“Direct Dublin thirty-two-five, Cheyenne four-six-two. Tell the tower thanks for the graveyard tour.”
“Will do.”
Static…unintelligible.
“Aircraft calling Savannah unreadable.”
“Challenger three-one-niner Charlie Bravo maintain two thousand five hundred until initial approach fix WORIB cleared GPS runway two-seven approach at Savannah, report over final approach fix SINBY.” “Two thousand five hundred until WORIB, cleared for approach, call SINBY, Challenger three-one-niner Charlie Bravo.”
Kaplan leaned back in his chair and readjusted his headset. Air traffic volume at Savannah had calmed down after the arrival rush from earlier in the morning. With St. Patrick’s Day just two days away, many revelers were already flying in for the Irish festival, among the largest in the nation. March 17th was a day when the entire city turned green in celebration. Children and adults looked forward to the excitement as the whole community, regardless of ethnic background, went into a celebratory mode. For Savannah, this time of year turned into a prodigious festival. Vendors would line the streets peddling trinkets and beads, hats and horns, and t-shirts galore, all of them shamrock green or trimmed in neon emerald
The river turned green, the fountains turned green, even the beer turned green. All of this in anticipation of the hordes of people who migrated to Savannah once a year to lavish in the traditional revelry.
What earlier seemed like an endless stream of inbounds had dwindled down to one business jet, two turboprops, and a singleengine Cessna.
A cold front had passed through Savannah overnight. The low pressure center stalled over New Jersey and shut down airports in the New England states with record snowfall and ice from Virginia all the way to Maine. Even the best-equipped airports couldn’t de-ice aircraft fast enough to allow for takeoffs, and with visibilities approaching zero, no landings were being accomplished or attempted for that matter. Hundreds of flights in and out of the Northeast had been canceled and it would be days before the airlines could resume normal operations.
Meteorologists were forecasting this freakish winter storm to stall for the next three days and anticipated snowfall in the Northeast to be measured in feet rather than inches. In its wake it left Savannah with overcast skies and exceptionally strong winds from the west. With winds calming by evening, the temperature was expected to drop, bringing thick fog to Savannah by morning.
“Savannah, Challenger three-one-niner Charlie Bravo, roger, coming up on SINBY leaving one thousand eight hundred”
“Challenger three-one-niner Charlie Bravo, roger, radar service terminated, contact Savannah tower now, one one niner point one.”
“Nineteen one, nine Charlie Bravo.”
“Mayday, Mayday, we just had an—”
“Challenger three-one-niner Charlie Bravo, Savannah.”
“Challenger three-one-niner Charlie Bravo, Savannah.”
He pressed the tower cab button and called the controller in the tower cab.
“Local,” the tower responded.
“Jerry, did nine Charlie Bravo come over?”
“Not yet.”
“Well, try him and see if he’s sitting there, will ya?”
“Okay, stand by …”
“Gregg, he’s not here.”
“Well, shit, that’s what I was afraid of.”
He turned around and stolidly called to the front line manager, “Hey Mac, I might have just lost one.”
CHAPTER 6
Jake Pendleton stood in the cold rushing water of Mountaintown Creek in Ellijay, Georgia. The pressure built against his waders, but he wouldn’t yield. He’d been stalking a rainbow trout that had taunted him for two days — he wasn’t about to quit now. Overcast skies kept the temperature pleasantly cool. A passing cold front left it breezy down in the valley by the creek where it was generally sheltered from the wind. The breeze ruffled his dirty blond hair as he watched the rapids. With each gust of wind, a weeping willow reached down to take a sip from the creek.
Twenty feet from the willow was a fire pit. Oak logs still smoldered from the fire he’d started earlier that morning. His gear bag sat atop a pine picnic table next to the pit.
A red-tailed hawk flew down from his nest across the creek, swooping toward the water in search of food. The hawk screeched, protesting the man’s presence, and then soared upward on a wind current and back into the trees.
He couldn’t see her, but he knew Beth was swinging in the rope hammock on the porch of the log cabin he’d built high above the creek. That’s where he’d left her when he started down the serpentine walkway from the cabin to the creek.
Thirty-three years old and a former Naval Intelligence Officer, Jake worked as an accident investigator at the Atlanta Field Office of the National Transportation Safety Board. Raised in the small Georgia town of Newnan, Jake had lived his life, and certainly his career, overshadowed by his father’s legacy.
Jake knew his coworkers at the Atlanta NTSB respected his intelligence. After all, he did graduate number one in his class at the United States Naval Academy with a bachelor of science in aerospace engineering and a minor in political science. But he also carried the stigma that his father, a former NTSB chairman, not only had secured him the job with the NTSB but also was instrumental in his placement at the Atlanta Field Office. It was a stigma Jake desperately wanted to destroy. No matter how good he was at his job, he wondered if he would ever be seen as anything besides “JP’s boy.”
He waded fifteen feet from the creek bank and cast a gold bead head pheasant tail fly toward some rocks to entice the elusive rainbow trout. His Sage fly rod and Tibor reel gleamed as he cast upstream past some rocks along the far shoreline. As the fly floated past him, he mended his line to ensure a clean presentation. Then, with repeated strips — slow ten-inch pulls of the line — he began retrieving the fly.
On the fourth strip, the water roiled when the trout swallowed the fly. He raised the rod tip to set the hook and the trout broke the surface of the water, trying to free itself from the hook. It was the big one, the one he’d been chasing for days.
His pager vibrated. He ignored it as he kept working the fish. The trout was only ten feet from him when it made another run for the rocks, but not before Jake caught a glimpse of the size of this fish, an easy four pounder.
The pager vibrated again. He glanced down and saw the number. It was Patrick McGill, his boss, manager of the Atlanta Field Office and a good friend. The pager was only used for official NTSB business. Any personal contact was always done via cell phone.
”I’m on vacation,” Jake grumbled. “What the hell does he want?” He ignored the pager.
He worked the trout closer to him — almost within netting distance. He patted his chest pocket, an unconscious reflex, ensuring his camera was in his pocket. This was a picture he had to have. Proof of his conquest. Lifting the rod high with his right hand, he reached behind his back for his net. As he brought the net around, the trout made a leap into the air, thrashed in the water, spitting the fly free from its mouth.
As if taunting him, the fish rolled away and slapped the surface of the water with its tail before disappearing out of sight beneath a rock. Jake stood still, staring at the water in disbelief. Robbed of his trophy trout. “Son of a bitch.”
He waded backwards toward shore, searching for any sign the trout had returned. After putting down his rod, he fumbled in his bag for his cell phone, never taking his eyes off the creek.
He pressed #3, speed dial for McGill, then pressed dial. The phone rang only once.