Armageddon_ A Novel of Berlin - Leon Uris [264]
Stan intoned the check list.
“Nose wheel.”
“Centered.”
“Parking brake.”
“Set.”
At a three-minute interval the second bird disappeared into the gray overcast.
“RPM.”
“Eight hundred.”
“Fuel pressure.”
“Seventeen.”
“Oil pressure.”
“Seventy.”
Nick told Clint Loveless to buckle in because it was going to be rough. Clint hated it. Nick plugged into a jack and gave the general a pair of ear phones.
“Main tanks.”
“On.”
“Booster pumps.”
“High.”
“Cowl flaps.”
“Trail.”
“Generators.”
“On.”
Nick pushed against the windows to make certain they were locked. They were, but they were leaking.
By the time Scott was nearing the end of the runway he could see that rain had slowed the interval of takeoff.
Stan called the tower.
“This is Big Easy Fifteen calling Rhein/Main Tower for taxi and takeoff instructions.”
“Big Easy Fifteen, this is Rhein/Main Tower. Bloc time is changed to zero seven three seven. Take off on runway two six. New altimeter setting is three zero, zero, zero. The time is zero seven three six, zulu.”
“Roger.”
“Big Easy Fifteen, clear to line up and hold.”
Scott coaxed the bird into position at the end of the runway.
“Big Easy Fifteen, this is Rhein/Main Tower. You are cleared for takeoff.”
As he pushed the throttle forward the multithousand-horsepower in the Pratt Whitney engines leaped to life. He felt the strain of the great engines plowing through the water and he knew he would need most of the runway.
Stan Kitchek called out the speed. At eighty Scott eased the yoke back, tilting the nose wheel off the ground.
“Ninety, ninety-five.”
Scott pulled the yoke and the bird lifted cleanly into the sky and was in an instant submerged in the weather and flying on instruments. He flew to nine hundred feet, banked south toward the Darmstadt Beacon, which his copilot had tuned in, crossed it, began his climb.
The ship bucked violently. Clint Loveless broke into a sweat. Stan asked for and received clearance to go up to six thousand feet. Scott fought the yoke as the turbulence threw the bird around, trying to gain altitude for the forty-five-mile run to the Fulda Range.
Over the Fulda Range on the edge of the Southern corridor the planes in the bloc checked their time with each other and adjusted their speed to set up the precision chain into Berlin.
He turned to a heading of 057 degrees and subtracted 10 degrees to crab into the wind, which was hitting from the northwest at forty knots and pushing him to the right of course.
Clinton Loveless wanted to die. He tried to think of other things to take his mind off his misery ... about getting back to Wiesbaden and making love to Judy. Even that didn’t help.
Nick Papas sipped coffee from a thermos, offered some to the general. He thought that two flights to Berlin today would be rougher than hell. There was a big card game on tonight in Frankfurt ... with luck he would make it.
Scott and Stan were too busy keeping the bird on course to think about anything.
Hiram Stonebraker felt it was a perfect day to try out the new ground-controlled approach system up at Tempelhof. After they landed, he planned to watch the GCA system land the next bloc from Wiesbaden, and then spend the day in Berlin with Clint on a number of problems.
Hiram Stonebraker had few flyers’ superstitions. One of them was that on each of his twenty flights to Berlin, he flew with Scott Davidson.
They reached the midway point in the 211-mile run in the corridor. While radio contact would be at a minimum, the general tapped Stan on the shoulder, took the copilot seat, and switched on the intercom.
“Good day to try out the GCA.”
“Yes, sir ... a lulu.” Scott nodded over his own shoulder. “Looks like Colonel Loveless’d rather be somewhere else.”
Clint’s chalky lips seemed to mumble prayer between the pitches and rolls.
“He’s a good engineer. He should know how safe these birds are.” Stonebraker produced a long cigar. “Mind if I smoke, Captain?”
Scott hated cigar smoke in the cabin. Nick,