SOUTHERN CHECHNYA
The plane had already gotten outside the hangar when Ferguson heard the first rumble. There were shouts from below and explosions in the distance.
“Let’s get to the cockpit,” he told Conners. “We’ll stop the bastards from taking off.”
Conners grunted and started after him. As Ferguson began to run, he heard a sound similar to a vacuum cleaner and felt the aircraft starting to shake. The dim light narrowed. The engines whined to life.
“The door,” yelled Conners.
Ferguson tripped as he ran. He grabbed his rifle, but then stopped himself from firing as the mechanism slapped shut. They were in the dark.
“There’s got to be some sort of switch if it’s powered,” Ferguson told Conners. “We’ll get it later if we have to. Let’s try to get in the cockpit. Come on.”
Ferguson reached the wall at the front of the plane and slapped at it with his hands, trying to feel for a ladder or something that would take him up to the flight deck, which on a 747 sat at the top of the plane, almost like the second story of a two-story building. There was no ladder, and he
couldn’t find a handhold. He went to the side, found a place to climb up, but lost his balance and tumbled to the floor of the plane, smacking his head so hard as he landed that he temporarily lost consciousness.
Conners, unable to climb, felt around with his hands for a ladder or steps. As he did, he smelled metal burning. A loud secondary explosion sounded in the distance, rocking the jet.
“Get down here, you guys,” he called to the assault team, as if they might hear him over the engines on the plane. He stepped back, pulled his rifle up, and aimed it at the door. But as he started to press the trigger, the plane jerked forward. Conners lost his balance, and the three slugs buried themselves harmlessly in the material wedged along the roof of the fuselage.