Phineas Fox. Or is it Fineas? Maybe even Ffineas?
Funny name, Phineas. Do you know anybody called Phineas? I do. Well, not personally. But by repute. Phineas Gage.
Phineas Gage is kind of famous in medical folklore. He was a US railwayman. Foreman of a gang. Not much formal education, but respected. One day he was supervising the laying of an explosive and securing it with a tamping rod. There was an explosion and the tamping rod got driven through Phineas Gage’s jaw, behind his left eye, up into his frontal lobes, and out through his skull. Miraculously he survived this horrendous injury. He even got back to work. But he wasn’t the same man. Phineas had always been a kind, gentle soul. Now he was something other. He became sour, bad-tempered, aggressive, and then violent. They say he suffered a complete personality change. He turned into something so different from what he had previously been that it was said of him he was ‘No longer Gage’.
I had no reason for doing so, but I found myself wondering if, somewhere along the line, Mr Phineas Fox had suffered a similar metamorphosis.
* * *
Saturday, April 16th, 5pm. Still banged up. Forty-one hours till my next court appearance. I was supposed to have been out in the exercise yard but apparently there were staff shortages and I just had to stay put. Next they’d be having me slopping out. What would it be like to be sent down for twenty years? I couldn’t cope. Meanwhile, best get as much exercise as I can under the circumstances. I got up and began to pace deliberately back and forth like a tiger behind my cell bars. I slipped back into my well of resource, my private memories. I went back all the way to Saturday January 9th, got back into the Cherokee Arrow up in Northland, and headed south for Auckland.
* * *
Somewhere over Kaipara Harbour under a low cloud base I picked up the Mayday call. It was so clumsily passed that I immediately knew somebody had died and somebody else, somebody very junior, had been promoted to captain.
‘This is … Jack … Apple … Zed for Zoo. Can anybody hear me?’
Young female voice with a tremor in it. It was still very early in the morning and she was calling on the unattended frequency. One one niner decimal one. She was lucky there was anybody awake at all. I might be her only hope.
‘Juliet Alpha Zulu, Echo Bravo Echo, pass your message.’
‘My instructor’s … I think he’s unconscious.’
‘Juliet Alpha Zulu state your position.’ But she had left her thumb on the transmit button. I just had to wait until she released it. I tried again.
‘Juliet Alpha Zulu this is Echo Bravo Echo. State your position.’
‘I … I don’t know.’
Time to drop the formal r/t procedures. Just have a chat. Nobody else is listening.
‘Where did you take off from?’
‘Dairy Flat.’ She’d got the hang of the transmit button.
‘How long ago?’
‘Twenty minutes?’
‘Are you in the training area?’
‘What?’
‘The local flying area. Did you take off on runway 21 and turn north?’
‘Yes.’
JAZ was a Cessna 172. I’d often flown her. She couldn’t be too far away.
‘What’s your altitude?’
‘Hang on a sec.’ If she’d picked up a bit more of the r/t lingo she would have said, ‘Stand by one.’ She was searching the instrument panel.
‘Five thousand feet.’
That was bad news. She was above cloud. Now the crunch question.
‘How many hours have you got?’
‘Six.’
That was very bad news.
‘You flying straight and level?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good. What’s your name?’
‘Nikki.’
‘I’m Alastair. Pleased to meet you.’
She laughed, a little hysterically. The fact that she pressed the transmit button and laughed made me think that maybe, just maybe, she had an outside chance.
‘Stay on this frequency. I’ll find you. I’m just going to change frequency for a sec. I’ll be right back.’
‘’kay.’
It was time to alert somebody on the ground that a critical incident was unfolding. Most private pilots in transit in New Zealand listen out on Christchurch Information. I gave them a call.
‘Echo Bravo Echo Christchurch Information, pass your message.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo overhead Kaipara Harbour, fifteen hundred feet this time. You got a fix on Juliet Alpha Zulu? I think they’re lost.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo stand by one.’
