“Naw… well, yes.” Scott turned back to her, glancing at Jim, who was also standing with folded arms and a knowing expression. “I stumbled across something I thought was interesting.”
“You talking about Ms. Rosen, here?” Jim quipped.
Scott began blushing, his entire face shifting toward red as he pretended not to understand. “I… ah, thought she might be interested in this,” he said, turning to meet April’s eyes. “I was on the way back when I checked with Anchorage Radio, which is the… ah, a service they provide…”
April was nodding. “Anchorage Radio is an FAA Flight Service Station. I know. I’m a pilot, too. Remember?”
“Oh. Right. Well, I was getting an inbound briefing—”
“In the air? I thought you were supposed to do that before departure.”
The jibe stopped him cold for a few seconds.
“Ah… usually that’s the way it’s done… before leaving. But… anyway… I happened to hear about a temporary military operations area newly created not far from here, and… I just got curious, because I’ve never heard of one right along there.”
“Where is ‘there’?”
“Well, the eastern end of it is a bit southwest of where we found the Albatross, and the western end runs west of Seward.”
“They’ve got the surface all restricted to boat traffic now, Scott,” Jim said. “I’ve been on the phone all afternoon.”
“Well,” April said, “Mr. McDermott, thank you for coming back to tell us this.”
Scott hesitated, looking sufficiently off-balance to trigger a tiny spark of sympathy in April, especially when he began studying his shoes and tapping some incoherent code on the wooden dock with his sole before looking her in the eye.
“Look, April, I apologize for leaving you in the lurch.”
There was a guttural sound from Jim Dobler. “Don’t think my house was ever called a ‘lurch’ before,” he said. “Is that like a yurt?”
Scott ignored him. “We both agree something strange is going on out there but… hear me out a second. When I got into Anchorage, I went over to the FSS and did a little personal research on what was going on last Monday night when the accident happened, and guess what? The very same military operations area was created for that night, too.”
April uncrossed her arms, remembering the F-15s she’d seen landing at Elmendorf days before. “There’s an awful lot of Air Force fighter activity around here, and I’m sure there’s a lot of training going on. Why would that restricted area be connected with what happened to my father?”
Scott shrugged. “I don’t know that it is. But it’s unusual. I know the restricted airspace around Alaska — this part, at least — and this kind of sudden military-operations-area creation is very odd.”
“What are you thinking, Scott?” Jim asked.
“I’m thinking there’s a special operation of some sort going on tonight, and I’m thinking there was one on Monday night, and even if it has nothing to do, April, with what happened to your folks, it’s too coincidental to ignore.”
She was shaking her head. “Dad lost a prop blade. Either it came off by itself, which is possible, or he clipped some metallic structure below, like a ship mast. The zone you’re talking about — this new MOA — has to do with airplanes and airspace.”
“Didn’t you say you asked the Coast Guard to see a tape of their vessel traffic system for that night?” Scott asked.
“Well, sure… to see if the Albatross showed up on-screen and to check on what ships might have been coming through the area, but they haven’t performed. I figure we’ll have to sue them to get that information.”
“April, stop and think about this. The Coast Guard charged in and took those tapes. That sort of thing just doesn’t happen unless there’s a military operation of some sort going on, and it may well be connected with these restricted areas.”
“But, I don’t understand how they could connect.”
“Maybe your dad did hit a ship on the surface that was taking part in some airborne exercise. Hell, I don’t know, but I tell you, my instincts are telling me there’s a connection, and I think we should go take a look.”
“We?” April said.
“Yeah. Unless you, you know, don’t want to. There’s no charge, April. This one’s on me.”
“Either way, yes, I want to. Just sitting here doing nothing is tearing me up,” she said, suddenly realizing the import of her words and glancing at Jim, who was reflecting ever so slightly their impact. “Jim, I’m sorry for how that sounded. That was not a reference to you and all your tremendous efforts on my behalf.”
“I know.”
“It’s just the fact that together we’ve been unable to move things forward.”
He shrugged, a shy smile registering appreciation. “Glad to help, April. So, you want the generator and the camera stuff again?”
“No, Jim,” Scott answered for her. “I’m just low on gas.”
“Well, that I can change.” He started to turn to get the fuel hose.
“Jim, you want to come along?” Scott asked.
Jim shook his head. “No. I’d just be ballast.”
“Well, we’ve got about an hour of daylight left. I’ll have to land back at the airport. Would you mind picking us up in a few hours?”
“Naw, I wouldn’t mind.”
With the waters of the bay a bit more choppy than the previous afternoon, the takeoff was a series of heavy shudders through the wave tops before Scott could yank the Widgeon free of the surface, barely skimming the next swell. They climbed to the west, turning then to the south down the channel toward Bligh Reef.
“We’re going to stay low?” April asked when she finally got the David Clark headset adjusted and the boom microphone in position, barely touching her lips.
He nodded, his head on a swivel for other traffic, before looking at her. “I thought we’d stay at about five hundred feet, which should be below most of the air traffic radars. We could be seen by anything airborne, of course.”
“Like an AWACS?”
“Yeah, or those F-15s you were mentioning. I’ve got the restricted area figured out on my GPS screen. I thought we’d drag the eastern side of it before the light fades and see if there’s any surface traffic.”
“How close can we get to the crash site?”
“Within two miles. It’s strange, April. The surface area the Coast Guard has declared restricted to boat traffic does not correspond with the military operations area for air traffic, except over the crash site. But there’s something else I didn’t tell you. Tonight, that military airspace is from the surface up to thirty thousand feet.”
“Okay.”
“On Monday evening, when your folks were coming through, it was from five thousand to thirty thousand feet, and if I’m calculating correctly, they flew right under it. You know what that suggests to me?”
“I think so,” April answered. “It means that between Monday and now, something has changed and they now want all the airspace.”
“And what may have caused that change is your folks flying legally right underneath their Monday-night block. The change suggests that something happened, and since we know the Albatross crashed in that airspace, it’s a pretty good bet that that’s it.”
“The connection, in other words?”
“Yes. I don’t know how. I mean, did they clip something, or did they have a mechanical failure? Either way it’s coincidental, but provocative.”
They flew in silence for nearly ten minutes as April let herself marvel at the verdant beauty of the forests lining the inlet on either side almost down to the water. The beaches were rocky and narrow here, with occasional sandy patches, but just as often a small slope or cliff marked the point where land and sea met.