by Peter James
God help his future passengers, Roger thought. However much Wilding thought he had the Almighty on his side, he simply wasn’t pilot material. To be a safe flier, in Roger’s opinion, you needed to be both cautious and extremely methodical. The best private pilots, other than those who’d come from an RAF or commercial pilot background, tended to be engineers or doctors or those with similar precision backgrounds where attention to detail was enshrined in their DNA. However much ‘someone up there’ might like you, there was an immutable law of physics called gravity, and that was never going to be a bad pilot’s best friend.
And boy, this guy was bad. He didn’t always listen and was slapdash in his approach, the kind of person who might take risks. Roger could just imagine him, at some future point, jumping into his plane despite a weather warning, and taking off, reliant only on his pal ‘up there’ who liked him. One day, for sure, his pal was going to be away from his desk, having a coffee break.
There were many levels of licence for a private pilot. The elementary one, which Byron Wilding was currently going for, was single-engine VFR – daylight visual flying – which required a minimum of forty hours of tuition. A further level was multi-engine rating. Another was night flying. Followed by instrument rating, which took as long again as getting a licence in the first place. That could be followed by several more levels and even more stringent medicals to gain a commercial pilot’s licence.
‘Touch and goes’ were a key part of the first level. Could the student pilot take off and land safely? Once the instructor was confident his – or her – pupil was up to it, after safely taxiing the plane to a halt and without giving the pupil time to think, they would jump out of the cockpit and tell the pupil to go for it. Solo!
It was the big moment for anyone learning to fly. They would have to take off, return to the airfield and land, all on their own, without an instructor to their right at the dual controls. Reliant now completely on their newly learned skills.
Or more likely in Byron’s case, his buddy ‘up there’.
Roger squinted as the plane banked steeply, turning south into the dazzling morning sun, then stiffened as they banked again, turning towards the runway. They were approaching too fast. Far too fast.
With a sharp intake of breath, he spoke into his mic, informing his pupil he was taking control. Opening the throttle, engine roaring, he pulled back on the control column, lifting the nose sharply in the air and adjusting the trim wheel.
‘What did you do that for?’ came his pupil’s voice through the headphones.
‘To save both our lives,’ he answered, calmly. ‘You forgot to lower the flaps and slow the aircraft right down. We’d have hit the runway at around 120 mph instead of the landing speed of 60 mph for this aircraft. If we didn’t break the undercarriage and flip over, we’d have ploughed off the end of the runway and ended up in the sand dunes.’
‘Bollocks, I had it under control. I was going to do all that.’
‘Let’s go around again,’ Roger said, not rising to the challenge of the man’s indignation.
They flew out over the Corbière Lighthouse, banked right further out over the sea, and then right again.
Roger radioed the tower. ‘Mike Whisky Seven Four Zulu to Jersey Tower, request another approach to runway 26 for a touch and go.’
‘Golf Uniform Zulu maintain 1,300 feet on reaching QNH 1020 and fly heading 180 degrees Golf Uniform Zulu.’
‘Understood, maintain 1,300 feet on reaching QNH 1020 and fly heading 180 degrees Golf Uniform Zulu.’
‘Golf Uniform Zulu, correct.’
Roger continued flying the aircraft himself as they climbed, heading well away from the airport. Two minutes later the controller came back on the radio.
‘Golf Uniform Zulu you are cleared touch and go runway 26 into a left-hand VFR circuit.’
‘You have control again,’ Roger instructed Wilding, routinely running his eye across the instruments.
‘I have control,’ Wilding replied.
As his student banked the plane too steeply, forcing Roger to make a small correction on the rudder and control column, his mind drifted momentarily to Georgie and the baby. Should they find out the sex? It had been the luckiest day of his life when he had met her. After all the crap he’d been through with the break-up of his marriage, and the joy Georgie had brought to him, maybe he should be the one saying that someone up there liked him.
He longed, as he did every workday, for the evening. To be home with her. With this amazing, beautiful, lovely woman. Who was now carrying their child.
