“Heading one-seven-zero, Three-Four Lima.” Now they were paralleling the storm, actually flying away from their destination. If the controller was making a strong suggestion to the pilot to turn back toward Elko, this was it. But the storm seemed to know it. Now that they were on a clear avoidance track, the storm seemed to awaken, transforming into the snarling ugly beast it really was and turning to pursue. But the storm had one more trick up its sleeve first.
Frank was relieved to actually see breaks in the cloud wall and decided to steer right for them. “I can see blue skies on the other side,” he said. “We can get through this.” He tried to aim right for those breaks, but it seemed as if he was almost flying sideways. The severe turbulence was more persistent now. He heard a BEEP BEEP BEEP! and saw a yellow flashing light — the turbulence had caused the autopilot to disconnect. He grabbed the control yoke tighter and fought to maintain control. He knew enough to let the plane wander in altitude a bit and not try to fight the up- and downdrafts.
“Three-Four Lima, turn left heading one-five-zero, vectors for weather, cleared in the block one-two thousand to one-four thousand,” the controller radioed. Frank realized with shock that he was flying almost north in his vain attempt to fly through the break in the storm, but now he could see nothing but a mass of dark gray. The turbulence had eased up a bit, but now the plane was being pelted by heavy rain and gravel-size hailstones. He had no idea what his altitude was — it took every ounce of concentration to steer to the heading and keep the wings relatively level.
The storm had sucked him in with fleeting glimpses of clear skies, and now its jaws were closing fast . “Salt Lake, Three-Four Lima, this is not good,” Frank said. “I need to get out of this.”
“Say again, Three-Four Lima?”
“Dad?”
“Not now, Jeremy.”
“Three-Four Lima, Battle Mountain Joint Air Base is at your six o’clock, fifty-five miles, turn right heading one-six-zero.”
“Dad?”
“Jeremy, what is it?”
“Ice on the pitot tube!” Frank looked and found the pitot tube and the leading edges of both wings covered in ice. It was July, and Elko had to be ninety degrees when they left… how could there be ice ? Frank turned on the pitot heat, then started a right turn…
… and then a gust of wind and turbulence lifted the left wing up so suddenly and so severely that they rolled completely inverted. Frank heard someone scream… and realized it might have been himself . He fought to roll wings-level again, but the artificial horizon was tumbling uncontrollably and the turn-and bank indicator seemed frozen in a full-scale right turn. The nose shot skyward — or it might have been earthward, he couldn’t tell for sure. Pulling and turning the yoke in any direction didn’t seem to do a thing.
“Dad?” Jeremy asked.
“Not now, Jeremy.”
“But, Dad, your heading indicator, your turn-and-bank… look at your—”
“I said not now, Jeremy, I’m trying to fly.” Suddenly more light seemed to come in through the windscreen. The pilot realized that a thin film of ice was obscuring the view outside, but he could see! They were out of the thunderstorm! “Okay, okay, I got it,” Frank said on intercom. “We made it. We…”
And just then he realized that the ground was rushing up to meet them — they were in a nearly vertical spinning dive heading straight for the ground. The pilot centered the controls and shoved in the left rudder, managed to somehow stop the spin, pulled back on the power, and raised the nose almost to level… just before the plane smashed into the ground.
“Cessna Two-Eight-Three-Four Lima, radar contact lost, how do you hear Salt Lake Center?” the controller radioed. He waited a few moments, feeling his skin turn cold, his throat turn dry, and little hairs stand up on the back of his neck. “Three-Four Lima, how do you hear Salt Lake Center?” His supervisor was already standing beside him. “Shit, Bill,” he said, “I think I lost him.”
“Salt Lake Center, United Twelve-Seventeen.”
“United Twelve-Seventeen, Salt Lake Center, go ahead.”
“We’re picking up an ELT beacon on two-four-three-point-zero,” the airline pilot radioed.
The controller felt his lower lip start to tremble. That UHF frequency was the international emergency channel on which an airplane’s ELT, or emergency locator transmitter, broadcast — and ELTs automatically activated after a crash. A hand touched his shoulder — it was his replacement, come to relieve him so he could get away from the console, pull himself together, and start his grim report. “Copy, Twelve-Seventeen, thank you,” he said.
“I’ll get on the horn to the Air Force,” the supervisor said.
“No, I’ll do it,” the controller said. He threw off his headset, kicked himself out of the chair, picked up the phone between his seat and the assistant controller, and hit a red button marked AFRCC . He took a deep breath and waited for the direct line to activate.
“Rescue Coordination Center, Sergeant Goris,” came the reply from the duty controller at the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida, which directed all air and sea rescue missions in the United States. “Ready to copy, Salt Lake Center.”
“This is Adams, Salt Lake Center. Lost radar contact with a Cessna 182, five-five miles north-northwest of Battle Mountain, Nevada, in an area of heavy thunderstorms. Airliner at flight level three-five-zero reports picking up a VHF ELT overhead that vicinity.”
“We’re on it, Salt Lake,” the voice on the other end of the line said. The controller could hear an alarm sounding in the background. “Colors, fuel on board, pilot’s name, and souls on board?”
The controller picked up the flight-plan strip from its holder. “White with blue stripes, five hours, three… three souls on board,” he read, his voice catching when he read the grim number off the flight’s data strip.
“Roger, Salt Lake,” the voice said. “When do you estimate the weather will move out of the area?”
“It’s moving pretty fast and it’s not very big, just long,” the controller said. “About an hour.”
“Thanks, Mr. Adams,” the voice said. “I’m sorry. Tyndall is clear.”
“Okay, guys, this is it,” the Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent in charge, Gary Hardison, said. He was surrounded by two plainclothes agents, a team of four FBI Special Weapons and Tactics officers, and a squad of eight federal Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents, all in full body armor and tactical helmets and carrying submachine guns. “It’s the culmination of eighteen months of undercover work to get close to this gang. It all happens in about an hour.”
Hardison stepped over to a large presentation board with overhead satellite photographs of the objective and a hand-drawn diagram of their ingress plan. “Here’s the hangar where they want to make the exchange, in the middle of the first row nearest to the taxiway. Be on the lookout for planes and pilots on the airport, but the weather has been stormy, so the airport manager believes there won’t be any pilots on the airport. To be sure, he’s deactivated everyone’s gate access cards except ours so they won’t be able to get onto the airport until we’re done. We’ve verified that the other hangars are occupied, the identities of the owners have been checked, and the airport manager has deactivated their gate cards so they won’t be able to get in.