“Make it so,” Jake said, mimicking Captain Picard of
As WOC Lewis started his descent, Jake saw a flock of geese approaching from the right.
“Watch the geese on your three o’clock,” Jake said.
“I see them,” Lewis answered. Lewis pulled the collective to try and go over them, but the geese were making the same maneuver.
“Damn!” Lewis shouted as several of the geese collided with the helicopter. Blood and feathers from those that hit the main rotor suddenly appeared on the windshield. There was also a sudden and severe vibration at the same time they could hear the high-pitched whine of the tail rotor drive shaft spinning without any resistance.
“I’ve got it!” Jake shouted, taking the controls.
There was a loud bang as the tail rotor and a part of the tail fin separated from the aircraft. The center of gravity pitched forward and, without the anti-torque action of the tail rotor, the helicopter began to spin to the right. Instinctively, Jake depressed the left anti-torque pedal to halt the spin, even as he knew that without the tail rotor, it would be ineffective.
The spin was much faster than anything Jake had ever experienced, and earth and sky blended into a whirling pattern that made it impossible to separate one from the other.
Out of the corner of his eye, Jake saw Candidate Lewis start to grab the cyclic.
“Hands off !” Jake screamed.
They were about seventy-five feet above ground and had already spun around at least fifteen times. Jake knew he needed to kill the engines in order to lessen the torque, but the engine controls were on the cockpit roof and he had to fight the centrifugal force in order to get his arm up. Finally he managed to kill both engines. The whirling main rotor blades continued to generate torque but, mercifully, without the engines, the spinning slowed.
Then, just before impact, Jake jerked back on the cyclic and the nose of the helicopter came up. Now, with the spin rate down to half what it had been, and with the helicopter level, the Blackhawk made a hard but somewhat controlled landing.
Jake sat in his seat with dust streaming up around the helicopter and the rotor blades still spinning. He waited until the spinning was slow enough that he knew they would not generate lift, then pulled the collective up, putting enough pitch in the blades to slow them until they finally stopped.
“Are you okay?” Jake asked.
“What the hell happened?” Candidate Lewis asked.
“You got hit by an RPG,” Jake said.
“What?”
“A goose, or some geese, took out the tail rotor,” Jake said. “It was the same effect as being hit by an RPG.”
“Damn. I’m glad I wasn’t flying solo,” Lewis said.
“Funny you would say that,” Jake said. “I was just thinking I wish the hell you had been flying solo.”
Although neither pilot was hurt, they were required by SOP to report to the hospital for a physical evaluation. Jake was in the examining room, just zipping his flight suit closed when Karin came in with a worried look on her face.
“I heard you were in a crash!” she said, the tone of her voice reflecting her worry.
“I resent that. I made a controlled landing,” Jake replied. “A hard landing, yes, but it was controlled.”
Karin threw her arms around him. “Oh,” she said. “When I heard you had been brought in I was scared to death.”
“It’s nice to be worried about,” Jake said. “But really, it was no big thing.”
“Hah, no big thing, my foot. I heard some of the other aviators talking about it. You lost your tail rotor but were able to land. Everyone is calling you a hero.”
“A hero?” Jake said. He smiled. “Yeah, I’ll accept that.”
“Well, now, don’t let it go to your head,” Karin teased. “You are hard enough to be around as it is.”
“Really? How do you manage to be around me so much?”
“Because I’m a saint. Didn’t you know that?” Karin asked. She kissed him.
“Careful. What if one of the other nurses came in now and caught you cavorting with a patient?”
“I’d tell them to get their own patient,” Karin replied with a broad smile.
“I’m off tomorrow,” Jake said. “Because of the aircraft incident, I’m supposed to take a forty-eight-hour stand-down. What about you?”
“I’m not off until next Tuesday, but I can trade with one of the other nurses.”
“Come over to the house, we’ll watch our new president be sworn in.”
The pictures on the TV screen, taken from cameras stationed all through the nation’s capitol, showed throngs of people ecstatically cheering as the car bearing President-elect Mehdi Ohmshidi drove by, headed for the capitol steps.
The television reporter was speaking in breathless excitement.
Jake was in his living room, eating popcorn and drinking a root beer as he watched the inaugural proceedings.
Jake had not voted for Ohmshidi, but then he had not really been enthusiastic about the other candidate either. His vote, as he had explained it to Karin, had been more
Ohmshidi had risen to national prominence as the federal prosecutor who tried the case against Masud Izz Udeen. Izz Udeen was an Islamic terrorist who released sarin gas into the ventilation system of Madison Square Garden, killing over seven hundred Americans.
As Izz Udeen received his sentence of death, he pronounced a fatwa against Ohmshidi and implored Muslims of the world to martyr themselves if need be in order to kill Ohmshidi. The fatwa against him, along with his successful prosecution of Izz Udeen, propelled Ohmshidi to national prominence, resulting in his election to President of the United States.
Jake watched as Ohmshidi stood on the steps of the nation’s capitol building with his right hand raised, and his left hand very pointedly not on the Bible, but hanging by his side. The chief justice of the United States administered the oath of office, then concluded with,
Ohmshidi responded with,
“Damn,” Jake said aloud, speaking to himself. “What was that about?”
Ohmshidi moved to the microphone to present his inaugural address.
