The Mysterious Tale of the Navigator.

[dodgy-alan 1,587]

It was late afternoon in November. the sun was heading downwards and the clouds building as a lone Hawk training jet screamed across the sky at 400 knots, the aircraft was on a navigation exercise and now they were heading south towards the training school at Cranwell.

The instructor was pleased, so far his pupil was doing well, they had made good progress and at this rate they should be back at base before the evening meal. He looked at the thickening cloud as it made it's way westwards towards them, something seemed a little odd with the way the cloud was forming, but he wasn't quite sure what it was.

He was still musing this when suddenly the peace was shattered by several warning lights all coming on at once, First the electronics tumbled, no gyro compass, no HUD, no computers, more and more systems were failing on the Hawk as he watched, Then the radios died leaving them with no way of contacting anyone .He could hear the pupil yelling something at him from the front but the intercom was down and the ejection screen ahead of him prevented him from hearing properly. red lights appeared all over the instrument panels, until eventually there were no electronics working at all, The Hydraulics seemed to be ok and the instructor found he was still able to control the aircraft, though she felt a bit sloppy. by some means he was still able to read the airspeed, and now the pupil had gone very quiet, it was obvious that it would be up to him, the senior officer to get them down !

He dared to glance out of the cockpit and was shocked to see that he could barely see past their wingtip, He noticed that the familiar glow of the navigation lights were also missing. he looked back inside the stricken aircraft. The engine was till running apparently smoothly but there were no instruments showing the fact, just the same dull roar from behind. It was then that he realised that not only were there no compasses working on the jet but he was not sure if the altimeter was telling the truth as it kept wavering up and down. They were down to seat-of the-pants flying.

Instinct told him they should eject, but last time he'd been able to see anything they were still out over the North Sea. He did not relish the thought of land in that in the winter. Still the engine roared away quietly.

Then out of the corner of his eye he spotted something, a shadow, getting closer on their port side, What the hell was it? suddenly the shadow manifested itself into the beautiful glorious sight of a Tornado GR4 strike aircraft, there she was, just a few feet from their wingtip, all her lights blinking brightly in the fog. From the rear cockpit, a light began to flash, it seemed to be saying something. His morse code was rusty but he worked it out quickly enough, FOLLOW ME ! He waved an acknowledgement and raised his thumb to show that he understood.

The Tornado pulled slightly ahead and for the next thirty minutes they followed her to wherever she was leading them. He made a note of her markings and mentally made a note to contact the crew as soon as they were down and to thank them, He assumed they had picked up his aircraft on their radar and as his IFF transponder was down, had closed in to investigate.

Ahead, slowly but surely the fog appeared to be thinning, then through the murk the landing lights of an airfield, but they were not yet safe, he reached down and moved the undercarriage lever, to his amazement he heard the rumble as the gear came down, but was it locked ? no way of knowing, then he tried lowering the flaps, agian they seeemed to have worked as the Hawk began to slow down. The Tornado dropped back alongside slightly, the navigator looked down below the Hawk, then made a walking motion with his hands and raised a thumb, he'd confirmed the gear was down. The Tornado pilot had now swept his wings fully forward and dropped his flaps to keep station with the Hawk, The lights of the airfield grew closer and they realised that the Tornado crew had lined them up for the approach perfectly, He began to recognise certain features on the airfield and Identified it as Conningsby, a big RAF Station in Lincolnshire. The field grew ever closer and as he brought the stricken jet in the Tornado swept back her wings, and with a roar of afterburner she was gone, dissappearing into the fog once again.

The instructor taxied the Hawk into a parking area, Ground crew came running out along with the emergency teams. He managed to shut down the engine, and unlock the canopy. Both he and his badly shaken pupil climbed shakily from their cockpit.

A car pulled up and a senior officer got out, He walked up to them, "Good Evening Gentlemen, I'm the C/O here, Just saw you land in this muck", He waved at the encroaching fog," what happened to you, no radios, no lights?" The instructor looked at him, " Sir we've just flown down from Scotland with everything gone, we thought we'd have to ditch but a Tornado found us and escorted us in, I'd sure like to thank that crew." Wow!" said the C/O , "you were lucky, did you get the number of your escort ?" Certainly Sir" said the instructor "it was..and he gave the number of the Tornado". The C/O looked at him oddly," Are you sure it was that aircraft? you'd better come with me". They got into his car and drove across to the station offices. The C/O went to his desk, rummaged through some files before pulling out a photograph, "Was this the aircraft you saw?" he asked handing them the photo.

The instructor looked at it. "Yes sir, that is the same aircraft, why what is all this about?" The C/Os face had now turned pale, " My dear fellow" he said gravely, " That aircraft was one of ours, I say Was because 3 years ago today she blew up over the North Sea just as she disengaged from a tanker, the tanker got home safely, That Tornado and her crew were never found!" Just as he said that the phone on his desk rang, He spoke briefly to someone at the other end, then said "I see, Thank you for telling us." and hung up, He turned to the instructor, "That was our fitters, they just managed to power up your trip computer, according to that ,you should have run out of fuel 45 minutes ago!"

Copywright ©Alan J Gale. 27/10/2012

[allardjd 1,853]

Well done, Alan.

John

[brett 2,316]

Excellent story Cue the Twilight Zone Music.

[hurricanemk1c 195]

That is a great story Alan! Thanks for posting - a nice talent there!

[mutley 4,498]

Nice story Alan.

[dodgy-alan 1,587]

Sorry Mike, I don't know that one, I'm more into Simon Scarrow, Steven Saylor and Bernard Cornwall. What's The Shepheard about then?

My inspiration cam from FS strangely enough, I have an AI program that flys Tornados in and out of RAF Leuchars, I was bimbling around the area in an F16 and nearly hit one in thick cloud. That was when I thought about adapting the situation and that was only a few days ago. My reasoning was that since it was coming up to Samhain (Halloween to you guys) I thought a ghost story would be appropriate.

I have no doubt there may be similar things around, I believe Alfred Hitchcock did a similar thing in a movie, but I dont recall ever reading anything like this.

[mutley 4,498]

I loved this story from John http://mutleyshangar.com/features/jda/intro.htm

[dodgy-alan 1,587]

Good Heavens, How Bizarre is that ?!! I've never heard of that story so knew nothing about it! That's spooky. They say great minds think alike ! As I said, mine was inspired by an FS near miss. Thanks for the link. that really is weird! Twilight Zone strikes again!!

[allardjd 1,853]

I loved this story from John http://mutleyshangar...s/jda/intro.htm

Wow - that's dredging up some old stuff.

John

[ddavid 149]

The old ones are the best, John!

Good piece of writing, Al' - I'd read thr Forsythe story some years ago, so thanks for bringing it "up to date".

Cheers -Dai.

[dodgy-alan 1,587]

LOL, well I hope you all enjoyed it inspite of its similarities to previous works, The fact that my effort is being spoken about in the same sentence as Mr Forsyths I take as high praise indeed. I shall have to look out for his novel and read it.