I didn’t want to tell them any more until I’d found out more myself.
‘Echo Bravo Echo we have an unidentified aircraft overhead Kawau Island tracking north at flight level five zero.’
‘That’ll be it. Any other traffic?’
‘Negative.’
‘I’ll go find them. Keep you posted. Switching one one niner one g’day.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo g’day.’
Time now to enter the murky world of IFR – instrument flying rules. I switched on the ADF, the VOR, and the DME, applied full power, and headed up towards the cloud base. I made a precautionary call on the unattended frequency, giving my situation. Then, ‘Any traffic?’
Silence.
‘Nikki you still there?’
‘Yes.’
‘How far above the cloud are you?’
‘Dunno. Maybe 2,000 feet?’
That was the first bit of good news. I wasn’t going to smack into her underbelly on the way up, and the cloud couldn’t be too thick.
‘Good. Hang in there. Shan’t be long.’
Then I lost visibility and entered the monochrome grey world of the instrument pilot. I switched my gaze from the outside world and concentrated on the instrument panel, my eyes darting back and forth between the artificial horizon, the direction indicator, the climb and descent indicator, and the airspeed indicator. Fly the little aeroplane on the dash! Keep up the scan!
I broke cloud in two minutes. I’d been climbing at a rate of 500 feet a minute. The cloud layer was 1000 feet thick. I lodged that piece of information in my memory. And I kept climbing and scanning the horizon.
There she was. About 1,500 feet above me and south-east, but heading in my direction. I kept climbing.
‘Hi Nikki. Got you. I’m in your ten o’clock, low. Be with you in a minute.’
I gained the altitude and then came round behind her and lodged into formation on her left. When you watch an aeroplane from the ground it’s just an object on the move, but when you come up close and personal and ‘formate’ like this you see the way the machine is alive to the elements, is at one with the atmosphere.
‘There you go. I’m in your nine o’clock.’
I could see her scanning round the horizon. Left-hand seat. Long light brown hair under the headphones.
‘I’m on your left.’
She looked round. I gave her a wave. She waved back. I throttled right back to adjust my speed to hers, rose above her and came down again in formation on her right. There was a bulky figure slumped in the right hand seat. That guy’s dead. I was going too fast. I throttled back further and dropped a stage of flap.
‘How much fuel you got?’
I could see her scanning the instrument panel. ‘Both tanks half full I think.’
‘Have you got the fuel cock on both?’
‘What?’
‘There’s a disc on the cockpit floor on your right with a lever. You can select left tank, right tank, or both simultaneously. The lever should be in the straight ahead position.’ I realised that the most difficult thing for me would be visualising the 172 cockpit layout while I was sitting in the Arrow.
‘Yes, it’s on both.’
‘Good. We have all the time in the world.’
‘What about my instructor?’
‘Don’t worry about him. The best thing you can do for him is to land the plane. And you will.’ I was still going too fast. I dropped the gear.
‘You done any circuits yet?’
‘A couple.’
‘Any landings?’
‘No.’
And all the time I was thinking, it’s not landing the plane that’s the problem, it’s getting under the cloud. Was there a gap somewhere? Could we fly somewhere where we’d be visual with the ground?
‘Nikki, I’m going to change frequency again for a minute. Stay on this frequency and whatever you do don’t twiddle the radio knobs. Got it?’ If we lost contact … the prospect of watching her lose control and being unable to intervene didn’t bear thinking about.
‘Yup.’
I took a deep breath and switched to 118.7. I’d already decided that Auckland International was her best chance. Longest, widest runway; best emergency facilities. It might cause major disruption to the heavy morning traffic coming in across the Pacific and down from southeast Asia, but it couldn’t be helped. I was going to call them up and present them with a fait accompli.
I was later to ask myself, why did I want to retain ownership of this problem? Was it vain cocksureness? I don’t think it was. I just happened to be in the best position to give Nikki help.
‘Auckland Tower, Echo Bravo Echo.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo Auckland Tower pass your message.’
