‘Qantas 12 you have 6 miles to touchdown. Wind is 15 knots from the west, gusting to 20 knots. Contact the tower on 120 decimal fife when established.’
‘Qantas 12.’ The Captain reached up to change frequencies as his co-pilot prepared to land. On the ground the queue for take-off was getting longer.
‘Qantas 438, heavy, ready.’
‘Sydney Tower, G’day. Expect a delay, there are twelve aircraft in front of you.’ Even when the pressure was intense Mick Hammond was unfailingly polite and good humoured. Qantas 438 lined up behind a Singapore Airlines 747 bound for London. There were now thirteen aircraft waiting to take off and Mick glanced at the ‘Maestro Ladder’, a computerised schedule which showed the landing sequence on the radar screen in front of him. Every rung was occupied.
As the controllers battled to get aircraft on the ground, seven nondescript trucks rolled along with the morning traffic. The first truck turned into Missenden Road near Sydney University, heading for Dunblane Street. Two more trucks headed west towards the M5, destined to pair up with two others heading east on the same expressway. The last two trucks had reached their positions; one at Woolloomooloo and one on the north side of the harbour at Neutral Bay.
‘Sydney tower, Qantas 12 established.’ Mick allowed himself a smile. Inbound aircraft were stacked up like poker chips in the dark clouds above the tower and the pilot sounded a little terse. Being forced into a long holding pattern after a 16-hour flight from Los Angeles would not have improved the mood on the flight deck.
‘Sydney tower, G’day.’ Mick’s voice was calm as he looked to the south. Through the gloom he could see the powerful landing lights of the big 747. Several sets of lights were lined up behind it. Mick Hammond was about to clear the big inbound 747 when his headphones crackled again.
‘Sydney Tower, this is Lifesaver One. Request immediate departure. We have a Medical One at the Light Horse Interchange on the M7.’
Mick glanced over his right shoulder towards the heliport on the eastern side of the airfield. With a priority clearance from the ground controller, the brightly coloured red and yellow rescue helicopter was already moving towards the threshold of the east-west runway. The weather and impatient driving was being blamed for a horrific accident involving a semi-trailer, a bus and three cars at the intersection of a dozen twisting overpasses that connected the M4 and M7 near the foothills of the Blue Mountains. Seven people had been critically injured, and three of these were fighting for their lives. To clear Lifesaver One would mean it would have to cross the path of the incoming 747.
Mick weighed up his options in an instant. The 747 was just inside the separation required for the chopper to cross in front of him, but was probably getting low on fuel and to send him around again would do nothing to ease the controlled chaos in the clouds above him. Mick calmly reached towards the big console in front of him and pressed the button that connected him with one of the departure directors in the terminal control unit across the highway.
‘I’m going to clear him direct but he’ll need to stay below 3000 feet, Shelley, if you can do that?’
‘No problem, I’ll whack in a quick flight plan.’ All of the controllers were under enormous stress but they took the load off one another in whatever way they could. It was one of the most professional operations in the world.
‘Lifesaver One, you’re cleared direct to the Light Horse Interchange below 3000 feet. Rapid departure on Runway 25, Qantas 12 inbound from the south on 34 left. Winds gusting to 20 knots from the north-east, contact departures when airborne.’
‘Lifesaver One, much obliged.’ As the medevac chopper tilted forward and powered down the cross runway, Mick shot the hastily made-up flight stick around the slide that connected adjacent controllers.
‘Qantas 12, you’re cleared to land runway 34 left. Lifesaver One crossing in front of you. Rapid exit Bravo.’ Mick Hammond glanced at the needles on the weather computer on his console. ‘Crosswinds are now gusting to 25 knots,’ he added.
‘Qantas 12.’
‘Damn it.’ The captain of the Qantas 747 peered through the fast-moving windscreen wipers and the driving rain. In the distance the white lighting that marked the edges of the main runway stretched into the gloom but on the left, the lights of the visual approach system flashed in and out of sync as the onboard computers adjusted the glide path and the weather played havoc with the instrument approach being flown by his co-pilot.
‘25 knots, I’ll take her, Jim.’
‘Handing over,’ his co-pilot said good-naturedly. The two worked well together. One day, Jim thought, he would be sitting in that left-hand seat and he’d be qualified to land this baby in a strong crosswind, but not today.
CHAPTER 70
O n board the Destiny Jamal was monitoring the police channel and commercial radio. The traffic on the M5 was heavy, although moving freely, but the lead item on the 10 a.m. news bulletin was a sign of things to come. ‘In breaking news there have been reports of an explosion outside the Chinese Consulate in Dunblane Street near Sydney University. As yet there is no information on casualties but police and ambulances are on the way and police are advising motorists to avoid the area around Church Street and Parramatta Road.’ Allah be praised, Jamal thought. Hopefully the casualties would be heavy.
The driver of the second eastbound Hino checked his odometer as he entered the short tunnel that dipped down and then flattened out underneath the Cooks River. He was confident that the truck in front had already passed through on the way to the airport. It was precisely 300 metres to the point where the tunnel crossed under the middle of the river and as the number ‘3’ tumbled into position on the odometer, the driver heard the muffled roar of an explosion in the westbound tunnel next to him. Slamming on the brakes and oblivious to the small car that rammed into the rear of his truck, he raised his fist in defiance, and shouted ‘ Allahu Akbar! God is Great!’. In his last act on Earth he pressed the button on the firing mechanism. Two tonnes of ANFO exploded in a deafening roar of flame and smoke. Most of the ferocious blast was directed upward towards the roof of the tunnel, breaching it and sending a plume of debris through the river above. In both of the tunnels the desperate screams of the injured and dying, many with limbs torn from their bodies, could be heard above the roar of water pouring in. Near the exits of the tunnels, drivers and their passengers were abandoning their cars and struggling to escape the rising waters. Many of the victims didn’t make it, pushing against the concrete of the tunnel roof in a desperate search for air.
In the State Crisis Centre, Brigadier Davis, Curtis and Kate watched in dismay as the cameras switched from the shattered Chinese Consulate to the devastation in the flooded tunnels under the Cooks River, then just as quickly, the left-hand screen switched to the short tunnel under the main runway. It was engulfed in flames, flying debris and billowing clouds of black smoke.
The explosion under the runway tunnel rocked the control tower but Mick Hammond’s years of training only took a fraction of a second to kick in.
‘Qantas 12, Sydney Tower, Abort! Abort!’ but his commands came too late. The 747 had settled its nose wheel onto the runway and the Captain had already applied reverse thrust.
‘What the-’ The Captain of Qantas 12 stared in disbelief as the main runway erupted in front of him. He increased the big engines to full emergency reverse thrust and the passengers were thrown forward as the 400-ton aircraft hurtled towards the clouds of smoke. Concrete and shards of steel-reinforcing rods were raining down on the runway.