Shannon was on the phone with the Air National Guard at Andrews when Flight 77 crashed into the western side of the Pentagon.
O’Malley leaped up at the thunderous roar, saying, “The White House will be next!”
September 11, 2001
Mojave, California
THEY WERE AS stunned as the rest of the nation, horrified by the incredible turn of events that saw three hijacked aircraft successfully attack their targets, and one, thanks to the heroism of its passengers, fail.
The Rodriquez family was there. Dennis Jenkins had brought Sally O’Malley out, along with Nancy and Anna Shannon.
“When did you last hear from Steve or V. R.?”
“Not since about eight our time. O’Malley phoned to let us know they were not injured in the Pentagon attack. They’ve both been too busy since.”
Anna asked, “Do you think it’s over?”
Bob Sr. answered, “If you mean are attacks by airliners over, they are for today; everything is grounded. But if you mean terrorism, it’s just getting started. After all the times we’ve made fun of Steve and V. R. about their phobias, they turn out to be right after all.”
Jenkins asked, “What do you think this will mean for RoboPlanes?”
Rodriquez said, “Lots more orders for UAVs; probably a slowdown on the hypersonic work.”
Rod spoke up. “I don’t think so, Dad. I think the anti-hypersonic cruise missile is going to be more important than ever. I think you are right about more orders for UAVs, but we might get some development money for the cruise missile work.”
His father shook his head, saying, “I hope so. We can use it. But I’ve got the feeling that even this isn’t going to be enough to wake America up. I don’t like the tenor of the commentary, people are indignant, but they are not as angry as they should be. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, there was an immediate, universal reaction against the Japanese. I’m already hearing cries for compassion for the peaceful Muslims. What I want to hear is cries for death to the fanatics. I’m not hearing it.”
Jenkins agreed with him, but said, “It’s early, Bob. People haven’t absorbed what’s happened yet. There’s bound to be a rising tide of anger. This is so outrageous, so cruel. The Japanese attack, however sneaky, was a military event. This is pure terrorism on civilians. I’ll never forget those shots of people leaping to their deaths, or the brave first responders going into the burning buildings. We’ve got to get angry about this.”
Anna rarely spoke at their gatherings, but tonight she said, “No. I don’t think so, Dennis. We’ve gotten too soft. I think we will make a big fuss about this for a while, and then go right back to sleep.”
No one said anything. Anna’s comments were too close to the bone, too apt to be right, and too horrible to contemplate.
December 2, 2001
Lambert Field, St. Louis, Missouri
V. R. SHANNON stepped outside the terminal entrance to soak up a little sun. It was warm for St. Louis in December, and it was good to escape the pall hanging over the airport, a mixture of resentment at the new and still clumsily executed security precautions, and embarrassment that workmen were still replacing the TWA signs with new ones from American. Flight 220, the last ceremonial TWA flight, had landed at Lambert yesterday, to a sorrowful crowd of veteran TWA employees. After many difficult years, the proud old airline, TWA, had given up, purchased by American Airlines. A great airline and a great tradition were no more.
Somehow it seemed exactly appropriate to V. R., for this was his last official trip for the United States Air Force. His retirement ceremonies in Washington were scheduled for December 31. He really didn’t have to make this trip, but he felt he owed a great deal to the old McDonnell Douglas team that had created the F-15 fighter. It was the Boeing F-15 now, of course, for just as American had acquired TWA and promptly changed its name, so had Boeing absorbed McDonnell Douglas in 1996. He could have sent any one of his deputies on this trip, to lay out the costs for extending the F-15E for some possible sales overseas, but with more than fifteen hundred hours in the airplane, he wanted to come and visit with the longtime MacDac people who wore the Boeing logo lightly and somewhat grudgingly.
He waited somewhat impatiently for his car to arrive. This was not like the McDonnell Douglas of years ago—there would have been half a dozen people on hand to meet him at the gate, and they would have had cars waiting outside the terminal doors. It didn’t surprise him. Since September 11, 2001, nothing seemed to go right at airports. The Muslim world had not only done the unthinkable, crashing their stolen aircraft into New York’s Twin Towers and the Pentagon, they had done the impossible, brought American air traffic to a halt.
