The Final Flight

by James Blatch

  It wasn’t much, especially as Rob and Red were headed up north to ferry back the new Vulcan. But it all helped to stall the project’s completion while Belkin ran the comparison figures.

  Millie busied himself with unrelated paperwork. Kilton appeared by his side.

  “Shouldn’t you be flying?”

  “Jet’s on the blink. Engineering are looking at her now.”

  Kilton grunted but didn’t pursue the issue.

  After lunch, a gleaming white Vulcan sat on the apron.

  “Are any of these left on the squadrons?” asked a passing pilot. “Or has TFU commandeered them all?”

  Millie shrugged. Adding a second Vulcan to the TFU fleet was a sign of the project’s importance. And Kilton’s growing influence.

  Rob appeared from Kilton’s office, still in flying coveralls. He marched directly up to Millie.

  “What happened with the tape recorder? Why wasn’t it fixed yesterday?”

  “I’m not sure, Rob. I guess they’re busy.”

  “Didn’t you tell them this is top priority?”

  “I’m sorry, Rob, are you running this project now?”

  “No, you’re supposed to be.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  Rob didn’t reply but moved off to the tea bar. Millie thought about following him, but Red appeared by his side.

  “He’s just had to tell Kilton the new Vulcan needs a hundred-hour service before we can use her. So Kilton kicked him and he kicked you. Sorry, pal.”

  “How long will the service take?”

  “Tomorrow, apparently. They would do it this afternoon, but they’ve got to reinstall your tape recorder first.”

  “Rob’s never spoken to me like that before.”

  Red nodded. “He’s moving up the ladder now. Things getting more serious for him. He’ll adapt. Not everyone’s a cool cucumber like you, Millie.”

  “I don’t feel cool, I can assure you. This whole thing, it just worries me.”

  “What does?” Red asked.

  Millie turned back to look at the American, and wondered how far he could go.

  “What’s the bloody rush? When did we go from being careful and thorough to moving at such an indecent speed?”

  Red patted him on the back. “I guess when anti-nuclear campaigners learn about the existence of our secret new system.”

  17

  Thursday 23rd June

  By Thursday afternoon, both Vulcans were serviceable. Kilton watched from the apron as the men charged with Guiding Light trial flights walked out in two groups.

  Millie strapped into the back of the older aircraft. In the rear bay of the new jet was Steve Bright. There was only one rear crew member in each; it was Kilton’s way of recreating the likely crewing situation in the next generation of military aircraft, now that the computer was doing most of the work.

  It also allowed him to operate both at the same time.

  They got airborne within a few minutes of each other. Millie’s aircraft, flown by Rob and Speedy, headed north to the Peak District. Red Brunson and Jock MacLeish headed west to the Brecon Beacons.

  All Millie could think about was the sheer number of blank reels they would get through between them.

  He had at least seen off the possibility of the final flight, with Stafford on board, taking place tomorrow.

  But it had only been pushed to next week.

  If Belkin came back with news of a serious flaw buried deep in the data, Millie would have just hours to make his move.

  The Vulcan slammed into a pocket of air as they descended to low-level.

  Reluctantly, Millie powered up the system and engaged the laser.

  He began the first reel recording the height data.

  The aircraft levelled out around one thousand feet and Millie felt a familiar jolt as the autopilot took over.

  He scanned the orange numbers, rotating the dial to check all angles before bringing the readout back to the ‘1’ position, below and just ahead of the nose.

  1,011 flickered over to 1,023 followed by a stream of numbers all within a few feet of each other.

  After fifteen minutes, the ride became rougher. The land rose and dropped below them and the Vulcan fell in unison, causing Millie’s stomach to turn.

  “Working perfectly!” Rob called over the intercom.

  “Wonderful,” said Millie. “It’s all perfect. That must be why we’re not allowed below one thousand feet.”

  Millie concentrated on not throwing up. Air-sickness had crept up on him in recent years, exacerbated by flying at low-level.

  After ten more miles over the hills, Rob piped up again.

  “How we doing? On to the second tape yet?”

  “When reel one’s full, I’ll switch over. Not before, thank you.”

  “OK, OK. Keep your hair on. I was just asking.”

  “Just concentrate on your job and I’ll do mine.”

  Rob didn’t reply.

  Millie was well into the third tape before they climbed out of low-level and headed north of Manchester, giving the city a wide berth before turning south.

  He poked the reels into the sleeves and marked them up. At least six more would have been consumed in the two flights.

  As they shut down, Millie heard some low whispers between Speedy and Rob.

  The pilots appeared down the ladder and Millie let Rob undo the hatch and lower the ladder down, all in silence.

  Speedy and Rob walked off toward TFU, leaving Millie to follow twenty yards behind. Once in the planning room, Millie piled the freshly recorded tapes on his desk, along with the one extra blank he hadn’t used.

  Rob appeared by his side.

  “What was that about?”

  “What?”

  “You know very well what.”

