The Aviators
Page 23
âśI'm in your VIP quarters. And since I invited myself, I'm grateful for that. âś
âśDon't be silly," Bellmon said. "You never need an invitation here.âť
âśWhen General Wendall came back from Fort Gordon, he sent me down here, first to see if we could find out what caused the crash, and then to ask you for any ideas you have about getting the grounding lifted.âť
âśWell, we're glad to have you," Bellmon said.
"Do you know Harry Schultz, General?" Rand said.
"Sure. Harry used to be here before he went to Benning." Who the hell is Harry Schultz? Oliver wondered.
"Nice to see you again, General," Schultz said, offering Bellmon his hand. "Bad circumstances.âť
âśAre you the one who found out what caused it, Harry?" Bellmon asked.
"Tom Everly did," Schultz replied. "I'll bet he's right. I was just showing General Rand what Tom found.âť
âśWhy don't you show me?" Bellmon said, and started up the ladder. Schultz followed him.
General Rand looked at Oliver.
"Sir, I'm General Bellmon's aide, John Oliver," Oliver said. "I'm afraid I owe you an apology.âť
âśWhat for?" Rand said, offering Oliver his hand.
"Well, for not being around when you arrived, Sir.âť
âśYour sergeant major took good care of me-no problem. âś
âśWell, I should have been available, Sir.âť
âśI said, no problem.âť
âśSir, I have some photographs I took yesterday at the crash site. Would you like to see them?âť
âśVery much," Rand said. Oliver handed them over.
"Lieutenant Stevens, you want to come up here?" Bellmon's voice came from the work platform. "You, too, Newell." Oliver looked around for them. They were making themselves as inconspicuous as possible against the hangar wall. He saw Rand's eyes examining Steven's cowboy hat and boots.
"Lieutenant Stevens flew in 'Nam with Lieutenant Dant, who was flying the right seat in this, Sir," Oliver explained.
"Lieutenant Newell was with us at the crash site yesterday.âť
âśI see," Rand said. "Did you serve in Vietnam, Captain? âś
âśYes, Sir.âť
âśHave you flown one of these?" Rand asked, nodding toward the Chinook.
"Yes, Sir," Oliver said. "Before I became General Bellmon's aide, they were going to make me an IP. I took the transition course.âť
âśThere are two schools of thought about this aircraft," Rand said. "One is that it's a fine machine and the other that it's a flying coffin. Which way do you feel?âť
âśI think it's a fine machine, Sir," Oliver said.
Rand grunted.
Bellmon came down the work-platform steps.
"Have a look, Oliver," he said. "If you like.âť
âśThank you, Sir," Oliver said, and went quickly up the stairs to the work platform.
Newell and Stevens came down as he went up. Both of them shook their heads.
Schultz had seen him coming, and waited for him. The panels over the rotor head and transmission had been removed. Schultz pointed at something inside.
What the hell am I being shown?
"Look at that, will you?" Schultz said.
And then comprehension came; he knew what he was looking at.
Each Chinook pylon had three rotor blades, each of which was almost exactly twenty feet long. These fitted into hub assemblies, which contained the mechanism to control their pitch, and which in turn were connected to the transmission.
The rear rotor-head assembly had tom loose from the transmission, flailed around, and then flown off. The cause for this was obvious. It had lost one of its three blades. The moment that happened, the assembly, grossly out of balance, had begun to tear itself loose.
On the rotor-head assembly itself, Oliver saw the now empty bolt holes where the rotor blades had been fastened to the assembly, four bolts for each blade. The bolt holes for two of the three blades were perfectly round. Where the third rotor blade had been mounted, two bolt holes were battered, twisted, elongated, and tom. The other two were round. What had happened, obviously, was that two bolts had lost their nuts and then vibrated out of their holes. And that allowed that blade to wobble, and the strain had been too great for the assembly; the remaining bolts had tom free.
It had all happened in probably no more than a couple of seconds. By the time the pilots had sensed that something was wrong, the tail rotor assembly had thrown a blade; and then it started tearing itself to pieces.
What had caused the accident was a lousy nut. It had either failed from metal fatigue, or, even less pleasant to consider, it had not been safety-wired in place.
Oliver refused to consider the one other possibility, sabotage, although that was just about as likely as a criminally negligent mechanic, who would now never be caught, or a pair of nuts failing one right after the other.