I kept it brief. ‘Echo Bravo Echo above Dairy Flat this time, flight level 50, in formation with Juliet Alpha Zulu. Zulu’s instructor incapacitated. I will assist tyro to land. Request emergency landing Auckland.’
That’ll put the cat among the pigeons! Then we had a tremendous stroke of luck.
‘Ally?’
Only in New Zealand. John Dempster. I knew the controller. It just shows you: it pays to pay social visits to the control tower.
‘Morning Johnnie.’
‘What you up to now, Ally?’
‘Don’t blame me if an instructor dies mid-flight.’
‘How many hours does the student have?’ Dempster went immediately to the heart of the matter.
‘By the time we reach you, seven.’
The silence spoke volumes. I didn’t break it. When Johnnie came back on, he had dropped the informality and resumed formal r/t procedure. No doubt he was mindful that everything was being recorded, that there would be a debrief, a post mortem, figuratively or literally. Best make it a textbook procedure.
‘Echo Bravo Echo Auckland Tower, Squawk ident 7320.’
I dialled the code up on the transponder. ‘Squawk ident 7320. Any local Victor Mike Charlie?’ I needed a cloud break. I needed a break.
‘Negative, Echo Bravo Echo.’
‘Roger, copy that. Request heading for descent below cloud.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo, Juliet Alpha Zulu, we have a fix on you. Turn on to heading one five zero and descend when ready.’
‘Heading one five zero descend when ready. Johnnie, can you listen out on one one niner one? I need to stay in touch with Juliet Alpha Zulu.’
‘Understood. Listening on one one niner one. Good luck.’
I changed frequency. ‘Nikki?’
I could hear the relief in her voice. ‘Thought you’d gone.’
‘I’m not going anywhere. I’ve just been waking up the cavalry. Now, can you turn right? Nice and gently. I’ll tell you when to stop.’ I watched the Cessna perform a graceful rate one turn. ‘That’s very nice. And … straight and level now. Perfect!’ We were being directed south-east, so that we could descend out over the Hauraki Gulf with the Hauraki Plains ahead of us. Flat country. Sensible choice.
At least we were blessed with a still morning. Turbulence would have made the exercise so much more difficult. ‘Now Nikki, just take your hands off the control column. I want to see how well trimmed out the aircraft is.’
She did so. The aircraft remained straight and level.
‘Good. You know the trimmer wheel?’ In the Arrow it sits down by your right hip, but in the Cessna it’s by your right knee.
‘Yes.’
‘Just roll it forward a little, maybe about two inches. You’ll see the nose go down. That’s good. Hold it there.’ Now we were in a gentle descent, about 500 feet a minute. ‘Now bring the throttle back, same sort of distance, very gently.’ I’d thought to leave the throttle alone, to keep it all as simple as possible, but in the descent the revs would begin to increase and she would accelerate. Besides, it would be as well that she handle the controls she would need to use for the landing.
‘Is your mixture rich?’
‘What?’
‘The control next to the throttle with a red handle. Should be fully forward.’
‘Yes. Yes it is.’
‘Good. Now, do you know the carb air intake? Little black lever to the right of the mixture?’
‘Yes.’
‘Set it warm. Pull it right out.’
‘Okay, that’s done.’
‘Now, d’you see the artificial horizon on the instrument panel? It’s the instrument with the model aeroplane on it.’
‘Got it.’
‘Is the aeroplane sitting just under the horizon?’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘Okay, now what I need you to do is stop looking out of the window. Just fix your eyes on the artificial horizon. I want you to fly that little aeroplane. Just keep the wings level, and keep the aircraft that little bit under the horizon. Got it?’
‘Yes.’ I could hear the cautionary note in her voice, as she was exploring new territory.
‘If you need to make any adjustments on the control column, make them very very subtle. No big movements.’
Now we were about 500 feet above the eternal flat expanse of grey. We had another minute of practice run, before we had to do it for real.
