Parallax View by Allan Leverone Page A

it’s
farther away from our current position than Bangor. And that’s why I don’t want
to land there: I don’t know how much longer I can stay conscious. The way I
feel right now, our best bet is to get this Big Ugly Fat Fucker on the ground
ASAP.”
    Tracie knew the
flight commander was right. She had no way of ascertaining the extent of his
injuries, but having seen the gaping head wound, with the splintered skull
bones and massive blood loss, she realized his actions were nothing short of
heroic.
    “Bangor it is,
then,” she said.
     
    ***
     
    May 30, 1987
    11:49 p.m.
    Bangor, Maine
    Runway 17 at Bangor International
Airport stretched out in front of the B-52 like a ribbon, visible to Tracie on
this moonlit night even from probably twenty miles away. The weather was clear,
but the controllers at Bangor Tower had lit the airport up like a Christmas
tree. The approach lights glowed and the sequenced flashers stabbed through the
night, an insistent finger of light pointing toward the approach end of the
runway.
    In the few minutes
since Major Wilczynski had regained control of the aircraft, the flight had
proceeded smoothly but his condition seemed to deteriorate steadily. Blood
continued to soak the bandage wrapped around his head and now it seeped through
the gauze and ran slowly down the side of his face, disappearing under the
collar of his jumpsuit. He had stopped talking and seemed to be focusing all
his energy on landing the plane.
    He moaned softly
and his head bobbed onto his chest before bouncing back up sluggishly. He
wavered in his seat.
    “Hang in there,
Stan,” Tracie said. She squeezed his hand and he nodded weakly.
    The B-52 turned onto
a long final approach, wobbling unsteadily as Wilczynski struggled to maintain
control. He had asked for at least a fifteen mile straight-in, explaining to
Tracie that although the goal was to get on the ground as quickly as possible,
he didn’t trust his ability to get the aircraft stabilized if they turned any
closer than that. Through the wind screen she could see flashing emergency
lights lining the runway on the side closest the control tower. At least one
rescue vehicle had been placed at each runway intersection, Tracie assumed, to
provide for the quickest response no matter where along the two-mile stretch of
pavement they landed.
    Or where they
crashed.
    The wings rocked
and the aircraft shuddered, the runway sliding from left to right and then back
again as Tracie watched anxiously. Wilczynski was struggling to keep the B-52
lined up with the runway centerline. He shook his head and cursed and grabbed
the microphone. “Wind check,” he demanded, and the controller’s response was
almost instantaneous.
    “Wind
two-zero-zero at eight, cleared to land.”
    The B-52 dipped
suddenly, the left wing dropped like an elevator until pointed almost directly
at the ground. “Goddammit,” Wilczynski muttered and added power, wrestling with
the yoke and somehow straightening the big aircraft out again.
    Against all odds,
they were still lined up with the runway, but Tracie knew now they were too
high. The thirteen-thousand-foot-long expanse of pavement stretched out in
front of them, promising safety, but it seemed far below. It looked to Tracie
like they would have to drop almost straight down to avoid overshooting the
runway, and she wondered whether the injured pilot had enough left to make a
second try if they ended up too high and had to go around.
    He seemed to have
the same thought. “We gotta get this thing down, now,” he said, and
pushed forward on the yoke, pulling back on the power, forcing the bird’s nose
toward the ground. The engines quieted and Tracie could hear the wind screaming
around the air frame. She realized she was holding her breath and her hands
gripped the sides of her seat so tightly she wondered how her fingers remained
unbroken.
    The ground rushed
up at the B-52, rising impossibly fast. The lights of the tiny city of Bangor
and its