(Originally published March 2015.)

                                     Did He Say Bomb?

 

 Tuesday, the 22^nd of November, 1994, dawned cold, with drizzling rain, and generally just plain awful conditions. It was two days prior to Thanksgiving, and the weather that day in the sprawling city of Memphis portended a wet holiday season (Elvis would do something about it…if only he were not dead).  First Officer Terry looked at me and asked, “Bill, do you want the engine heat on?” “Yeah, it’s below 10 degrees C, let’s turn it on…Ken, would you make the EPR corrections on the take-off data card?” (Exhaust Pressure Ratio…essentially, the gauges we use to set the thrust.) As we gingerly taxied out of the cramped alleyway to join the conga-line of red-tailed Northwest Airlines jets queuing for departure that grey morning, First Officer Terry and Second Officer Ken were busying themselves with their respective “before take-off” duties. I, on the other hand, concentrated solely on taxiing the aircraft without swapping paint with any of the jets jammed back in the alley with us. After a layover in Little Rock the previous night, we had flown the 20-minute flight to Memphis and were now working NWA Flight 632, destination: New York’s LaGuardia Airport. The aircraft was one of our line’s superb Boeing 727-251s, registration N298US. Save for the inclement weather, things were humming along nicely, and life was good. All this was to change in the next few moments.

As mentioned before, in aviation, one experiences many firsts. Most of these are wonderful occasions: your first solo, your first time in command of a multi-engine aircraft, your first time flying passengers for hire, your first time as an Instructor Pilot when you release a student to fly solo, etc. However, not all your aviation events are so full of joy: things like your first FAA check ride or perhaps your first in-flight emergency are decidedly not full of joy. Over the years, I have heard it said on more than a few occasions that during your career as a professional pilot, “you will experience one of everything.” Before my head would hit the pillow at the end of this day, I would be able to put a check in the box marked “Bomb Threat.” Not necessarily a good thing.

(By the year 1994, we had merged with Republic Airlines [in 1987] and dropped the “Orient” from our corporate “nom de guerre”.)

Continuing to concentrate on the taxi, I called for Terry to position the flaps to their normal take-off position of 15 degrees. Suddenly, we received a “ding-dong” chime from the Lead Flight Attendant, Rose. Second Officer Ken selected the “Intercom” button on his Communications Panel to answer it. By the tone of his voice, I could tell that it was something important (not the usual issue, like being out of Colombian coffee or the forward lavatory being backed up). My ears began to perk up. Ken’s response had them perk up a bit more. “OK, I’ll tell him, and why don’t you come on up, so he can talk to you?” He hung up the interphone microphone and turned sideways from his engineer’s panel to face me. What he uttered next would affect the lives of all 146 strangers and the crew of six for the next several hours. It came out as, “Bill, you’re gonna love this, we’ve got a bomb threat.” My “steely-eyed, squared-jawed, iron-nerved, Captain-like” response came out as, “Huh?”

Let me stop for a moment and introduce you to the cast of characters in this little “ship of fools” melodrama.

Playing the part of Captain and aircraft commander was yours truly. At the time, I was a 38-year-old, relatively new “four striper” with about nine months of experience in the left seat of the Boeing 727. I was feeling quite comfortable in the Commander’s seat, as moving from the First Officer’s seat on the DC-10 and training on the “7-2” as a Captain was like reuniting with an old girlfriend. I had crewed her as a Second Officer in my initial position as a new hire at NWA, then served as a simulator instructor and Check Airman, and flew her as a First Officer for about a year in the mid-80s. It is a tremendous machine (albeit old technology), built like a tank, and (like the old saying goes) when the “going gets tough, put me in a Boeing.”

Sitting 3 feet to my right was my trusted First Officer, Terry. A tall, handsome, gregarious fellow Texan from the bright lights of Houston. He was in his early thirties, and in another life and time, I’m convinced he would have been a riverboat gambler. His gold chains and Rolex watch were rather gaudy evidence that he had done quite well in the world of wagering; however, his mood would change as did his fortunes. This is not to say that Terry had a “problem” with gambling, but at every stop during our trips that month, he would be on the phone with his bookie. They may have been your friendly “how’s the wife and kids?” type calls, but I got the impression that he and this person were maybe a wee bit closer than he and his betrothed. A terrific pilot, full of opinions (what pilot is not?), and generally a fun guy to share the cockpit with.

