Road to Ubar Pa - Nicholas Clapp [2]
March 1997
NOTE: In this journey to unfamiliar places populated by unfamiliar people, both of the past and of the present, the reader may wish to consult Key Dates in the History of Ubar, [>], and the Glossary of People and Places, [>].
I. Myth
1. Unicorns
Over Iran, December 1980 ... The small cargo plane flew on into a starry but moonless night.
"You cannot be up there," the voice crackled over the radio. "We are having a war here. You are not understanding? Yes?"
While the pilot worked the radio, the copilot tried to make some sense of the scattered lights below. Were they in southern Jordan or perhaps Saudi Arabia? No. It appeared that the aircraft had somehow strayed into Iran, which at the time was engaged in a heated war with Iraq.
"Okay, okay, okay. Got it," the pilot radioed back. With a sigh, he turned to the copilot. "We'll head west then? And sort things out." He paused. "Hopefully."
As the cargo plane banked, the flight engineer, wedged behind the copilot, checked his instruments—those that didn't have "INOP" stickers stuck to their faceplates. The oil leak seemed okay now, and the port engine wasn't overheating as long as they took it easy and held back on the throttle.
The journey had begun two days earlier in a winter storm that turned the San Diego Wild Animal Park into a sea of mud. In a driving rain, three of the zoo's rare Arabian oryxes—magnificent black and white animals with long, tapered horns—were patiently coaxed into a chute and loaded into large wooden crates. They were going home.
Once, great herds of oryxes had freely roamed Arabia. But in the early part of this century, the peninsula's bedouin began replacing their old flintlocks with accurate and deadly Martini-Henrys. A large oryx could feed a family for a month, and the hunt was exciting, a test of riding and marksmanship. Later, oil-rich princes joined the hunt, not on fiery Arab steeds but on military half-tracks fitted with heavy-caliber machine guns. For sport, not food, they would slaughter sixty or more animals in an afternoon. Until there were no more. By the early 1970s, the Arabian oryx was extinct in the wild.
Fortunately, a number of conservation groups had faced the reality that the animal was being wiped out in its native habitat and had initiated an innovative breeding program. Arabian oryxes in zoos were swapped back and forth so that a genetically sound "world herd" could be created. By 1980 there were enough animals in captivity that a few at a time could be returned to the wild.
On their journey home, San Diego's oryxes would have company: Dave Malone, a young zookeeper, and a documentary film crew, consisting of myself and my wife, Kay, cameraman Bert Van Munster, and soundman George Goen. As soon as the oryxes were secured in their crates, the clock began ticking, for it would be unwise to risk opening the crates to give the sharp-horned animals food or water. It was essential to get them to Arabia as quickly as possible.
The freeway north to Los Angeles was partially flooded and choked with traffic. The Wild Animal Park truck made it to Air France Cargo with not a moment to spare, and we and the oryxes were on our way to Paris. There we transferred to another cargo plane, flown by a pickup crew that normally worked for British Midlands. After nightfall they veered off course somewhere over eastern Turkey. The error was understandable. Of the crew, only the pilot had made the run before—once, ten years ago.
Now I was in a jump seat behind the pilot, except the pilot wasn't there. He was all but on hands and knees, puzzling with the rest of the crew over navigational charts spread out on the cockpit floor. Gazing into the night, I thought I saw something. A glint in the moonlight.