  Millie fixed him with a gaze. “And you very well know what I think—”

  “No, Millie, I don’t know what you think. The system’s working flawlessly. It’s embarrassing in front of Speedy, who’s seen nothing but a brilliant new system working without fault. There’s no reason to keep batting on about it, and most of all no reason to take out your grievances on the rest of us. It’s unprofessional.”

  Millie looked over Rob’s shoulder. Speedy and a couple of others watched from afar.

  “That’s what you all think? It’s flawless?”

  “Yes. I’m afraid you’re alone in thinking otherwise. Don’t make this difficult for me, Millie—”

  “Difficult for you?”

  “Yes. Everyone knows you and I are friends—”

  “Are we, Rob? Still friends?”

  Rob looked disappointed. “I thought we were.”

  The two men stared at each other for a moment before Rob walked back to the tea bar.

  Millie stood by himself, next to the little corner of the planning room he’d made his own.

  The pilots and aircrew on the far side were in good cheer, with laughter bouncing off the low ceiling.

  He removed his flying coveralls and checked in his equipment before picking up the tapes and walking slowly over to the station commander’s office.

  Periwinkle was behind his desk again, ignoring the comings and goings to the safe. Just as Millie was signing in his tapes, Steve Bright appeared.

  “How many complete reels?” the corporal asked.

  “Four,” Bright replied.

  “Four?” Millie said.

  “Yep.” Bright handed his tapes to the corporal, complete with annotations on the sleeves.

  Bright and the corporal left the room.

  Millie gazed at the dwindling pile of blanks as the safe door closed, then checked he’d passed everything from his case.

  As he walked to the door, he turned back to Periwinkle and hesitated.

  Should he say something now?

  TFU was quiet, with most of the men in their respective mess bars.

  Millie looked at his watch. He was due to call Belkin in an hour.

&nbs
p; Susie watched as two Vulcans screamed out of West Porton. So much for their disruption.

  “They appear to be expanding.”

  “What?” David asked, lying on the ground next to her.

  “That’s the first time I’ve seen two Vulcans.”

  David didn’t bother looking.

  “Are we done here now, David? I mean, what are we doing? It just feels like the energy has gone, along with half the people.”

  “Megan’s waiting to hear from Sampson. He’s obviously working on how to get the information out.”

  “Right.”

  “Meanwhile, she wants to march again. If they’re not going to charge us, we may as well make the most of our freedom.”

  “Won’t that provoke them?”

  “I think that’s the point.”

  Susie sighed. “I see.”

  Later in the afternoon, she made her daily call.

  “Nothing’s happening or going to happen,” she told Roger. “They’ve done as much as they can, and it did nothing. They’re talking about bloody marching around the airfield now, as if that will suddenly force Britain into giving up her nuclear deterrent.”

  “They want you there a little longer. Number Ten got back to us rather late in the day. Apparently that project you stumbled across is rather high value. They’re keen we protect it from any further interruptions.”

  “That’s not our job, is it? Don’t they have their special branch for that?”

  “Not sure they covered themselves in glory when you and your friends walked under their noses and into the heart of a secret test flying unit. Anyway, won’t be long. The project is due to end next week and move into production.”

  “Fine. What is it, by the way?”

  “Guiding Light. Some sort of guidance system for the delivery of nukes. Don’t know any more, I’m afraid, and probably won’t find out. But they are all jolly keen on it at the top of the tree. Something about a big export order to our American friends.”

  “So we really stumbled across something.”

  “Well, it’s done us no harm. The PM is personally grateful for our work—”

  “My work.”

  “I thought we were a team, my dear?”

  “When it suits you, Roger.”

  At 7PM, Millie checked Georgina was safely in the garden with a drink, before he went into the house through the French doors. He closed the living room door behind him and stood over the telephone.

  He dialled the Oxford number with a shaking hand.

  “Ah, Squadron Leader Milford. Good evening. Are you well?”

  “Quite well, yes, thank you, Professor Belkin.” His legs were jelly.

  “Good. Well, I expect you’d like to hear the results of our digging?”

  “Yes, please.”

  “Well, let me tell you, we had quite a week of it.” The professor spoke slowly and deliberately.

  “Did you find anything?”

  “No.”

  The response hit Millie like a knife in his chest. His shoulders hunched forward.

  “Not at first.”

  “Not at first?”

  “It was a case of adjusting the parameters. Initially, my erstwhile undergraduate set the computer a task of finding a variation in height readings that moved two thousand feet or more in two seconds. Something he considered would be a clear sign of an error.”

  “That’s quite a dramatic change.”

  “Well, yes. I thought so, too. And it provided a negative return. However, I then instructed young Strangways to look for a more moderate difference, and we settled on seven hundred and fifty feet or more in three seconds or less.”

  “And?”

  “And, Mr Milford, I think I can safely say there is a problem with your new equipment.”

  Millie sat down on the small bench by the telephone desk.

  “Tell me more.”