Shannon had helped set up Operation Noble Eagle, the combat air patrols instituted on September 14 over major cities, and he had been in on the initial planning for Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. He had immediately tried to get his retirement deferred—it was no time for him to get out of uniform, not when the fanatical Muslim world had exposed its hand. But even in the heat of planning, his reputation for hating Muslim extremists preceded him, and the State Department let it be known that they did not want V. R. Shannon participating in the war on terror.
Maybe Anna was right. Maybe America was too soft. Well, the State Department was too soft. There was no doubt about that.
So here he was, shut down almost as tight as TWA, and unable to do anything about it. He berated himself for having been so obvious, but knew that there was no way he could have concealed his animosity—it was just too strong. Now he would have to find some other way to express it.
He glanced at his watch and down the curving road to the terminal. No car in view; he signaled to a cab and got in. The Boeing office where the meeting was scheduled was probably less than a mile away, but it would be twenty minutes before the cab could negotiate the departure from the terminal and the entrance to the tight security at the plant.
Shannon looked at his notes. They had invited him out to give a bit of a retrospective on the F-15 program from a pilot’s—and a general’s—point of view. But he wanted to cover some other things that were important to the future. Shannon always spoke extemporaneously, from a list of bullets, and he quickly jotted down some ideas.
First, the F-16/F-15 programs—their hazards, successes, comparisons. The two programs complemented each other, but both competed for the declining Air Force budget and Shannon wanted to give the Boeing people some idea of how much the Air Force had appreciated concessions that had been made to keep the F-15 program going over the years.
Second, the Chinese launch of two Long March missiles, placing two satellites in orbit. This was a little out of the F-15 plant’s normal sphere of interest, and that’s why he wanted it included. McDonnell Douglas had once been at the forefront of the space race, and the advances of the Chinese made it seem like Boeing ought to reinvigorate the space effort in St. Louis. The top Boeing guys might not like this sort of suggestion, but he knew the middle management people would soak it up.
Third, Boeing’s Sonic Cruiser. He was going to take a little jab at them on this one; no one believed Boeing was serious about their proposed Sonic Cruiser airliner, which was supposed to be their trump card with Airbus. He wanted to test the waters and see what the response was. The Sonic Cruiser looked good—but he thought there might be a Hypersonic Cruiser before there would be a Sonic Cruiser.
Fourth, Paul MacCready’s Helios. Everybody in the industry loved Paul, who was always coming up with something new and startling. His Helios, a huge, unlikely-looking UAV, had recently set a 96,500-foot altitude record. He was going to have to come in with some tie-in on this, as there was no direct Boeing interest in the project. Maybe he could wrap it in with the need for more space activity here in St. Louis.
Fifth, Predator using Hellfire weapons in Afghanistan. He’d have to watch himself on this one. A lot of the material was still classified, but it would certainly generate the most questions. It wa
s incredible, it was just what O’Malley had predicted—a Predator had used a Hellfire missile to take out an enemy in Afghanistan. It opened up whole new worlds for UAVs.
Sixth, Lockheed Martin winning the Joint Strike Fighter competition. This one would have to be soft-pedaled. He couldn’t avoid mentioning it, it was too recent and too important. Maybe some nice words on the Boeing approach, but emphasize the lift-fan on the Lockheed Martin F-35.
Seventh, the war on terror. Here’s where he would have to be really careful. He knew that many people regarded him as a nutcase on the subject, and he knew that his obsession had ended his career on a slightly sour note. Still, here was the perfect venue to tell important engineers exactly what the dangers were. He’d just have to be measured, and make it sound reasonable.
