by G. E. Nolly
“Okay.”
“Now,” Fish continued, “do you see the Radio Altimeter? It’s next to the Altimeter.”
I hadn’t noticed it until now, probably because it only indicated radio altitudes of less than 1000 feet, and the needle was not yet in view.
“Yes.”
“Okay, Hamfist, I’m going to talk you through a mechanical way to land the Guppy. When the Radio Altimeter reads 30 feet, I want you to gently flare the airplane, looking at the far end of the runway.”
“All right, but I may have some trouble looking outside and also looking at the Radio Altimeter.”
“You said you had the Flight Attendant in the cockpit, is that right?”
“Affirm.”
“Have her call the 30 feet for you.”
I glanced over at Nancy, and pointed at the Radio Altimeter.
“Do you think you can handle that, Nancy? Just call out the altitudes as we get close to the ground.”
“I think I can do it,” she replied.
“Okay,” I transmitted, “we have a handle on it.”
“Last thing,” Fish said. “After you land, just stop straight ahead on the runway. Raise the Reverser Levers after you land, and use your wheel brakes. Don’t try to taxi clear. You don’t have complete steering authority with the rudder pedals. We use the tiller to steer, and it’s really sensitive. So just stop wherever you can, and we’ll have stairs ready to meet the airplane. The parking brake is set with the small lever just to the left of the throttle quadrant. To set the parking brake, just step on the brakes and raise that lever.”
“Got it.”
We were now on final approach. I gave a last glance inside the airplane and checked my airspeed. It was steady at 130 knots.
We passed over the approach lights, and I was precisely on the VASI. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the Radio Altimeter pass through 100 feet.
“Talk to me, Nancy.”
“Eighty,” she replied, “seventy, sixty, fifty, forty, thirty…”
I gently flared the aircraft, looking at the far end of the runway, as I pulled the throttles to Idle. The wheels gave a short chirp as the airplane landed. A cheer erupted from the back of the airplane as I brought it to a stop.
“Great job, Hamfist!” Fish yelled, “Now pull the Fuel Control Levers, below the throttles, to Cut-Off. I’ll meet you planeside.”
I positioned the Fuel Control Levers to Cut-Off, and heard the engines winding down. Then all of the instruments died and the aircraft suddenly became strangely quiet, the only sound the whirring of the gyros as they spun down.
We were safe on the runway, and I could see emergency response vehicles approaching us. Nancy was crying now, and unstrapped from the First Officer seat and hugged me tightly.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
“You’re welcome, Nancy. I couldn’t have done it without your help.”
She blinked back tears, straightened her uniform and turned toward the cockpit door. She appeared a little embarrassed.
“I need to go disarm the slide at Door One Left.”
Mobile stairs had been positioned at the front entry door, and medics rushed aboard as soon as the door was opened. They immediately inserted IV drips into the Captain and First Officer, stabilized their condition, and removed them to the waiting ambulance.
Nancy had made a PA announcement asking the passengers to remain seated until the medics deplaned, and everyone complied. After the medics left, Nancy instructed the passengers to gather their personal belongings, and to exit the airplane through the same door where they had entered. Buses were waiting to transport them to the terminal. At the same time, mechanics were hooking a tow vehicle to the airplane nose wheel.
As the passengers deplaned, almost all of them looked up into the cockpit and thanked me. It was a really satisfying feeling. If I hadn’t been on board, I don’t know what would have happened.
I had an instantaneous flash back to high school Latin class. We had been translating some really difficult passages, and I still remembered the quote from the Roman philosopher Seneca. Fortuna est momentum quo occasionem convenit talentum: “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity”.
Today I’d had my share of luck.
65
March 12, 1978
I waited for all the passengers to leave, and then I went back to seat 2B, retrieved my carry-on bag, and descended the portable stairs. There was a throng of reporters all trying to get my attention, and I felt very uncomfortable being in the spotlight. A reporter from a news team shoved a microphone in front of me.
“What’s it feel like, being the hero that saved the plane?”
I paused for a moment to collect my thoughts.
“I’m not a hero. I’m just a pilot, doing what I was trained to do. But I’ve served with a lot of heroes. Fifty-eight thousand of them.”
As I was trying to think of something else to say, I saw Fish drive up in a van with the WorldJet Airways logo on the side. He was out of the vehicle as soon as the parking brake was set, and ran up to me and gave me a bear hug that knocked the wind out of me.
“Great job, Hamfist! You are one hell of a pilot!”
“I think it was because you are one hell of an instructor.” I replied. “Once again you save the bacon.”
Fish had pulled my ass out of the fire more than once when we were at DaNang. The first time, he covered for me when I was making a drunken fool of myself. More important, he flew res-cap – rescue cover – for me when I was shot down in Laos.
“So how did you get to be such a big shot in your airline?”
“Climb in,” he said, heading toward the van, “and I’ll tell you all about it. And can you please take off that uniform blouse? You smell like a barf bag.”
“I know. Reminds me of our drinking days at DaNang.”
I removed my Class-A uniform jacket, folded it, inside out, and put it in the back seat.
“How about you stay at my house? I want you to meet my wife, anyway.”
