The Shark Mutiny

for a helicopter to try to reach them, since a tiny spark from the engine could ignite the gas cloud into a mountainous pillar of fire that would climb thousands of feet into the air, the heat almost certainly vaporizing the ship and the final two 20,000-ton tanks of liquid gas.

The roar of the for’ard fire way down the deck was like a 50-foot-high gas cooker, blasting out blue flame, too loud, too intimidating, to allow any question of trying to control it. Commodore McGhee ordered: “ABANDON SHIP! MAN THE LIFEBOATS PORT SIDE.”

The crew charged off the bridge. The radio operator shouted, “I’ll transmit a MAYDAY! before we go.” The rest of them made for the three big orange Zodiacs moored on their davits along the deck rails. And then Commodore McGhee saw it — the Royal Navy’s helicopter clattering toward them, low over the surface, totally unaware of the gas cloud rising up along the Bronco’s aft starboard side and stern.

The tanker’s master ordered his radio operator to open up the VHF on 16 and stop the chopper’s advance at all costs. Then he opened the door to the viewing catwalk, a white-walkway jutting over the main deck. And he raced out onto it, jumping up and down, waving his arms, yelling to the pilot at the top of his lungs in futile desperation…“STOP…FOR GOD’S SAKE STOP…PLEASE STOP…TURN AROUND…”

Inside the helicopter both the pilot and his navigator saw the Captain’s frenzied signal. The Navigator just had time to say, “Take a turn to the left here…this guy’s waving us off…. I’ll try the radio….”

But it was too late. The Royal Navy’s Sea King Mk 4, making just over 60 knots, flew bang into the middle of the rising gas-cloud, which ignited like a nuclear bomb, causing a gigantic blowtorch to rear up from off the surface of the water, roaring a black, scarlet and blue tower of fire 5,000 feet into the air.

The Navy helicopter was incinerated instantly. The Global Bronco and her crew perished in a split second, when the entire after end of the ship was enveloped by the searing near-2,000-degree- centigrade petrochemical blaze. Two minutes later there was just a blistered, white-hot steel-and-aluminum hulk, sizzling in the water, where once the mighty tanker had been. And the flames on board were dying. There was nothing left to burn, not even a coat of paint, not even an electric wire.

By some fluke of science and nature, Tank Two had held, but the aluminum of Tank One had melted and 20,000 more tons of liquid gas exploded in another deafening fireball. And the gas in the bottom third of the tank just poured out into the water, feeding the gas inferno, fueling the 200-yard-wide column of raging fire, which fought its way higher and higher as the liquid fuel flashed off into the atmosphere. Furiously hot now, sucking in oxygen and nitrogen like a tornado, it rose up thousands of feet into the clear skies. It was as if Satan himself were attempting to communicate with God.

0800. Friday, April 27.

Office of Admiral Arnold Morgan. The White House.

Washington. D.C.

Arnold Morgan was watching CNN news with rapt concentration. The destruction of a big U.S.-owned tanker, with no survivors, deep in the Gulf of Hormuz, was the lead item. Despite being six miles from Oman, and at least 40 from Bandar Abbas, the Global Bronco had very quickly become public property. Right now CNN was showing graphic pictures of the burning hulk, and its accompanying column of fire. The reporter was mentioning the overall problem, that Tank Two might suddenly blow, and for that reason no one was taking the risk of going closer.

Because the ship was well over on the Omani side of the strait, news-gathering operations were being conducted with a friendly nation, and most broadcasters and media organizations had offices and satellite facilities in nearby Dubai. Two clattering helicopters were already prowling the shore, trying to take pictures, but unable to fly in close.

The Omani Navy had two 1,450-ton guided-missile Corvettes circling the area, warning ships off, and CNN had close-up pictures of these two British-built bodyguards. There were also two Chinese-built guided-missile frigates, flying the flag of Iran, within 10 miles of the disaster.

The dimension of the story outshone the limited coverage possible at this time. And the 24-hour news station was already off-line, reporting, wrongly, the Global Bronco was still burning. It wasn’t the tanker on fire. It was the released gas in the water.

They interviewed a Royal Navy Lieutenant Commander serving with a patrol out of Dubai, who speculated it might be necessary to bang a torpedo right into the hull, starboard of Tank Two, in order to blow up the remaining liquid gas. Either that or shell the giant on-deck holding dome. “It cannot,” he said, “just be left out there, ultimately to sink and take its twenty-thousand-ton cargo with it.”

Arnold Morgan sipped his black coffee, and listened, nodding slowly, and pondering. “Now who the hell are Texas Global Ships. And what do they have to say for themselves? Come on, guys. Get some reporters on this… gimme the only information worth having…. What do the owners think of the destruction of their ship…accident? I suppose so. But if so, how? I don’t think there’s ever been a major explosion and fire on one of those gas ships… except for one in Tokyo Bay nearly twenty years ago.”

He switched off the channel, and walked over to his desk. “I wish I knew a little more about gas carriers,” he said. “They must have the best possible safety systems…hmmmmm…I suppose there’s no chance the goddamned towelheads whacked it with a torpedo, or the Iranians planted a minefield out in the exit lanes from the gulf. No. I guess not. There seems to be no suggestion of that. Still I better get Fort Meade onto it. I’d just like to know a little more about the Global Bronco.

“KATHY!” he yelled, scorning as ever the delicate little green telephone on his desk, which would have connected him to anyone in the world, including the lady right outside the door, the spectacular redhead Kathy O’Brien, who for three years had refused to marry him until he retired.

The wide wooden door opened, and she came in, shaking her head, saying she understood he would rather have a ship’s tannoy system so he could bellow at everyone at the same time, but this was the twenty-first century and normal telephones were becoming quite acceptable, and would he ever consider using one. “Darling rude pig,” she added.

“Could I have a little more coffee?” he asked, smiling. “And then I’ve got a little task for you.”

“I’m not here to do little tasks,” she replied. “Don’t you have any big ones?”

The Big Man chuckled, all five feet eight and a half inches of him. He ignored her request, and asked if she had been watching the news.

“No, but I heard on the radio about the tanker that just blew up in the gulf. Soon as they mentioned it, I guessed it would be right up there on the priority list.”

“Well, Kathy, it’s a volatile area, and we always have to guard against lunatic action by the locals…. Anyway, the ship was owned by an outfit called Texas Global Ships. I want you to locate them, and get their president on the line.”

“You have an address?”

“No. But try Information in the Houston-Galveston area. It’s bound to be down there in the gulf oil ports… you’ll find it.”

Five minutes later, she returned to tell the Admiral that she’d found it, but had spoken only to a security guard since the place was not yet open.

“What’s the name of the president?”

“Robert J. Heseltine III.”

“Call the guard back, and tell him to have the boss call the White House, right away. Give him the main switchboard number and have him put through here immediately.”

Kathy retreated, full of optimism. She knew the galvanizing effect a call from the White House can have on any American, and she was right about the guard.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Right away.”

Three minutes and fifteen seconds later, she answered her phone and a deep Texan voice said, “Morning. This is Bob Heseltine.”

She switched him through to the Admiral, who commiserated briefly about the ship, and then asked him, “Bob, do you have any reason to think the Global Bronco might have run into some form of Naval hardware down there…a mine or a torpedo or something?”

“Well, every tanker man worries about the strait, but it’s always been safe on the Omani side…We didn’t hardly get a warning from the ship…apparently, according to the Royal Navy, our operator just had time to call