Life right now was as good as he could ever imagine it getting. He always felt happy up in the sky. Perhaps it would have been marginally better if he didn’t have a total dickhead at the controls.
Roger’s phone began vibrating.
He looked down. The display read GEORGIE.
Much though he would have loved to answer, he let the call go to voicemail.
Looking down at the airport as they turned onto their final approach, he saw a twin-engine private plane, a Beechcraft, moving slowly along the taxiway. Over his headphones he heard the tower giving it instructions to continue taxiing to holding point G and hold position.
Wilding reduced the throttle and this time remembered to lower the flaps. The Piper slowed sharply.
A text from Georgie pinged in.
Was just calling to say I love yoooooou xx
Roger watched the altimeter descending – 700 . . . 600 . . . 500 . . . 400 . . .
And the airspeed dropping – 90 . . . 80 . . . 70 . . .
The tarmac strip of runway was looming ahead.
100 on the altimeter . . . 90 . . . 80 . . .
The dickhead was actually doing it right! A couple more of these, like this, and he might, at some point in the next lesson, be confident enough to jump out and let Wilding do a take-off and landing solo.
60 mph.
Any minute the wheels would bump down.
Then something hurtled towards the windscreen, like a mad bird.
A drone.
Wilding shouted, ‘Holy shit!’ He swung the joystick as if it was the steering wheel of a car, so hard it jerked out of his instructor’s hands, at the same time kicking the rudder pedals so hard that Roger’s feet momentarily lost contact with them. With no time for Roger to react, the plane veered sharply left. There was a massive bang.
Wilding screamed in terror.
Splinters shot past the windscreen.
The plane was sideways, at a sharp angle, its left wing tip inches from the runway.
Roger pulled the joystick back, as hard as he could, at the same time ramming open the throttle.
The plane levelled out, but the stall warning alarm began. A dumb sound, like a foghorn. They were veering sharply left, away from the runway.
Barp . . . barp . . . barp . . .
Wilding shot a terrified glance at him.
They were losing control.
There was no resistance from the joystick. It came right back to his chest.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
Then, to his horror, through the cracked windscreen, he saw the Beechcraft, right in front of them.
Someone in the Beechcraft’s co-pilot’s seat looked at them in total, frozen shock.
The gap was closing.
A screech as their wheels hit the grass, between the runway and the taxiway.
Followed by an instant of total silence as they bounced up in the air. Rolling right then left. Then bounced on.
Reeling the Beechcraft in towards them, like it was a big fish.
Again, Roger desperately pulled the joystick back as far as it would go.
Nothing happened.
The gap was narrowing.
Closing.
They hit the grass again.
Stayed down. Bouncing. Bouncing.
Hurtling towards the Beechcraft.
Closing on it.
‘Jesus!’ Wilding shouted.
Roger pressed down on
the right-turn pedal as hard as he could, as Wilding, in his panic, was stamping on the left. They continued heading straight on.
Roger braced himself. ‘Shit,’ he said.
38
Monday 14 January
On Saturdays Marcus liked to do the cooking, leaving the Sunday roast to Claire. That suited him as he used to play golf on a Sunday morning, although running now gave him more time back with the kids. Sunday lunch was normally the time of the week he looked forward to the most. A few glasses of red wine, a snooze in his armchair in front of the television, then taking the twins out for a walk around the quay, with Cormac in a buggy.
But yesterday, after his morning run, everything had irritated him. Claire was annoyed that her pork crackling wasn’t crisp enough, which she blamed on the Aga being too low, and that the roast potatoes – her absolute speciality – weren’t cooked enough. Cormac, teething, hadn’t stopped screaming all morning. And the twins were playing up as well – something that was supposed to improve after they’d passed through the stage of the ‘terrible twos’, wasn’t it?
As a result he’d actually – and unusually – been looking forward to Monday morning and escaping to the relative calm and sanity of work. First up had been a number of private patients he’d seen in his consulting rooms in the Bon Sante suite, a couple of miles from the hospital. Then, shortly before midday, he’d headed across to the hospital for a brief meeting, followed by a busy operating list in theatre which would take him well into late afternoon.