Ken was even more enjoyable to have in the little room in the “pointy-end.” He was relatively new to the airline, in his fifties, sported a full head of grey hair, and had recently retired from the Navy at the rank of Captain (I’m not sure, but isn’t Admiral next?). He was cast in the role of the (older, sober, full of wisdom) Flight Engineer and took the job at Northwest basically to get out of the house and have some fun. He had done it all, and seen it all, from flying fighters off the rolling decks of aircraft carriers to serving in the Pentagon, and was now sitting behind a “wet behind the ears” new Captain at the Second Officer’s panel on a twenty-year-old airplane. His wit and sense of humor were sharp as a blade, and the fact that he had two “young pups” driving him around the system was a constant source of jocularity for him. He stayed planted rather firmly in Terry’s face (good-naturedly, of course) and kept “the kid” riled up almost constantly. (It did not help that they went out gambling on the layover the week before in New Orleans on our previous trip, and he won big on the craps table not having any idea what he was doing…..he spent the entire next day counting his $2400 winnings on his Second Officer’s table over and over again, while asking Terry “how much did you win last night?” Terry had not done well at all … I loved it.

The last member of the troupe in this episode is Rose, the Lead Flight Attendant. A wonderful lady and a true source of help during all that transpired. She was most assuredly from the “old school”, made sure her hair and makeup were always perfect, and was hired back in the days when all “good” things started with N…Nixon, Napalm, Namath, and Nicotine (probably hired back when they were known as “stewardesses”). She, too, was in her fifties, loved her job, and before NWA, she had logged many hours flying for the (now defunct) Braniff Airways. There was no mystery as to who was in charge in the back of the jet, and I was very lucky to have her aboard during all of this.

(One of the jets Northwest purchased from Eastern Airlines, N820EA. The Flight Engineers loved them because the bean-counters at Eastern forked over the extra dollars and ordered them from Boeing with “fancy” electronic automatic pressurization controllers. Our old NWA birds had none of that “new-fangled” craziness; our F/Es had to work at keeping the passengers’ ears from being a source of pain.)

With that said, the cockpit door opened, and in stepped Rose with a magazine in her hand. “Bill, I think you’re going to want to take a look at this” Since I can’t taxi and read at the same time (at least not in the confined alley we had found ourselves in), and since Terry did not have a “tiller wheel” on his side of the cockpit to steer the jet on the ground, I stopped the plane, set the brakes and took the magazine from her. It was our version of the complimentary in-flight magazine that all airlines have. You know the one; it is full of interviews with people you couldn’t care less about, blathering on about stuff you have no interest in reading about (do we really need another article about “finding yourself”?), and a crossword puzzle that Daniel Webster could not finish. On the page adjacent to our “Welcome Aboard” message from the CEO, someone wrote, “I have placed a bomb on board this aircraft. If you choose to ignore this, it could be FATLL! You choose.” Lovely, a wordsmith, a Spelling Bee champion, and a terrorist all rolled into one. Just the way to start my day.

After reading a couple of times, I decided to share it with the other two heads, who were trying to read over my shoulder. Terry’s eyes started to take on the “doe in the headlights” look, and Ken just started to smile and shake his head. Rose looked at me with an “O.K., Herr new Kapitan, now what are you going to do?” look. I had three pairs of eyes boring holes into my skull, looking for guidance, and I was desperately trying to figure out how I felt about all of this. This is, of course, “the rub” with wearing that fourth stripe. When the excrement begins to impact the proverbial fan, all eyes look to you, and you must make a plan, and it HAS TO BE right. Although this was my first experience with someone making a threat against my aircraft, I was determined to follow the proper procedures and get it right.

Since we were away from the gate, the last place that Air Traffic Controllers and the law enforcement authorities wanted us was back at the terminal, so we were committed to doing this out on the tarmac. As most of you might well imagine, the moment you mention the “B” word over any FAA frequency, telephones start to ring in offices all over America (from the local FBI to the airline, to the aircraft manufacturer, to the FAA, all sorts of folks in D.C….it gets ugly in a hurry). We are briefed, trained, and practiced at the art of what to do when this starts to happen, but it is a bit like getting pregnant; it’s no big deal until it happens to you!

We fessed up on the ATC Ground Control frequency, and that person leaned over and slammed down the big red button (I don’t think they actually have one, but it’s a cool image, right?). The first thing they had us do was to taxi out of the crowded alleyway (for obvious reasons, an explosive device detonating around all those jets, people, fuel trucks, catering trucks, etc., would be devastating). Unbeknownst to most laypeople, every commercial airport has a designated “ground zero” area for just such an aircraft (be it a bomb threat, a hijacking, etc.), and we were instructed to taxi to that spot. This area affords the best access to your aircraft, and just as importantly, it keeps you well away from anything important in the case of any collateral event (a nice way to say ‘big explosions,’ eh?). We began our taxi to that spot at the Memphis airport, while I had Terry suggest to ATC that they have the other jets on the taxiway keep a safe distance from us (none of them seemed to mind doing just that).

