“NADT Test Flight One, we have an aircraft refusing to answer hails or directions at this time,” snapped the controller.
“We’ll check it out for you. We’re closer than Guard Sixteen,” he said, referring to the F-16 that had been vectored to check out the plane.
The controller hesitated but then acknowledged. Howe and Storey selected max thrust — the Hawks had no after-burners — and changed course for the intercept.
The small low-winged monoplane was flying a straight-on path toward the Capitol building. A bomb-laden plane on a suicide flight? Or a lost civilian with his radio out?
Howe’s augmented radar system painted the light plane to his right as he approached. A new controller added data about the plane. The pilot was off his filed flight plan by several miles.
Howe and Storey tried hailing the pilot on the civilian frequencies and an emergency channel but got no response. In the meantime the Air National Guard F-16 was galloping toward them with orders authorizing the pilot to shoot down the plane.
As he cut the distance between them to under five miles, Howe flipped through the radar modes into Close Surveillance to scan the interior of the aircraft.
“NADT Hawk Flight One, advise your situation,” said the Air National Guard pilot.
Howe told him he thought he could get a look at the cockpit.
“You’re not going to make it in time,” said the other pilot, who naturally assumed that Howe would have to fly alongside the other plane at very close range, matching his speed and altitude, to see what was going on.
A blue bar at the top of Howe’s radar image screen alerted him that he was now close enough to get a good view of the plane. “Interior image,” he told the computer. The two planes were still about two and a half miles apart.
The pilot was slumped over the control yoke. But there was another person in the plane.
An injured pilot and a hijacker? Or an injured pilot and a scared, nonpilot passenger.
The person in the first officer’s seat was much smaller and moved around.
The rest of the plane appeared empty.
No bomb that the gear could see.
“Guard Sixteen, pilot of target plane appears unconscious. There’s a passenger. Looks like a kid,” added Howe. “He’s light on fuel as well.”
“How the hell do you know all that?” demanded the Guard pilot.
“NADT Flight to Guard Sixteen,” said Howe, hoping his call sign would provide a clue, “I’m afraid I can’t go into details. But I do know it.”
There was a spar and a compartment behind the cockpit area painted solid by the AMV: The gear couldn’t see inside. It was possible that it was a bomb.
“NADT Flight Hawk One, Hawk Two, Guard Sixteen, we have additional data on the intercepted flight,” said the ground controller before the F-16 jock could respond. “Pilot is a thirty-four-year-old male, one passenger, ten-year-old girl, his daughter.”
“Shit,” said Storey.
“All right, let’s think on this a second,” said Howe. “How many terrorists are going to take their daughters with them on their final flight?”
“How do we know that’s really who they are?” responded Guard Sixteen.
“The person in the first officer’s seat is pretty small,” said Howe. “Yeah, it’s definitely a girl. She’s got long hair.”
Howe slid closer, riding inside twenty yards, ten, worried that the turbulence off his aircraft might upset the plane. He didn’t need the high-tech AMV system any more: He could see the girl pretty clearly through the large window in the relatively new plane. He tried to signal for her to speak, but she didn’t seem to have a headset. He tried a few times to mime that she should take her father’s, but he knew that wasn’t likely to help much. Whatever happened in the movies, in real life the odds of talking a ten-year-old into a safe landing had to be a million to one.
“How much fuel does he have left?” Storey asked.
One of the ground controllers thought he was talking to him and replied that, if the flight plan was correct, he ought to be able to fly for another half hour or so. Howe thought the estimate fairly accurate based on the scan, though it was difficult to tell without more details about the airplane and its engine.
“That should take it out of the restricted area,” said Storey.
“Then what happens?” said the ANG pilot.
“I think it’s a Cirrus SR22,” said Storey.
“And?”
“If that’s a Cirrus SR22, it has a parachute,” explained Storey. “All we have to do is get the kid to pull it when she’s clear of the capital.”
The controller confirmed that the plane was designed to carry a parachute — but added that there was no way to know if it had one.
“Where is it located?” asked Howe.
“Behind the cabin area,” said Storey, describing the compartment.
“It’s there,” said Howe. “I say we give it a shot,” said Howe. “Better than shooting down a ten-year-old kid over the Potomac.”
“Stand by,” said the ground controller.
The Capitol building loomed ahead. Two more interceptors were flying up from the southeast, along with a police helicopter.
“We have a company representative on the line,” said the controller finally. “We think it might work. Can you hang with them?”
“Not a problem,” replied Howe, exhaling slowly into his oxygen mask.
“Good advertisement for the I-MAN system,” said Storey.
I-MAN was an emergency piloting system that would allow the controls for a private plane to be taken over in an emergency such as this. It was another NADT project. Until this moment he hadn’t thought that much about it — and certainly hadn’t seen it as important or even worthwhile.
But it might be. If he took the job, he could find out. He could help all sorts of people, not just the Air Force, not just the military. It was an important job.
Just not his.
“You have to get that passenger on the radio,” said the controller, explaining that they would need to instruct her to kill the engine and then deploy the chute. Howe acknowledged, then closed in.
“Radio,” he said, miming how she should take the headset from her father and put it on. It took several tries before she finally got it. But she still didn’t acknowledge the broadcasts.
“Wave your hand if you hear us,” said Howe.
She did.
“Okay, ground,” said Howe. “For some reason she’s not transmitting, but she can definitely hear. Do we have an easy place to land ahead somewhere?”
The controller mapped a spot in Virginia. They were a good ten minutes from it when the aircraft’s engine began to cough. That at least solved one problem: They didn’t have to tell her how to cut power.
Howe listened as the controller, speaking in what had to be the calmest voice he’d ever heard, told her to tug on the emergency handle. It took forty pounds of pressure to pull the lever; Howe watched anxiously as the girl pulled down with all her weight.
Nothing happened for a second. And then the panel at the rear of the cockpit seemed to mushroom upward. The parachute appeared as if it had come down from above, snagging the aircraft in a harness. The airplane slowed abruptly and Howe lost sight of it for a moment as he banked to the north. By the time he came around, the Cirrus was descending calmly toward the ground, more like a balloon than a skydiver. It landed against a patch of trees near a baseball field; a Coast Guard helicopter that had been scrambled as part of the rescue effort closed in.
“Time for lunch, Colonel,” said Storey.
His flight suit was soaked. He’d been sweating his brains out, worried about the kid and her father.
“Colonel, we going home?” asked Storey. “We’re, uh, getting low on fuel ourselves.”