He was in his office reading the Jersey Evening Post, whilst eating an early lunch of a cheese-and-tomato sandwich, catching up on the minutiae of island life.
The headline on page five said:
NEW YEAR GOOD NEWS FOR FLYING INSTRUCTOR!
Beneath was a photograph of his loved-up mate Roger Richardson with his arms around Georgie Maclean.
The story, by staff reporter David Edbrooke, read:
Popular Jersey flying instructor, Roger Richardson, has double reason to be celebrating the start of the year. His application to launch an air taxi business is expected to be approved by Jersey States at a States sitting this coming Thursday. And his fiancée, personal trainer Georgie Maclean, is expecting their baby later this year.
Marcus didn’t bother reading the rest of the story. He’d already read it twice before.
How wonderful for the happy couple – not. So why are you such a flirt, Georgie? Why did you touch my lapel at dinner? Why have you given me your phone number? Why did you want me to turn up to your class? Why are you playing games with me?
You and I both know we’re meant to be together.
He stared at Richardson’s face, all smiles. At Georgie, looking so in love.
And thought, Really?
39
Monday 14 January
‘OK,’ Georgie said to her group of six women who were coming to the end of their fifty-minute, mid-morning spinning session. ‘Three minutes’ cool down!’ She liked this group, they were all fun, and earlier in the warm-up, when they weren’t too breathless to speak, had showered her with congratulations over the news of her baby, which they’d read about in the newspaper that morning.
She was in a great mood and looking forward to her next client, who was utterly charming. Bless him, although in his late eighties, he was determined to get his fitness level up. He was due at midday – in ten minutes. She glanced at her phone, to double-check the time, and saw a Sky newsflash. Breaking news. But her mind at the moment was on another leak that had appeared, this time in the empty hotel’s dining-room ceiling. She’d noticed it on Friday and had called the hotel owner. He’d asked her to check with Edouardo about it to see if it was spreading at all and get the plumber to come back and sort it.
As she left the gym and walked along the long, slightly musty-smelling corridor past the kitchens and staff toilets, she dialled Roger. They normally spoke and texted each other several times a day and she particularly liked speaking to him when she was doing her round of inspection of the hotel. Even though it was now broad daylight the place still spooked her.
The phone went to his voicemail again. He was probably instructing, she thought, he had three or four lessons booked for today. She left him a message.
‘Hi darling, just wondering what you fancy for dinner tonight? I’m suddenly feeling like a really old-fashioned steak and kidney pie – I know it’s strange, I’ve not eaten meat in a while, but I’d like that with some baked beans – and some very creamy coleslaw! If you want anything different, just let me know in the next couple of hours – I’ve got a free afternoon and I’ll be going out foraging. Call me when you can. I love you.’
Like her, Roger rarely ate meat and he wasn’t a big fan of pies. But too bad if he didn’t call back before she went shopping, he’d have to lump it. Hell, if she was doing all the heavy lifting, as he put it, he could make a few small sacrifices with his diet.
As she ended the call, a streak of red and white on the screen caught her eye. A newsflash again.
This time she looked at it.
Major incident declared at St Helier Airport, Jersey, following collision between two aircraft. Multiple casualties reported.
As she read the words it was as if a bright light inside her had been switched off, plunging her into darkness.
Roger was instructing there all today.
Roger had told her over breakfast that one of his students today was an over-confident nutter who scared him.
Oh God, Roger, please be OK. Please don’t be involved in this.
He hadn’t responded to her text of an hour or so ago, which was unlike him – unless she’d missed it during this last session. Normally, he replied within minutes.
She checked her messages. Saw the last one she had sent.
Was just calling to say I love yoooooou xx
There was no reply.
She dialled his number. It rang six times, then went to voicemail.
Hi, this is Roger, I can’t take your call right now, I may be flying. Please leave a message and I’ll call you back as soon as I’m back down on terra firma.