During the ten-minute taxi to “ground zero”, a myriad of questions began to race around in my head. Is this a “for real” bomb threat where an explosive truly is on board the jet? What will we do if we find said explosive device? Should we evacuate the aircraft? What am I going to tell the 146 customers who think we are happily on our way to New York? Will our training be sufficient to enable this emergency to unfold as we have trained for it to do? I had to come up with some answers to these questions, and do it pretty darn quickly. I began by having Rose stay with us in the cockpit for a few minutes, so she could hear what the game plan would be and thus be on the same page as the rest of us.

With the same three heads giving me “the look”, I stopped about halfway to the ground zero spot, set the brakes, and began to formulate the plan. I started by eliciting opinions about how “serious” they thought this little note might be. We all agreed that it was serious, but we all felt that it was almost certainly put there by either some snickering, pimply-faced 15-year-old or some drunken moron pissed off because we had lost his bag the last time he flew NWA; none of us was inclined to believe that “Spelling Bee” person actually put a device on the jet. We all agreed that had we had an actual “ticking thing” to look at, then we’d all be off the jet like we were shot out of a cannon! I felt very certain (and they all agreed) that this was almost certainly your basic hoax. We would treat it seriously, and we would ALL be getting off this thing shortly. Still, we WOULD NOT be conducting an emergency evacuation (invariably, someone is injured during this type of evac; breaking an ankle, etc.). Rose left the cockpit knowing how we were going to play this, so now it was time to tell the folks in the cabin that they would be a bit delayed. I picked up the passenger P.A. mic and told them what was happening, that it was most certainly a hoax (I did not use the snickering 15-year-old, or pissed off drunken moron analogy), and what we were planning to do about it.

(Since we did not have a “ticking thing” in hand, the emergency slides would be staying in their door packs. This looked like the vehicle response that greeted us, only far more law enforcement and “black SUVs” than Fire/Rescue.”)

So far, the plan had been going rather smoothly, well, as smoothly as a bomb threat can go, I suppose. The local authorities were scrambling to find enough buses to meet us at “ground zero,” deplane the passengers, take them into the terminal, and begin to brief/interrogate them. The FBI bomb team was to be on-site as we set the brakes at “ground zero,” and the NWA Memphis Station Manager was there to meet us when we shut down the engines. He was on-site to coordinate any additional needs we may have. Cool, just like in the movies.

Rose came back into the cockpit to tell me that “most of them are doing fine with all this, but one little old lady wants to know WHY we aren’t evacuating the airplane.” Really lady? Ray Charles could have seen that one coming. I stopped the jet (once again), set the brakes, and returned to the P.A. mic to explain why we were going to prevent this from turning into a “Chinese fire drill” (apologies to anyone from China reading this). Rose was doing a great job of keeping everyone in the back informed and focused on what she needed them to do, and I could not help but wonder if “Riverboat Terry the gambler” was mentally calculating our odds on this one. “Let’s see…. I’ll take $5000 on Spelling Bee Bomber to WIN in the daily double.” I was hoping that if he had to place a wager, he would at least bet on the Boeing crew. During all of this, “Admiral” Ken was a cool as a cucumber… I would have expected no less from him.

By now, our fame had spread all across the airport property, evidenced by our escort of about a million emergency vehicles (all with lights flashing). As we reached the designated spot, I brought the big jet to a final stop, set the brakes (once again), and began to speak into the P.A. mic (once again). “Folks, this is where we’ll be parking the aircraft during all of this. You will see the buses arrive very shortly. In a few minutes, you’ll be hearing us shut down the engines, the authorities will be boarding the aircraft from the stairs in the tail, and then we’ll have you deplane and wait in the terminal while we have everything checked out.” So far, so good. I glanced back at Ken, “O.K., let’s have the ‘Shut Down Checklist’ please.”

“WAIT!” (It was Terry the F/O speaking)

I won’t go as far as to suggest that “Riverboat Terry” was spending too much time in a world other than the one MOST of us find ourselves, but maybe his overactive imagination was starting to get the best of him. On our layover in Little Rock the day before, he and Ken had gone to the movie and watched the blockbuster cinematic adventure that was in all the theaters at the time. None other than the film “Speed” with Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock…you know the one with the BOMB ON THE BUS?! You can see it coming. As I was reaching for the Fuel Cut-off Levers to shut down the two screaming Pratt and Whitneys that were wailing away, sucking Jet A fuel at an amazing rate, he grabbed my hand. The look on his face was comical — if not troubling.