"Ain't that something?" Schultz said bitterly.
Oliver didn't trust himself to respond beyond saying, "Thank you, Mr. Schultz." He went down the work-platform steps.
Bellmon met his eyes.
Is he pissed at me because of General Rand? Or at the world generally because of what we've just seen?
"Oliver," General Bellmon said, "I have just volunteered your services to take General Rand back to Benning. Any reason you can't do that?âť
âśNo, Sir. I'll be happy to. âś
âśI hate to ruin your day off," General Rand said.
"Don't worry about it," General Bellmon said. "Captain Oliver gets plenty of time off, don't you, Oliver?âť
âśYes, Sir," Oliver said.
x
[ONE]
Base Operations
Cairns Army Airfield Fort Rucker, Alabama
1005 Hours 13 January 1964
Brigadier General George F. Rand, ignoring the FLIGHT PERSONNEL ONLY signs on the doors, followed Captain John S. Oliver into the Weather Briefing Room, and then into the Flight Planning Room. No one said anything, of course. The only people in the Army who dare ask general officers what they are doing are other general officers.
Rand listened intently as an Air Force master sergeant delivered his assessment of the weather to be encountered between Cairns and Lawson, and he even glanced over Olivers shoulders as Oliver took notes. "We're above minimums, Sir," Oliver explained, I think we'll file an instrument flight plan anyway.âť
On the rotor-head assembly itself, Oliver saw the now empty bolt holes where the rotor blades had been fastened to the assembly, four bolts for each blade. The bolt holes for two of the three blades were perfectly round. Where the third rotor blade had been mounted, two bolt holes were battered, twisted, elongated, and tom. The other two were round. What had happened, obviously, was that two bolts had lost their nuts and then vibrated out of their holes. And that allowed that blade to wobble, and the strain had been too great for the assembly; the remaining bolts had tom free.
It had all happened in probably no more than a couple of seconds. By the time the pilots had sensed that something was wrong, the tail rotor assembly had thrown a blade; and then it started tearing itself to pieces.
What had caused the accident was a lousy nut. It had either failed from metal fatigue, or, even less pleasant to consider, it had not been safety-wired in place.
Oliver refused to consider the one other possibility, sabotage, although that was just about as likely as a criminally negligent mechanic, who would now never be caught, or a pair of nuts failing one right after the other.
"Ain't that something?" Schultz said bitterly".
Oliver didn't trust himself to respond beyond saying, "Thank you, Mr. Schultz." He went down the work-platform steps.
Bellmon met his eyes.
Is he pissed at me because of General Rand? Or at the world generally because of what we've just seen?
"Oliver," General Bellmon said, "I have just volunteered your services to take General Rand back to Benning. Any reason you can't do
that?"
"No, Sir. I'll be happy to."
"I hate to ruin your day off," General Rand said.
"Don't worry about it," General Bellmon said. "Captain Oliver gets plenty of time-off, don't you, Oliver?"
"Yes, Sir," Oliver said.
[ONE]
Base Operations
Cairns Army Airfield Fort Rucker, Alabama
1005 Hours 13 January 1964
Brigadier General George F. Rand, ignoring the FLIGHT PERSONNEL ONLY signs on the doors, followed Captain John S. Oliver into. the Weather Briefing Room, and then into the Flight Planning Room. No one said" anything, of course. The only people in the Army who dare ask general officers what they are doing are other general officers.
Rand listened intently as an Air Force master sergeant delivered his assessment of the weather to be encountered between Cairns and Lawson, and he even glanced over Oliver's shoulders as Oliver took notes.
"We're above minimums, Sir," Oliver explained.
"I Think we'll file an instrument flight plan anyway".
"Why?" Rand asked simply.
"Well, Sir, if the rubber bands break, that way Lawson will know when we don't show up when we're supposed to and can come looking for us." Rand stared at him without comprehension for a moment, long enough for Oliver to consider that his mouth had just run away with him again. Then Rand's lips curved in a faint' smile, and he mimed, twirling his finger, a small boy winding up his balsawood airplane. Then he grunted "For someone in my job, Deputy Commanding General of the 11th Air Assault Division," Rand said, "I know' damned little about flying." That's so. I wonder why they assigned you to the 11th.
"Sir, General Bellmon said you're going to go through a Blue Course," Oliver said. "I think you'll find it isn't really as mysterious as it might seem."
