She was in charge of this. It was glorious.
Things were coming together. Once the choppers discharged their cargo, which would include state-of-the-art field communications equipment, she could really take charge of her division.
“Finally got a meteorology report, General.” Her secretary, Nelda, had been working on this task, among others, ever since she’d finally walked on base at ten o’clock that morning in mud-streaked sweat pants and her most sensible shoes.
“Can you summarize?”
“A high-pressure system will start moving through early tomorrow morning. Forecast is cooler and gusty tomorrow, followed by several clear days.”
Jessica nodded. “Good,” she said. There would be a few good days for operations, at least, though she knew that there might be problems later on. A rotating high pressure front moving over the plains would, as it passed, pull a lot of hot, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico in its wake. When this air cooled it would dump a lot of rain on the western plains, which would increase the danger of flood. But there would be at least a few days for the flooded areas to drain first. That was good news.
“Any luck getting ahold of CERI?” Jessica asked.
“Nope. None.” Nelda had to shout over the throbbing of the helicopters. One of the aspects of the Corps’ earthquake plan involved coordination with the Center for Earthquake Research and Information at the University of Memphis. CERI had not, however, been answering its phone.
Jessica suspected that the Center for Earthquake Research had been wiped out by earthquake. One of life’s little ironies.
“The city engineer’s office sent someone over to inquire about restoring Vicksburg’s electrical supply.” Jessica shook her head. “We don’t have enough generating capacity to do that.”
“He meant helping to repair the lines. We mostly get our power from that nuclear plant south of here.” Jessica stared at her. “From where?” she said.
Nelda stared back, only now absorbing the horror that Jessica felt rolling through her heart.
“But,” Nelda said, “surely it’s somebody’s job to look after the power plants.” Her eyes widened. “Isn’t it?” she said.
On the morning of Monday last the 16th inst. several shocks were felt—four have been ascertained by an accurate observer to have been felt in this city. The principal one, as near as can be collected, was about ten minutes past two o’clock, a.m. There was no noise heard in the atmosphere but in a few instances in certain situations—The shock was attended by a tremulous motion of the earth and buildings—felt by some for about one and a half minutes; by others about five; and my own impression is, that I am conscious of its lasting at least three, having been awakened from my sleep. Several clocks were stopped at two or about ten minutes after. Several articles were thrown off the shelves; crockery was sent rolling about the floor; articles suspended from the ceiling of the stores vibrated rapidly without any air to disturb them, for about nine inches; the plastering in the rooms of some houses was cracked and injured; the river was much convulsed, so much that it induced some of the boatmen at the landing, who supposed the bank was falling in, to cut adrift. The shocks in the morning were at about six or half after, one of them considerable. The vibration of suspended articles was, whenever room would admit them, east to west. Accounts from Louisiana state, that the first shock was felt about ten minutes past 2 a.m. at Black river, thirty miles distant, and at different places on the road to Rapids, where the trees were violently agitated. It was also felt on the river at a considerable distance above and below Vidalia. The shock was also felt as far up as the Big Black, and at the different intervening towns; in the vicinity of Washington the trees were observed to be much convulsed, nodding their heads together as if coming to the ground.
The thing about helicopters was the way gravity kept moving around. G forces went up, down, sideways, and sometimes in circles. The shifts from one state to the next were often very sudden. Jessica loved helicopters. But then she liked roller-coaster rides, too. She sat up front, in the copilot’s seat, where she could get a view of the world zooming past.
The pilot was happy to impress the general with a display of his skills. He skimmed his Bell Kiowa over the WES, banked, put the chopper’s nose down, and headed south. Adrenaline sang happily in Jessica’s veins.
Pity she’d never had time to learn how to fly one of these things.
“Just follow the river,” Jessica said. She watched with interest—this was the best view she’d had since the quake—as the Kiowa Warrior sped over the flat, tree-filled country below Vicksburg’s bluff. At least a third of the trees seem to have fallen. The roads were blocked with fallen timber and cut by crevasses or sudden uplifts. Of the few structures Jessica could see, most were heavily damaged, especially the larger buildings.
She clenched her teeth at the sight of the broken levees, the way the river continued to pour through the gaps. Those were USACE levees, damn it, and Corps levees hadn’t broken since the 1930s. And now when it happened, it was on Jessica’s watch.
She should have covered her ass. All it would have taken was a letter in her file, directed to her superiors, expressing concern about earthquake preparedness. “I was working on it from Day One,” she could have said, “but my superiors didn’t respond in time. And the record supports this.” Still, there was small comfort to be drawn. Jessica saw no sign of massive failure in the levees, no huge mile-long crevasses. The levees didn’t look as if they’d broken all at once; they showed every sign of having been weakened, not destroyed, in the quake. And then river water, with the weight of the whole Mississippi behind it, pushed inexorably into the levees’ weak points, strained the structures, crawled underneath to undermine the levees from below, put more pressure on them until at last they gave way. The flooding wouldn’t have been catastrophically sudden, and Jessica hoped this meant people had a chance to get away from the rising water.
It also meant that once the floods subsided, repair would be that much easier. The pilot’s voice grated on Jessica’s headphones. “There’s your power plant, General.” She looked up and saw the distinctive outline of a cooling tower rising above the trees, the graceful white double curves. But the grace was marred, she saw, part of it had peeled away like the rind of a fruit. Her heart gave a lurch. She wasn’t sure she was ready for this.
The Kiowa sped past the tower, and the pilot banked to give Jessica a view of the plant. Poinsett Landing was a wreck, most of its buildings broken, the river streaming through the wreckage. There was evidence of fire. The big black cube that held the reactor was intact, though—no shattered roof and pillar of murderous radioactive smoke a la Chernobyl, thank God—but the two big buildings leaning against the reactor, which she assumed were control structures, had clearly suffered degrees of damage. The pilot’s voice interrupted Jessica’s thoughts. “This isn’t a nuke plant, is it, General?”
“Yes. This is nuclear.”
“Should we be wearing moon suits? Shall I get us some altitude?”
“I don’t think that’s necessary.” She hoped.
“Yes, sir.”
Jessica noticed, however, that the Kiowa began to crab slightly away from the reactor complex. A little caution in the pilot’s hands. And then one of the hands pointed.
“Some survivors, General. On that little hill over there.”
The Kiowa rotated in space while maintaining its bank, and Jessica saw a clump of people—waving, jumping up and down, probably screaming their heads off—on a flat grassy hill near the perimeter fence.