Shannon read through the notes one more time and put them in his briefcase. He wouldn’t need them once he was introduced and started talking. The main thing was not to go on too long. About twenty minutes was all anyone wanted, unless you were a stand-up comedian. The cab pulled to the curb, where Jack Cummings, the Boeing rep, stood, visibly embarrassed at not having been there to pick Shannon up.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
THE PASSING PARADE: Terrorist prisoners taken to Guantanamo Bay; Catholic church cover-up of pedophile problem sparks outrage; Enron scandal spreads, Enron chairman Kenneth L. Lay resigns; in first State of the Union address, President Bush links Iran, Iraq, and North Korea in an “axis of evil” to unprecedented high popularity rating; kidnapped reporter Daniel Pearl killed by terrorists in Pakistan; Muslim/Hindu riots in India claim hundreds of lives; Operation Anaconda launched with mixed success in Afghanistan; despite Saudi proposal for normal relations with Israel, warfare breaks out in Middle East as a result of Palestinian suicide attacks; Hugo Chavez reinstated after ouster in Venezuela, threatens to tighten control, confront United States; Russia and United States agree to major cuts in nuclear forces; United States announces that it will not recognize an independent Palestinian state with Yasir Arafat as its head; another major fraud disclosed when WorldCom files for largest bankruptcy in history; world watches rescue of Pennsylvania miners after three days in flooded shaft; President Bush calls for regime change in Iraq in address to UN; North Korea continues to develop nuclear arms; terrorist rebels take 763 hostages in Moscow theater, many killed in rescue attempt; Washington, D.C., area terrorized by two snipers; UN calls on Iraq to disarm.
September 1, 2002
Palos Verdes, California
Talk about blue Mondays! V. R. Shannon had never seen Steve O’Malley so depressed. He was spread out on the ancient leather couch, an untouched bottle of beer on the floor beside him, staring at the ceiling and occasionally giving off the kind of groan you hear in a suicide ward. For the first time that morning, he spoke.
“Look at us. Two retired four-stars, both still young, and almost worn-out trying to keep this Hypersonic Cruiser madness going.”
V. R. Shannon knew he had to cheer O’Malley up, no easy task since the week before when the latest experimental scramjet engine blew up in their supersonic tunnel in Mojave.
“I don’t know how long we can go, V. R. We’ve got at least six years to go, and we are hemorrhaging money. Every time I go in the house, Sally is all over me, demanding to know what’s going to happen to us, and I cannot tell her a thing. I don’t know. I just know we can’t quit now.”
“That’s for damn sure. We’d be idiots to quit now after all we’ve spent. In for a penny, in for a pound as the Brits say. And we are doing well on the cruise missile and the anti-cruise-missile missile; they’re moving right along.”
It was true, the two less ambitious projects were going well, and they already had bona-fide proof of it from the government. The proof was not yet in the form of a contract, but in a Department of Defense prohibition of their sale to anyone but a U.S. military service. They had welcomed the “prohibition,” for they never intended to sell the missiles anywhere else, and it meant that the government was granting some grudging approval to their efforts.
Shannon went on. “Besides, Bob Rodriquez has never failed yet. Look what he did for GPS, for precision guided munitions, for composite structures. He’s a genius, right up there with Rutan and MacCready.”
“I know that. Nobody has more regard for Bob than I. But Rutan and MacCready sort of keep their sights on more realistic targets. You don’t see Rutan trying to fly into space, or MacCready trying to launch satellites. We’re going way beyond anything anybody’s even dreamed about. Just the cruise missiles programs are fantastic, but a Hypersonic Cruiser? Look at Boeing, the biggest, maybe the finest, aircraft company in the world, loaded with government contracts, and they don’t dare to try what we’re trying.”
Shannon breathed a little easier. The conversation was taking a direction he could manage: talking about airplanes.
“Yeah, you’re right, but of course look at all the other things they are doing that we’re not even looking at. They flew their first Airborne Laser aircraft back in July.”
He knew O’Malley had been invited to Wichita to see the first flight, because he had been a big backer of the project in the Pentagon. Then he bit his tongue; this might get O’Malley off on one of his anti-Muslim rants. As ferocious as Shannon was about the fanatical Muslim world, he was dead tired of listening to O’Malley’s harangues. Sheepishly, he realized that he must bore people as badly as O’Malley bored him on the subject.