‘Just put a little bit of pressure on your right rudder. See the turn and slip indicator? Keep the ball in the middle. That’s good.’
Two hundred and fifty feet to go.
‘When we enter the cloud there will be some turbulence. Don’t worry about it. Just keep your eyes glued to that model aeroplane and keep the wings level and keep the nose just under the horizon. No big movements on the controls. Light-touch regulation.’
I’d thought of positioning myself behind and trying to stay visual with her nav lights but that would be incredibly dangerous. No. She was going to have to pass round the dark side of the moon.
One hundred and fifty feet to go. Would it be best to keep talking? I decided not. ‘Nikki, I’m going to shut up and let you get on with it. Just make that little aeroplane your whole world. Keep the wings level, hold the attitude. Call me if you need me. See you on the other side.’
She tapped the transmission button in a gesture of acknowledgement. It was almost blasé.
Then we entered the grey universe where up might be down, where nothing is but what is not. I fell out of formation and turned ten degrees to the right. I clicked on the stopwatch on the centre of the Arrow’s control yoke and fixed my own eyes on the little model aeroplane. Now the aeroplane began to pitch and judder but on the whole the turbulence was gentle. I wondered how alarming Nikki would find it. But there was radio silence. Wings level on the artificial horizon, 500 feet a minute on the climb and descent indicator, air speed steady, turn and slip level, ball in the middle. A minute crept by. Then Nikki called.
‘Doesn’t feel right. I’m turning.’
She had the leans.
‘Just watch the wee aeroplane Nikki. Keep the wings level. Keep the nose down. You’re doing just fine.’
The last half minute of the descent was excruciating. The second hand of the stopwatch ticked on indifferently and edged its way up towards twelve o’clock. Nothing happened. We were still in the grey zone. Quite suddenly an image formed itself out of the greyness. It was a seascape and, ahead, the broad curve of the Hauraki Plains Coast Line. I set the QNH pressure reading on the altimeter. One thousand eight-hundred feet. I swept the horizon from right to left. Nothing. My heart began to thump.
There she was, about one nautical mile to my north.
‘Nikki, you made it.’ I tried to sound nonchalant, to keep too much of a sense of relief out of my voice. She answered with an inarticulate sob, and it crossed my mind that she probably knew she had performed some sort of miracle, and that she may have used up a large percentage of her dwindling supply of resilience. We needed to get on to the ground.
‘Nose up a little, back to straight and level.’
I could see the 172 respond.
‘Reset the throttle for straight and level, like it was before. Just an inch or two forward. Carb air back to cold. Trim back if you like. You’re a natural!’
There was no reply. I had an idea her eyes were still glued to the artificial horizon. In a minute she might freeze on the controls. I turned north and slipped in behind her and took up my formation position on her left.
‘Hiya!’ I waggled my wings at her. ‘You okay?’
There was a silence, and then she said, ‘Yes. Yes. I’m all right.’ She was back in command.
‘Okay Nikki. The hardest part is over. Let’s go to Auckland.’
‘I’ve never landed a plane.’
‘Piece of cake. The secret of landing a plane, is to try not to land it.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It’s kinda like what you’ve just done, only this time you’re not flying the wee aeroplane, you’re flying the big one. We’re going to fly down to the start of a very long runway. Then you pull the throttle back and the plane has got to land. But just keep flying the plane until she decides she’s had enough. This time the nose’ll be up. Your job is to keep the wings level. I’ll tell you when to bring the nose up. Okay?’
I decided to keep it simple. Flapless landing. The flap control in the 172 is electric and not manual and is operated by a rather pernickety flange. And the Cessna 172 is a very ‘aeroplaney’ aeroplane. If you can fly a 172 well, you can fly anything. It has been designed to have an impressive take-off and landing performance on short strips, and so it has wide control surfaces. The downside to this is that to fly it well, to control the beast, you need to take control of these surfaces. Especially the rudders. You need to use your feet. I decided not to use flap because Nicki might be overawed by the marked change in nose attitude and the need for extensive use of the trim. Keep it simple. I called Auckland, this time on 119.1. Johnnie answered immediately. True to his word, he had been listening out.