“Thanks, but I don’t know, Fish. I’m here for a Dash One conference that’s being held at my hotel. I think I should stay there. But we could do dinner together.”
“Okay, I’ll call Rachel and tell her to get ready. Where are you staying?”
“The Stapleton Doubletree.”
“All right. Let’s get you checked in, then we’ll go out to lunch. You can do that, can’t you?”
“Absolutely. I don’t need to meet up with the attendees until tomorrow morning.”
Fish parked the airline van in front of airline headquarters, at the rear entrance of the terminal, and we transferred to his Toyota. He drove me to the Doubletree, which was only a block from the airport, and I quickly checked in and changed into civvies. I removed the ribbons and insignia from my uniform, put it into the plastic laundry bag I found in the closet, and left the bag outside my room door. Then I called the front desk to tell them I had a rush dry cleaning job for pickup.
“Okay, Fish, I’m all yours.”
“Let’s go,” Fish answered, as we walked across the parking lot to his car, “What kind of food are you in the mood for?”
“I haven’t had sushi in over two years.” I remembered hearing that a lot of Japanese had been relocated to internment camps in Colorado during the war, and there was a Little Tokyo section in Denver.
“I know just the place. So you like sushi… Did you ever hook up with that Japanese girl?”
“You have a good memory,” I said, as I took my family photos out of my wallet, “Actually, she’s Eurasian.”
Fish stopped walking and stared at the pictures.
“Wow! I wish she was my Asian! You really lucked out.”
“I know. I sure got the best part of the bargain, that’s for sure. That’s Samantha, and our boys, Johnny and Tommy. We got married a year after I left DaNang.”
We made small talk as we drove the short distance to downtown Denver.
“
What I really like about Stapleton is how close it is to downtown,” Fish commented, as he parked in a vacant spot on Champa Street, “And what I like about Denver is how compact the city is. You can walk just about anywhere. This is probably the best pilot base in the entire system.”
We walked a short distance.
“How’s this?” he asked, as we stopped in front of a small sign that read “Sakura Sushi”.
“Looks perfect.”
We entered a small restaurant and waited for the hostess to seat us.
“Futari, onegai-shimasu,” I said, in my best Japanese. I wasn’t sure who I was trying to impress more, Fish or the hostess.
“Hai, dozo,” she responded, leading us to a table in the corner.
We glanced over the menu, and I picked out what I wanted.
“So,” Fish said, “fill me in on the past nine years.”
“Well, after DaNang, I went to Yokota to fly T-39s.”
“So you didn’t get the B-52 deal like the rest of us.”
“No, I lucked out. I married Sam while I was at Yokota. I ended up going TDY to Vietnam a lot, then volunteered for a second tour.”
“Wow. You really are a lifer, aren’t you. What did you fly your second tour?”
“F-4s. I got to Ubon just in time for Linebacker, and DEROSed just as the POWs were coming home. Perfect timing.”
“I’ll say.”
“Then I went to Kadena in F-4s.”
I wanted to tell him about my aerial victories, but I thought better of it. I didn’t want to sound like I was bragging.
“I flew F-4s for a little while, then they put me in Wing Ops and Training, and I ended up flying T-29s for a short time, then T-39s again. Actually, I was dual qualified, so I flew the F-4 also.”
“Wow. Very cool.”
“After that, they sent me to Patrick to be an O-2 IP. How about you? As I recall, you went to Buffs.”
The “as I recall” part was a polite bit of an understatement. The last month he was at DaNang, all Fish could talk about was how badly he’d been screwed over by MPC with his B-52 assignment.
“Let me tell you, Hamfist,” Fish grinned, “that B-52 assignment was the best thing that ever happened to me.”
“You’re shitting me, right?”
“No, it was my entrance into flying heavy metal. If I hadn’t gotten that Buff assignment, I wouldn’t be where I am today. I learned how to operate in a crew environment, I learned a lot more about jet engines than we learned in pilot training, and I learned about Boeing systems and procedures. Most important, I met my wife while I was at Castle Air Force Base, going through training.”
“I had a DOS (Date of Separation),” he continued, “and WorldJet was just starting to hire when I got out of the Air Force. I went to the interview and dazzled them with my knowledge of how the big Boeings operate, and I was in the first new-hire class.”
“Very cool,” I responded.
“Here’s the best part. With the big hiring and expansion, I made Captain in less than six years. Some of the guys I few with when I was first hired took fifteen years or more to upgrade. Like they say, timing is everything.”
“How did you get to be an IP?”
“Well, in the airline, seniority is everything. Totally different from the Air Force, where guys upgrade based on ability. The one place where they hire based on performance rather than seniority is in the Training Department. I had been doing a pretty good job on the line, and my Chief Pilot invited me to apply for a position as an IP.”
“Impressive.”
“I don’t know. More luck than anything. So, I interviewed with the Training Department and some personnel types, went through additional training, and became a 737 IP. I work in the Training Center seventeen days a month, and fly three days. Every third month I fly the line the whole month just like a normal pilot.” Fish paused for effect. “During a typical line month I have eighteen days off.”
He was grinning like a Cheshire cat.