“What if the bomber hooked up the device to a Tach Generator on one of the engines, and when it winds down…. KA-BOOM?”

(The killer-deadly Fuel Cutoff Levers that were living “rent-free” in Terry’s head.)

I looked at him and uttered, “What? What the hell are you talking about?.”

Now his voice patterns became excited, “You know, just like in ‘Speed’… only they have to keep the bus above 55 mph, or it goes KA-blooey!”

I glanced back at Ken…his eyes were closed and he was slowing shaking his head.

“Uh, Terry, you definitely have to get out into the fresh air more often. Now, I am going to move both levers to the “Cutoff” position….and if you’re right, the next sound you hear will be your ass flying through your eyeballs. Ready?”

I could go an entire career without the chance to do what I did next. Sneaking a glance at Ken, I winked; he caught my drift and immediately became part of the conspiracy. As I lifted both levers over the “Run” detent and quickly brought them down toward the “Cutoff” position, we both let out a huge “BOOM!” (and Ken forcefully hit the back of Terry’s seat with both hands!)

Terry either almost: 1 had a small heart attack, or 2) defecated in his black uniform pants…maybe he did both. I’m not sure, but I’m certain that I hadn’t laughed that hard in a long time. It still makes me giggle a bit.

(Looking over Flight Engineer Ken’s shoulder toward First Officer Terry’s cockpit seat.)

Once firmly anchored at “ground zero,” the engines shut down, and the “Securing Checklist” was accomplished; things began to happen rather quickly. On Ken’s Second Officer panel, we were showing that the aft air stairs were unlocked, and the aft entry door was open; he uttered something to the effect of, “Elvis was in the building.” Within a few seconds, some rather stern-looking gentlemen came into the cockpit and informed me that they were the “local response team,” here to assist in getting all the passengers onto the buses and headed for the terminal. The next face I would see ended up pissing me off to no end. In walked a guy who was about as tall as he was round, and he immediately started to hit me with a fast line of “Here’s what we are going to do” (he was the aforementioned Station Manager for my line). “We’ve been on the phone with all the appropriate security folks, and have decided that this is a hoax, there is no bomb, and so we’re just going to do a quick search of the cabin, re-board the folks, then you’ll be on your way to New York in no time.”

HOLD ON THERE BIG HOSS! Wrong, buffalo-breath! This scrawny-assed (four-striped) home-boy had no intention of playing it like that. My Texas blood got a bit riled at all those “this is what you’re gonna do” type words, and I blurted out,

“Now just a minute there, cowboy. I don’t know who you’ve been talking to, and I don’t really care, but I am not taking this anywhere until every inch of this aircraft has been searched. I want every seat, every overhead bin, every suitcase, and every friggin matchstick to be searched. If that’s not good enough for you and all those folks you’ve been on the phone with, then YOU can fly it to New York…. the keys are in the ignition!”

I spun around and pretended to have something important to attend to. What kind of a moron did this guy take me for? Yes, there is no question that the note was probably a hoax, but I do not get paid to take that kind of chance with anyone’s well-being. And I did not give a rat’s ass how long it was going to take; they were going to be looking at ol’ Mr. Boeing’s airplane long and hard before I would take it anywhere. “Mr. Personality” got pretty pissed off, turned around, and marched out of the cockpit. I think Terry and Ken wanted to give me a big kiss right then and there (ugh, sobering thought).

So out into the cold, drizzling rain, we marched. Your steely-eyed, intrepid flight crew (more like cold and rain-soaked). As I spoke to the on-scene commander for the FBI, I noticed that my two stout cohorts had taken refuge in the black government Suburban (read: heated and dry) …wimps. The passengers and my three flight attendants were now safely in the terminal, so the process of turning this thing inside out had begun. The FBI Bomb Squad was on site with their two K9 companions, and were in the process of testing them before turning them loose on the aircraft (one gentleman was planting packages of C4 in an adjacent field for the dogs to individually search for and find…. if they failed, then they are not used for that mission). To my relief, they both passed their tests, and into the cabin they ran (and I do mean ran). I followed them in and was amazed to see them up in the overhead bins, rapidly moving and sniffing everything at an incredible rate. They covered every inch of the jet in no time. I have heard that a dog’s sense of smell is thousands of times greater than ours, and I was hoping that whoever relayed that little tidbit of “fun facts to know and tell” was not mistaken.

