined the FAA?”

There was a momentary waver in Harrison’s expression, but he stifled it quickly. “I looked up your records, Rosen. You’re an alcoholic. You were drinking, weren’t you?”

“WHAT?!” Arlie yelped.

“I understand you were in United’s alcoholic program a few years back.”

“That was ten years ago, and I honorably completed that program!”

Harrison walked toward the door, turning back as he opened it.

“Oh, I’m sure you filled all the squares, Rosen. But we all know there are dropouts. It’s painfully obvious you were flying that Albatross last night drunk as a skunk and scud-hopping to boot. When I find the proof that you were drinking and flying — and I will — we’ll get your reckless tail permanently grounded.” Harrison moved through the door, his back turned.

“Come back here you little son of a bitch!” Arlie bellowed at Harrison as he tried to swing out of bed and found his legs trapped by the tightly tucked sheets. “I’m gonna have your ass fired, Harrison!” he yelled through the door at Harrison’s back as George Mikulsky retreated after him.

“Dad! Calm down!”

“Goddammit! Goddammit!” He was shaking with fury, his face beet red.

“That’s not helping!”

“I can’t believe that little shit! THAT WAS OUTRAGEOUS!”

“Dad! Your language is outrageous!”

“Where’s the damned phone? Get me that phone, April. I’m gonna call the entire congressional delegation and have that bastard cashiered!”

“Dad! Take a deep breath and think this through.”

“What? Why?”

“You told me yourself, never antagonize an FAA inspector.”

“Me antagonize? You were right here!”

“Dad, please!”

The door was opening again and the noise riveted Arlie’s attention as he tensed for another round, but a wheelchair entered instead with Rachel Rosen aboard.

“Mom!” April said as she ran to hug her. Rachel returned the hug, her eyes on the murderous look in her husband’s eyes.

“What’s going on here?”

“It’s…” April began, but Arlie blurted out the basics of the acidic exchange with the FAA.

“Good grief, Arlie, they control your license!” Rachel said.

“Dammit, you think I don’t know that?” he replied through gritted teeth.

Rachel left the wheelchair and walked somewhat unsteadily to her husband’s side, gathering him to her breast until he hugged her back and stopped snarling.

April watched the seamless move with admiration. Her mother always knew precisely what to do to calm him down, while issuing orders with a flick of her eyes, which she did now in April’s direction. April understood instantly. Rachel wanted a sedative for her husband and a strategy session in the corridor as soon as possible. Damage control was obviously going to be necessary, and April silently raised her cell phone and mouthed “Gracie,” eliciting an affirmative nod from her mother.