It was followed by a beep.
She left him a message.
‘Hey, it’s me, I’ve just seen on the news about an accident. Please call me as soon as you get this to let me know you’re safe. I love you.’
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Please be OK.
40
Monday 14 January
There were two hotline phones in the Emergency Assessment Unit of Jersey General Hospital. They were mounted prominently on a column in the open-plan admin station, directly above the duty staff nurse’s desk. The top one was on a red base marked AMBULANCE, the bottom one on a blue base marked POLICE.
Dan Bathurst, an exhausted A&E registrar, who had been in the hospital all night covering for a colleague who’d gone home sick, was also at this moment covering for the staff nurse who’d gone to get an early lunch. Stethoscope hung around his neck, he sipped a tepid coffee and yawned, struggling to keep his eyes open. He checked the time – 12.09 p.m. Someone would be relieving him at 1 p.m. – not a minute too soon.
The red phone rang, startling him.
He had to stand to reach the receiver. Lifting it from its cradle, he presumed it was going to be a routine call from an incoming ambulance, informing the hospital of the status of the patient. Mostly it was cardiac arrests or suspected strokes, mothers going into labour, work-place accidents, road-traffic collisions and, without fail on Friday and Saturday nights, at least one pub or nightclub fight victim.
But not today.
As Bathurst answered, ready to brief one of the two on-call Emergency department consultants who would make the decision on whichever medics would be required, an authoritative female voice said, ‘This is Jersey Ambulance Service. Two light aircraft have collided at the airport and we have multiple casualties, including reports of fatalities. We’re declaring a Major Incident. Police and the Airport Fire Cr
ew are attending and we’re setting up triaging. One ambulance is now at the scene, with all the others arriving imminently.’
‘Do you have an estimate of the number of casualties?’ Bathurst asked.
‘I believe seven, possibly eight at this stage, but we’re getting constant updates.’
Whilst she was speaking the Major Incident METHANE report appeared on the screen on his desk. It gave the exact location; the type of incident; hazards – one plane on fire; access and egress routes; number of casualties – it was showing now as ten; emergency services now present – Ambulance, Fire crew, Police and Coastguard.
The hospital had a clear procedure laid out for the instances – few and far between – when such an incident was declared. Blinking nervously through his glasses, the registrar looked around the large room for any sign of either of the two duty consultants. Not able to see them, he paged them with the simple message:
MAJOR INCIDENT
Within moments both doctors appeared from different directions. Nick Greene, a tall, former military doctor who’d had battlefield experience in Afghanistan and was unfazed by anything, loped towards the registrar. He was dressed in the pink scrubs worn by all the team in this department. He was followed, seconds later, by the suited figure of Adrian Noon, a calm, highly experienced man, who had started his career as a GP, before becoming Medical Director of the Essex Ambulance Service and then moving to Jersey as an A&E consultant.
As soon as Bathurst had brought them up to speed, Noon and Greene made a quick decision. Greene left to go to the airport to supervise the triaging of the casualties at the scene there. He grabbed a wedge of Triage Sieve Diagram leaflets, which would be handed out to non-medical emergency workers at the scene to assist in grading the injured into three levels of priority: Immediate, Urgent and Delayed.
Adrian Noon began implementing the hospital Major Incident Plan. First, he put out the call to evacuate all patients from the Emergency department. Those needing beds were to be found temporary ones in other wards. Next, he asked the switchboard to cancel all scheduled operations in the hospital’s five theatres, except for any life-threatening situations, and to request all consultants, anaesthetists, doctors, nurses, students and porters to assemble immediately in the Education Centre. He needed to know what resources were currently available to him. And if there were ten casualties all needing surgery, he would have to organize a rota of surgeons – sending some home to get some rest and come back in later to relieve others who would be starting in theatre right away. From past experience he knew the dangers of an exhausted surgeon. It was all too easy for a tired surgeon to do the major part of the surgery and miss the one tiny bit of damage that would end up killing the patient – hours, days or even weeks later.