“Yeah, it’s something else. It’s got that big turret—looks like Durante’s schnozzle—on the nose. But you got to remember, Boeing’s working with Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman on this thing—they are not going it alone like we are. Everybody in the industry but us teams up on risky projects.”
O’Malley was quiet for a minute and then said, “I was more impressed—and more worried—about Boeing’s X-45. They are building a whole family of them, calling them UCAVs—unmanned combat aerial vehicles—and planning to use them for defense suppression.”
This time both men were quiet, each lost in his own memory of flying the old Wild Weasel missions, attacking the enemy air defenses, taking out surface-to-air missile sites. It was the toughest job in the world, and if any mission could benefit from being unmanned, that was it. V. R.’s dad, Tom, had told him about the terrible losses the Wild Weasels had incurred in the Vietnam War. Their motto was “First In, Last Out” but all too often they didn’t come out at all, victims of the very SAMs they were trying to suppress.
V. R. said, “The X-45 is pretty impressive, and they’ve got some bigger ones coming along, too. I heard that they even have one that is super-secret, a deep black program that is much farther along than people would believe.”
O’Malley immediately switched subjects, convincing V. R. that he had been on target with the deep black X-45 program. If it had been just speculation, O’Malley would have run with the subject, but he clammed up, saying, “All that stuff is great, but I saw something this year, got to fly it, in fact, that is nonmilitary in character, and is just about the most important advance in safety I’ve ever seen. They let me fly a Gulfstream V with the Enhanced Vision System. It is absolutely incredible.”
V. R. had been briefed thoroughly on the EVS at Gulfstream’s Savannah headquarters two months before, but didn’t say a word. The only way to get O’Malley out of his deep funk would be to get his juices going, talking about airplanes.
“You know, it sounds like the simplest thing in the world. They have an infrared camera, sensing heat and light, a whole bunch of computers and processors and a heads-up display in the cockpit, and it literally turns night into day. I was making an approach into Aspen, late at night, in the soup, and there, on the heads-up display, the HUD, was the whole scene, the valley, the ridge line of the mountains, the runway, the surrounding industrial area, the residences, it was just like it was VFR. But if you looked out the windscreen—nada, nothing. You glance back at the HUD, and it’s all clear. Amazing. And scary to reali
ze that most people are flying without it.”
“I wish Grandpa Vance could have seen something like that. He used to tell me about flying the radio ranges, doing aural null approaches, and things like that—it must have been terrifying!”
“I know one thing—we’re going to have the EVS retrofitted on our Gulfstream—if we still own one after we get through with this Hypersonic Cruiser craziness.”
“I agree; it’s almost irresponsible to fly an airplane without it. But I tell you something else we are going to get—when we get through with the Cruiser—or it gets through with us. You know Vern Raburn, don’t you?”
“Sure, a great guy. Good thinker, straight shooter.”
“He had me down to Albuquerque the last week in August for the first flight of his new Eclipse 500. It’s one of the new VLJs—Very Light Jets. It is the neatest-looking little business jet you ever saw, six passengers, 370 knots, and he’s going to bring it in for way under a million dollars—he hopes!”
“Did you get to fly it?”
“No, I flew in the chase plane with Verne. The number one Eclipse took off, flew forty minutes, and landed, a totally routine flight. The thing I like about it is that it’s all metal—no questions about composite construction and pressurization—and they use a special welding process that eliminates most of the rivets. Really a clever design.”
“Well, I share your concern about composites and pressurization. We don’t have the data on fatigue life of composites yet. It’s OK on UAVs, even desirable, because they are expendable. But not in full-size, people-carrying aircraft. I know everybody is going that way, Boeing, Airbus, Cirrus, Rutan, of course. But it’s still not like an aluminum structure, not in my mind.”
“Well, you’ve got some company. Everybody’s pointing to composites in the crash of Flight 587, you know, the Airbus A300 that went in after departing JFK last year.”
Hypersonic Thunder: A Novel of the Jet Age Page 31