  “We found seven instances initially. When we looked at the surrounding data, three of them were normal. The aircraft appeared to be descending or ascending as part of a planned manoeuvre, although the numbers may have exaggerated the rate of climb or descent.”

  “Right, but the other four instances?”

  “Yes, well, they point to anomalies. The sudden change in height didn’t fit with readings around it. A definite issue for you to resolve. Something we would call a systemic problem.”

  “Incredible work. I can hardly believe it.”

  “Interestingly, when we narrowed the parameters further, we kept finding anomalies.”

  “How many?”

  “Many. The narrower the parameters, the more we found. Small deviations, I should say. But a clear sign that there is a recurring issue with the data received by the computer from whatever is feeding it.”

  “I want to say I’m relieved, but it doesn’t feel like the right reaction. In fact, as I think about it, I’m becoming angry.”

  “Well, I must remind you, this is a very small sample size. We measured less than thirteen hours of data according to the time field.”

  Millie toyed with his pen.

  “I understand, but from what you’ve seen, you believe this is enough to predict actual losses?”

  “Well, that brings me on to the more complex side of the equation.”

  “More complex? I’m only just keeping up as it is.”

  “Then I’ll try and be gentle with you. Now, you may wish to make some notes. We’ve done what we can to be as accurate as possible on the limited information. One of the students found a Parliamentary Written Answer on Royal Air Force establishment numbers with predictions for the next five years. From there we made an estimate of flying hours and within those hours, an estimate of low-level flying.

  “After that, we applied the occurrence frequency we found on your tapes. That produced a startlingly high number of incidents.”

  “Really? How high?”

  “I can’t recall the actual rate, but too high. So high that you would have experienced mishaps every week, just during this trial.”

  “So the data is wrong? Or your calculations are wrong?”

  “Neither, I’m happy to report. We went back to the detail of the incidents and realised that in the vast majority of cases, the incorrect readings would go unnoticed.”

  “Unnoticed? Can you explain that? How would a crew not notice a sudden change in height?”

  “Because the erroneous height information would be just a quick burst, in many cases less than a second. So the aircraft would either not have time to react, or would only just start to change velocity, before the correct readings flowed through, cancelling any required change.”

  “I see.”

  “We refined the search parameters and asked the mainframe to search for those large variations. This is where it gets interesting.”

  “Go on,” Millie said, pen poised over the back of one of the data sheets.

  “While far rarer, longer bursts of incorrect data that could affect flight do occur. Although, again, in many cases we estimate this would be inconsequential.”

  “How so?”

  “Firstly, the higher the aircraft is from the ground, the less likely that even three seconds of deviation could cause an actual accident. Secondly, even at low-level, when straight and level, the aircraft would often recover itself, even without pilot interference, as the wrong height readings would run out and be replaced by the actual distance to the surface. But…”

  “But?”

  “Well, that leaves us those occasions when an aircraft is low, fast and banked, when even two to three seconds worth of incorrect height information could be catastrophic. Add into that scenario a flight at night or with restricted visibility and you have an unwelcome circumstance. Albeit rare.”

  “How rare?”

  “We estimate 0.014% of the time.”

  “Small enough to be inconsequential?” Millie asked.

  “Not when you apply that frequency to the overall hours. Now, the number I’m going to giv
e you is based on our predictions and it involves a good deal of extrapolation on a limited data supply. So, fair warning of its accuracy. We estimate the RAF will operate around two hundred and sixty-two hours of training flights at low-level, around the world, per day, over the next couple of years.

  “If we guess that fewer than half will employ your new system, that still leaves twenty-five thousand hours over the course of a year.

  “Even at just 0.014%, that points to 3.5 aircraft caught in the very worst of scenarios.

  “Now, you told me the system will be fitted to a range of aircraft from those with two seats to those with a crew of four or even five?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “So, another guess is the average number of crew members per aircraft. We rounded that to 2.5.”

  Millie quickly did a calculation.

  “8.75?”

  “Indeed. 8.75 is the number we reached. In our view, based on limited data and much guesswork, the Royal Air Force would expect to lose 3.5 aircraft on average each year, risking the lives of 8.75 crewmen.”

  Millie stared at the figure at the base of his scribbled notes.

  “8.75. And you’re sure?”

  “No, we’re not sure. But with more data, a refined figure will be more certain.” The professor paused. “However, the important point here is that the true number will not be zero.”

  There was a long silence on the phone.

  Eventually, the professor spoke again. “Mr Milford, may I ask you something?”

  “Of course.”

  “You told me you would speak to the station commander at West Porton, correct?”

  “Yes, that’s still my plan.”

  “You also told me the man in charge of the project wields a lot of influence?”

  “Yes.”

  “May I ask, is the station commander trustworthy and able to support you in what you ask for?”

  Periwinkle had never come across as a strong character; Kilton got the better of him most of the time.

  “I can’t be sure.”

  “Well, if you don’t mind me making this observation, I think you may place yourself in a challenging position if, for instance, the conversation with the station commander does not go as you would like.”