after dark, and when he went below, Chantelle was waiting for him. She
stood up from the long couch under the forward windows of the stateroom.
We are under way again. Yes/he said. It's going to be all right. The
engine control was switched to automatic at nine o'clock local time that
night. The engine room personnel went up to dinner, and to bed, all
except the Chief Engineer. He lingered for another two hours shaking
his head and mumbling bitterly over the massive bearing assembly in the
long narrow shaft tunnel. Every few minutes, he laid his hand on the
massive casting, feeling for the heat and vibration that would warn of
structural damage.
At eleven o'clock, he spat on the steadily revolving propeller shaft. It
was thick as an oak trunk and polished brilliant silver in the stark
white lights of the tunnel.
He pushed himself up stiffly from his crouch beside the bearing.
In the control room, he checked again that all the ship's systems were
on automatic, and that all circuits were functioning and repeating on
the big control board, then he stepped into the elevator and went up.
Thirty-five minutes later, one of the tiny transistors in the board blew
with a pop like a champagne cork and a puff of grey smoke.
There was nobody in the control room to hear or see it. The system was
not duplicated, there was no back-up to switch itself in automatically,
so that when the temperature of the bearing began to rise again, there
was no impulse carried to the alarm system, no automatic shutdown of
power.
The massive shaft spun on while the over-heated bearing closed its grip
upon the area of rough metal, damaged by the previous prolonged running,
A fine sliver of metal lifted from the polished surface of the spinning
shaft, and curled like a silver hair spring, was caught up and smeared
into the bearing. The whole assembly began to glow a sullen cherry red
and then the oxide paint that was daubed on the outer surfaces of the
bearing began to blister and blacken. Still the tremendous power of the
engine forced the shaft around.
What oil was still being fed between the glowing surfaces of the
spinning shaft and the shells of the bearing turned instantly thin as
water in the heat, then reached its flash point and burst into flame and
ran in little fiery rivulets down the heavy casting of the main bearing,
flashing the blistered paint-work alight. The shaft tunnel filled with
thick billows of stinking chemical-tainted smoke, and only then did the
fire sensors come to life and their alarms repeated on the navigation
bridge and in the quarters of Master, First Officer and Chief Engineer.
But the great engine was still pounding along at 70% of power, and the
shaft still turned in the disintegrating bearing, smearing heat-softened
metal, buckling and distorting under unbearable strains.
The Chief Engineer was the first to reach the central console in the
engine control room, and without orders from the bridge he began
emergency shut-down of all systems.
It was another hour before the team under the direction of the First
Officer had the fire in the shaft tunnel under control. They used
carbon dioxide gas to smother the burning paint and oil, for cold water