I was incredulous. “Eighteen days a month of work, or eighteen days a month off?”
“Eighteen days off. That’s what the line guys get. And if the bullshit level at the Training Center ever gets too deep, I can go back to line flying whenever I want.”
The waitress had brought our order and placed it on the table between us.
“So,” Fish said, “what’s the deal here? Do we eat with our fingers, chopsticks, what?”
“We use chopsticks, called hashi. Here, I’ll show you.”
Fish and I spent about an hour at the restaurant, with me showing him how to use hashi, and him telling me about airline life. It was really great to be back with Fish again, and to see the good old Fish, the happy, vibrant guy he had been when I’d first met him at DaNang. I could see that airline life agreed with him. It sounded like a great lifestyle.
After lunch, Fish took me to the car rental desk at Stapleton, and we made arrangements to have dinner at his house in Castle Rock at five o’clock.
66
March 12, 1978
When I was a cadet at the Air Force Academy, Castle Rock had been just a wide spot in the road. Actually, it was just off the road, on the east side of I-25. As seniors, when we were allowed to have cars, we knew we were getting close to the North Gate of the Academy when we passed the Castle Rock exit on our way back from Denver. The giant prominence that gave the town its name was easy to spot from miles away. The fastest I ever made it from Castle Rock to the North Gate was seventeen minutes. One guy, who had a Corvette, claimed he had done it in eleven.
Castle Rock was different now. Larger. Much larger. There were lots of winding roads that hadn’t existed when I was a cadet. The hills on the east side of the highway were dotted with gorgeous homes overlooking the town. I followed the directions Fish had given me, and discovered that one of those homes was his.
I parked in the circular driveway and rechecked the address, to make sure I was at the right residence.
“Right on schedule, Hamfist,” Fish called from the wide two-door entrance. “You made another TOT (Time On Target).”
“Nice place, Fish!”
“Aw, it’s just my humble little abode,” he grinned, “Come on in, and I’ll show you around.”
“First,” he continued, “I want you to meet Rachel.”
Fish’s wife stood in the doorway.
“Tom’s anxious to show off the Captain’s House we built last year,” she said, as she extended her hand. “I’m Rachel.”
“Great to meet you, Rachel. I’m Hamfist. With a house like this, I don’t blame him.”
“Well,” Tom smiled, “it’s only 6000 square feet. But it’s the view I’m really in love with.”
I turned to follow his gaze, and marveled at the gorgeous vista.
“That’s Pike’s Peak over there,” he said, pointing toward the south, “and Mount Evans over there, to the north. And we have the rest of the Front Range to greet us every time we open our door.”
Pikes Peak had a sugary dusting of snow, standing in stark contrast to the clear, dark blue sky. The view was magnificent.
“Beautiful,” I responded, “Now let me see how an airline pilot lives.”
Tom guided me through his home, and I was more impressed with every room we entered. The main house was on one level, and there was a finished basement downstairs. The finished basement had a study, an exercise room and an additional bedroom with a private bath. On the main level, there was a huge kitchen with a stand-alone island complete with cook-top, a living room, a family room, and two bedroom suites, each with private bathrooms and walk-in closets.
“Wow!” I marveled, “You’ve come a long way since DaNang!”
“I’ve been really lucky,” Fish answered. “Are you hungry? We’re going to have fish, but this time, we’re going to cook it before we eat it.”
Apparently, he hadn’t been as crazy about our sushi lunch as I was. But he’d been a good sport.
When we sat down, Fish
brought out a bottle of fine wine and showed me the label. “How’s this look for us tonight?”
“Sorry, Fish, I don’t want to be rude, but I don’t drink anymore.”
Fish looked at me like I had two heads. “Are you sure you’re the real Hamfist? Maybe I need to look under your bed for pods, to see if the body snatchers have replaced you.”
“Long story, Fish, but I made a promise to my wife that I’d quit drinking. You remember how I would get when I was drunk. So I just quit.”
“Wow. Not a problem, I’m just amazed that she got you to do it.” He paused. “Good for her!”
Fish had seen me when I’d gotten drunk at DaNang, and had pulled me out of more than one bad situation when I’d blacked out. He’d never said anything about my drinking, but I could tell he was glad to see I’d quit.
Over dinner, Fish and Rachel took turns telling me how they’d met while he was in B-52 training. Rachel had been working at a travel agency in Atwater, the town just outside the base. Fish had gone in to buy some airline tickets, and they’d hit it off immediately. They’d gotten married just as Fish completed training, and he separated from the Air Force two months later and got snapped up by WorldJet almost immediately. It was exactly like he had said in his letter to Strategic Air Command when we were at DaNang – he had a Date of Separation, and it was ridiculous for the Air Force to spend money training him if he was about to leave the Air Force.
“Sounds like you guys have had a storybook life,” I observed.
“We really have, Hamfist,” Fish replied, “You know, if you ever decide to leave the Air Force…”
The sound of the doorbell interrupted our conversation. Fish got up from his seat.
“I invited someone over,” he remarked as he approached the door, “He said he’d like to meet you.”
A large man, probably in his late forties, was standing outside the door.