"You ever hear, Captain, what they say about teaching old dogs new tricks?" Rand said. "I've been feeling pretty ignorant at Benning, but in the last twenty-four hours you experts-unintentionally, of course, it's not a criticism-have really made me aware of my awesome ignorance."
"Sir, I remember the first time I got close- to an M-48, at the Armor School. I was awed. Six weeks later I could change tracks on it."
"Well, I hope you're right," Rand said.
In Flight Planning, Oliver explained each step as he prepared his flight plan. Rand seemed fascinated, but didn't ask any questions, and Oliver wondered if he was a quick learner or whether he was afraid of asking what might be a dumb question.
Ten minutes later, after Oliver had the U-8F trimmed up to climb to the altitude Atlanta Area Control had assigned Army 917, he turned to General Rand and said, "Sir, it is absolutely forbidden to permit non rated personnel to touch the controls of an aircraft in flight.' Having said that, would you like to try?" Rand smiled at him.
"I wouldn't know what I'm doing," he said.
Oliver pointed to the radio compass and then to the altimeter.
"That's our course," he said. "You keep those two needles crossed. And what we're doing-we're at fifty-two hundred feet-is climbing to ten thousand. The little airplane on the artificial horizon shows our attitude with relation to the earth. It shows we're going up. And the rate-of-climb indicator" he pointed to it-"shows we're climbing at about five hundred feet a minute. The phrase would be, 'Keep what you've got.' " When Rand put his feet on the rubber pedals and his hands' on the wheel, Oliver disengaged the auto pilot.
"You've got it," Oliver said.
He restrained the smile that wanted to come to his lips.
Rand was excited.
He didn't do badly. The altimeter crept slowly up to ten thousand feet.
"Now see if you can level it off," Oliver commanded.
The plane leveled off, then nosed down. And then Rand overcorrected and the nose went up again.
"Atlanta Area Control, Army Nine One Seven at ten thousand," Oliver said to the radio. He started to take the wheel.
Then he changed his mind.
"There's nobody up here but us," he said. "Just be a little more gentle."
'Army Nine One Seven, maintain flight level ten thousand on present course. "
"Roger, Atlanta."
"Army Nine One Seven, you may switch to one twenty one point three at this time."
"Roger, Army Nine One Seven switching to one twenty-one decimal three," Oliver said.
The undulations diminished. General Rand finally got it in straight and level flight about 9,800 feet. Oliver figured that was close enough. He adjusted the trim and retarded the throttles "Lawson, Army Nine One" Seven," Oliver said into the microphone.
"Nine One Seven, Lawson."
"Nine One Seven is sixty miles south of your station, IFR at ten. "
"Roger, we have you on IFF."
"Nine One Seven for approach and landing. We have a Code Seven aboard."
Nine One Seven, Lawson. Maintain your present heading. You may commence descent to three thousand at your option. Report when passing through five thousand. Would you care to identify the Code Seven?'"
"Nine One Seven leaving ten thousand. Rand. I spell Roger Able Nan Dog. We will require ground transportation."
"Nine One Seven, Lawson, roger on wheels for General Rand."
"Now we start to go down," Oliver said to General Rand.
"The problem with going down is that you pick up airspeed. When the needle on the airspeed indicator goes past the red mark, the wings come off. So what you do is take your foot off the gas." Rand looked at him and smiled.
"I'll do that," Oliver said as he reached to retard the throttles. "You just push the nose down a little and try to go down as fast as we came up-five hundred feet a minute."
"There's a lot to remember, isn't there?" Rand said as-he ever so carefully pushed forward on the wheel.
"After a while, Sir, it becomes automatic." Rand's reply surprised him.
"Have you got heavy plans for the rest of the day, Oliver?"
"No, Sir. I'm at your disposal."
"What about the airplane? Do you have to get it back to Rucker right away?" Oh, Christ! I'm going to spend, the afternoon giving bootleg instruction.
"No, Sir. I don't think General Bellmon is going anywhere. I'll have to call and say I'm delayed. "
"The reason I wanted to come back here is to ,brief General - Wendall, and probably General Roberts, on what happened to the Chinook. It just occurred to me that you are far better qualified to do that than I am. And we left the tech reps at Rucker. "
"I'm at your disposal, General."
"And I think maybe you should take over flying this thing again. "