‘Juliet Alpha Zulu, Echo Bravo Echo, two nautical miles east of Clevedon, 1800 feet, inbound.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo Auckland Tower, clear to land in your own time. No other traffic. Runway 23, QFE 1002. Call at McLaughlins Mountain.’
They’d cleared the skies for us. I read it back.
‘Okay Nikki, home soon. We’ll keep it simple. Just fly the plane, like you’ve been doing. We’ll just use the control column and the rudder pedals, and the throttle. Maybe a bit of trim. Nothing much else. I’ll tell you what to do. Got it?’
‘Got it.’ There was a new resolve in her voice. She had a sense she might just make it.
‘Okay. Hold this height. Round to the right, in your own time. Very good. And … straight and level again. Incidentally, you fly beautifully.’
Now we were headed west. The Hauraki Gulf fell behind us. Some elevated ground to the north of the Clevedon Valley. A bit of turbulence – not too bad. There, just five minutes ahead of us, lay the sprawling suburbs of South Auckland. We had a bit of time on our hands.
‘Where you from?’
‘England.’
‘Which bit?’
‘Place called Bishop’s Waltham.’
‘I know it! Way down south. What do you do when you’re not flying an aeroplane?’
‘I’m in the army.’
That explained a lot. A cool head, an ability to take instructions. A professionalism.
‘What, are you a general or something?’
‘A captain.’
‘They should promote you.’
‘Tell that to my superior.’
I had a sudden intuition.
‘Not Major Forster?’
‘Well, my goodness, it’s a small world! I was only talking to him yesterday …’ I was wittering on. When you are learning to fly an aeroplane you give it your maximum concentration because you are under the impression that if you don’t, the aircraft will fall out of the sky. You don’t know that the plane can fly herself much better than you can. I could sense that the girl called Nikki wished like hell I would shut up.
‘Echo Bravo Echo Auckland Tower.’ I could hear a note of caution in Johnnie Dempster’s voice.
‘Echo Bravo Echo.’
‘Switch one one eight seven.’
‘Roger.’ Then, to Nikki, ‘Nikki, I’m switching frequency again. Back in a minute.’ I dialled up 118.7 and made the call.
It wasn’t Johnnie. It was some disembodied, self-important, pompous voice.
‘Echo Bravo Echo vacate to Ardmore. We will talk Juliet Alpha Zulu down from the tower.’
Always, the fly in the ointment.
‘Negative Auckland Tower. Estimate McLaughlins Mountain five minutes.’
‘Echo Bravo Echo you are in controlled airspace. There are procedures to follow. We have rehearsed routines. Echo Bravo Echo you are skiing off-piste.’
He was ticking boxes. I wasn’t going to waste time arguing with him. I flicked back to 119.1. ‘Johnnie, you there?’
‘Hi Al.’
‘Any other traffic?’
‘Negative. Sky’s yours.’
‘Don’t let that guy on to this frequency. I don’t want him upsetting the apple cart. If he comes on again I swear to God I’ll come up to the tower and punch his lights out.’
‘Roger copy that.’ God bless him. The best air traffic controllers are serene. The last sin is to upset somebody in a cockpit. And that guy, whoever he was, had upset me. He had introduced an element of doubt. What if he was right? What if I had bitten off more than I could chew? Was I being quixotic? It occurred to me that if this didn’t come off, if this turned into a disaster, I’d be finished. Finished with aviation for sure. The CAA would wipe the floor with me. Probably finished with medicine. It would be cast as a dereliction of a duty of care. Finished with New Zealand. I’d always be ‘the guy who thought he knew better than the pros …’ And, even on a personal level, finished. The press would have a field day. ‘The inquest concluded that Cameron-Strange was leading a deluded, Walter Mitty existence …’
I was breaking out in a cold sweat. Maybe I am on the spectrum. Wasn’t this just the sort of obsessive compulsive behaviour that people with Asperger’s had? Once they’d embarked on a mission, there was no diverting them.