As we exited the plane, the ramp personnel had unloaded all the suitcases and lined them up neatly in several rows on the pavement. Each dog then had a turn sniffing the bags, and when they would “target” one (signified by sitting down next to it), the handler would remove the dog from the area. The ramp folks would then play “shuffle the suitcases,” and the dog would return to do more sniffing. This went on for quite some time, and BOTH dogs ended up targeting the same three suitcases each time! Oh, oh…. not looking good for the home team. I noticed that “Mr. Personality” had changed his tune. He said to me, “Maybe it WAS a good idea to have them search everything.”…. brilliant statement there, Sherlock Holmes!

(One of the most beautiful commercial jets ever conceived. Aerial artistry to be sure…plus a joy to fly.)

The FBI agents swung into high gear. They headed for the terminal, rounded up the folks that owned the three suspicious pieces of luggage, and back to the jet they came. Each one was asked to open the offending bag and display its contents, and they did one by one. The first was an elderly gentleman who had a butane hand warmer in his bag (good pooch, smelling that butane). The next was a lady from Korea, and she had some cooking spices packed in her suitcase (poor dogs had probably never sniffed Kimchi before…been there, done that). The last was a lady who looked to be in her twenties (I do not even want to think about what they sniffed in her suitcase). When they were examining it, I was talking to the “fingerprint expert” about the prints of Rose and me on the magazine. Since I had never heard a “Freeze, FBI!”, I assumed that the young lady’s contents were okay. All that was left now was to load everything (and everyone) back onboard, and away we’d go.

So, after our 3+ hour delay, everyone (minus one lady who did not want to have anything more to do with my operation that day) got back on the jet, and we began the process of taking 175,000 pounds of metal and people into low Earth orbit. The passengers all seemed to be in a rather “who gives a damn” mood after all of this, and we flew the next two hours without one bad comment about the entire episode (they were, after all, New Yorkers). The weather cleared over eastern Tennessee, and we sailed into LaGuardia without incident. Well, almost without incident.

For those of you who have never landed at the “mess” called La Guardia Airport, let me describe it for you. It was built back in the Roosevelt era (or perhaps even in the caveman era), on a sandbar in the middle of Flushing Bay. It has two short runways (by transport category jet standards), and if you run off the end of them, one ends with a trip onto a very busy freeway, while the other ends with a journey into the water. In my opinion, this place was obsolete the moment the first DC-4 landed there, and it has only deteriorated since then. The volume of traffic is insane, the ramp areas are nightmarish, and the NYC “attitude” (regarding the ATC people) adds to the level of tension. In a nutshell, when landing at this place, finesse is not in the cards; you drive the jet in, slam it on the runway, and do your best to get it stopped quickly. By the way, it’s the same as the “technique” you use landing at the other two really “interesting” airports that accept big airliners: Washington’s Ronald Reagan and San Diego’s Lindbergh Field. I was to perfect this to an art form on this very day.

(The approach plate for the “Expressway Visual” approach to runway 31 into La Guardia.)

The “Expressway Visual 31” approach went off without a hitch. Hell, the ATC people did not even yell at us once (a first, on occasion, I have heard them yell at EVERYONE), and the tight 135-degree turn over Shea Stadium to line up with RWY 31 came off nicely (I silently mused, “I got her wired today”…. famous last thoughts). I wish I could say it was the gusty crosswinds, or the wake from the airliner in front of us, or even that the sun was in my eyes, or that the grass was too tall…. but none of that applies. I got the beast into the flare, thought I had it just about an inch above the pavement, just ready to gently kiss the big main wheels on, when …”Uh, oh”, we dropped about five feet, and … WHAM! “Contact!” was the smart-assed response from Terry, while Ken said something about “You got the three wire (Navy carrier term), and I got whiplash!”

My pithy response? “Bite me!”

(The view from over “Flushing Meadow Park” looking to the northwest. The touchdown zone for Runway 31 is in the lower right. If you look closely, you might still be able to see the dent I put in the pavement…)

After wrestling the machine to a safe taxi speed, I turned off the runway, and we contacted Ground Control. We immediately found ourselves in line behind numerous aircraft on the taxiway, so we had some time before we reached the gate. My two “partners in crime” were still giggling and making smart-assed comments about my arrival, so I did the only thing that I could think of…. I grabbed the P.A. microphone and spoke thusly:

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. I want to welcome you to New York. Once again, we apologize for the delay today, and I would like to express our sincere gratitude for your patience. Also, if you were wondering about the “firm” landing, that was just one more effort on my part to find out CONCLUSIVELY if we had any explosive devices on this aircraft…. for if there was anything hidden onboard, it SURELY would have gone off with that landing.”

After hanging up the mic, I was greeted by two faces sporting huge smiles.

However, it was what I was hearing from the cabin that made the day for me — the sound of laughter and applause.

‘till next time,

BBall