To hell with it! Put it all out of your head! This is not about you.
‘Nikki, I’m back.’
No rehearsals. No dry runs. If they went badly it could only make things worse. Get it right the first time.
‘Let’s go back into a gentle descent just as you did for the cloud. Use the trimmer wheel again if you like. D’you see that conical volcano on the nose? That’s McLaughlins Mountain. That’s just to the left side of the extended centre line for runway 23. If we come abeam that at about a thousand feet we’ll be about right.’
At McLaughlins I called Johnnie. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t had an ally on the ground.
‘Juliet Alpha Zulu, clear to land, runway 23, wind, two three zero, ten knots.’
I acknowledged.
‘No further calls required. Good luck.’
Then we were heading up Puhinui Road. I positioned myself about 100 metres to her left, and slightly behind, to give myself the best possible view.
‘Carb air back to warm. Bring the throttle back to 1500 rpm … that’s good. You might want to trim back just to get the tension off the control column.’
‘Looking good.’
Eight hundred feet.
‘See the runway?’
No reply.
‘Aim for the piano keys.’
‘Power back to 1200 or so.’ She had about 75 knots. In the final approach of a flapless landing the nose attitude is a little high and forward visibility not that good.
‘Come a little round to your right. And hold it there.’ She was back on the extended centre line.
Six hundred feet. I could make out the emergency services, the crash wagons, gathered discreetly clear of the holding point on the right, behind them the domestic terminal, and beyond that the international terminal. At the far end of three kilometres of runway, the dark waters of the Manukau harbour and, on the horizon, the sharp silhouette of Manukau Heads.
Four hundred feet.
‘Trickle a tad more power off.’ If we crossed the threshold at 100 feet and 70 knots, we’d be all set up. Automatically I called the tower.
‘Juliet Alpha Zulu finals full stop.’
Then she lost her nerve. It was a cry of anguish. I could barely distinguish it.
‘I can’t do this!’
‘Nikki. Be my hands and feet for one more minute and I promise I’ll get you down.’ I had to be careful about my own flying. I had full flap, pitch full fine, gear down. It was absolutely essential that I not get in front of her, that I not lose my ringside seat.
‘Pull the throttle right back now as far as it will go.’
Two hundred feet and two hundred metres short of the piano keys. She could glide in from here. Wind, ten knots straight down the runway, thank God. A crosswind would have made it impossible.
One hundred feet over the threshold as planned. Power off. Seventy knots. I wanted Nikki to be an automaton. Like some sort of psychic medium, I wanted to occupy her consciousness and land that plane.
‘Bring the nose up, very gently, hold it there … keep the wings level …’
Fifty feet. All the runway length in the world.
‘Nose up … hold that.’
Forty feet. Thirty feet, twenty … Speed coming back nicely.
‘When I tell you, but not yet, pull the control column right back and hold it in your tummy. Do it when I say “now”.’
Ten feet, nearly at the stall. From here the aircraft might still bounce and pitch and yaw and go out of control.
Then I saw Juliet Alpha Zulu lose flying speed and sink.
‘NOW!’
It was a heavy landing but she didn’t bounce. The aircraft veered off to the left. No matter.
‘Pull the mixture right back!’ If only she could perform that last task, the engine would stop and the aircraft would come to rest.
Then Juliet Alpha Zulu swerved underneath me and was lost to my view.
‘Echo Bravo Echo going round.’ I suppose I could have landed straight off halfway down the immense runway but I elected to overshoot and come back round. I made a low-level left-hand circuit and got a good view of JAZ, now stationary on the grass, surrounded by emergency vehicles.
‘Echo Bravo Echo finals complete.’ Automatically I went through the ‘CUP’ checks. Cowl flaps checked, undercart down and locked (check three greens), pitch full fine.
‘Echo Bravo Echo clear to land. Bloody good, mate.’