Lifeboat! (6 page)

‘And the helicopter?' Macready wanted to know.

‘We'll ask Breymouth to request assistance.'

‘Right,' Macready said decisively. ‘We're on our way. Roger and out.'

Now the boys could not even see the beach for they were huddled in the bottom of the dinghy cold, wet and very frightened. Martin's tears had subsided to the occasional sniffle but he was shivering uncontrollably. The inflatable drifted north-eastwards at the rate of approximately three knots carried by the ebbing tide and pushed further by the south-westerly offshore breeze. The sea seemed, to the boys, much rougher out here. The little black-and-orange dinghy tossed and bucked and the waves slapped against the sides, splashing water over the edge and drenching the already bedraggled pair.

‘Nigel,' Martin whimpered. ‘I feel sick.'

‘Well, 'ang yer 'ead over the side. I don't want it all over me!' snapped the unsympathetic fat boy. He was uncomfortably wet and the cold was just beginning to penetrate even his extra layers of fat, but nausea—even out here on the rolling ocean—never worried Nigel.

‘Eh, I've just thought.' Excitement, hope was in Nigel's voice. ‘The lifeboat! It'll see us when it comes back.'

He was struggling to stand up, raising his arms, already convinced that the lifeboat would see him at once. ‘But we ought to wave …'

The dinghy rocked dangerously.

‘Oooh, Nigel, don't. You'll tip us over!' Martin screeched but at that second the fat boy slipped on the wet plastic and fell on to one side of the dinghy, his weight squashing the inflated side. Martin, weak with cold and sea-sickness, slithered helplessly towards Nigel, landing in a sprawling heap against him. The dinghy tipped up, the lighter side leaving the water, and the side where the two boys were dipping almost beneath the waves. Martin was wedged in the corner of the dinghy but Nigel, already half over the side, slipped backwards.

There was nothing to save him on the slippery PVC—his head and shoulders dipped beneath the water, his arms threshed and his legs flailed the air.

Martin watched in horror as, almost in slow motion, Nigel slid into the sea.

Mike Harland had discovered gliding four years ago. He had come upon it by accident. Out cycling around the Lincolnshire Wolds one summer Sunday about four miles from the village where he lived, he had been startled by the sudden appearance of a glider surging up from behind a clump of trees. Intrigued, he had pedalled towards it. Closer he could see the cable pulling the glider higher and higher, climbing into the sky at an angle of about forty-five degrees.

But how? And where?

The how was a winch attached to the end of a converted double-decker bus and the where was a disused Lincolnshire airfield which the glider club had rescued and resuscitated. Instead of the Lancaster bombers blundering down the runways and lifting reluctantly into the air, now the silent, ethereal bird-like craft skimmed smoothly across the grass and soared upwards into the sky.

Mike Harland had leant across his handlebars and stared, open-mouthed and fascinated.

He was back the following weekend determined to get a flight. He signed a form to become a day member of the Golden Eagle Gliding Club, paid his flight fee and the launch fee and went up for two separate flights of ten minutes duration with one of the club's instructors.

That was just the beginning.

Mike was twenty-three and in the final stages of becoming a qualified architect. He was not particularly tall, thin and with floppy straight mouse-coloured hair and hazel eyes, and a mouth that was a little inclined to sulkiness. It happened that he was between girlfriends at the moment when gliding entered his life and took it over.

Like all the converted, he became more fanatical about it than the original devotees. It was an expensive hobby. Sometimes he didn't eat lunch mid-week to be sure of getting a flight at the weekend, though he was careful to keep this fact hidden from his widowed mother with whom he still lived. Girlfriends of the past faded into obscurity. The only girls he even noticed were the one or two at the gliding club.

He took a course of instruction, passed all the tests, put in all the necessary flying hours and flew solo.

It was like being transported from the mundane world into a heavenly existence. Not content with just bumming around the sky above the airfield, Mike Harland became addicted to gaining as many of the awards for gliding as he could. Whilst it was necessary for him to do distance and duration flying to obtain each stage, nevertheless it was cloud flying that intrigued and exhilarated him. Whilst his club-mates flew ever-increasing distances across country, Mike's one aim was to climb higher and higher, ever higher.

And on this particular Bank Holiday weekend he had the chance—if the weather conditions were only right—to try for his first diamond badge—an in-flight height gain of five thousand metres.

At the moment when the maroons were being fired on that Saturday morning, twenty miles to the north west of Saltershaven and five miles due west inland from the coast, Mike Harland was listening to a weather report over the telephone.

The general weather forecast broadcast on the radio earlier had said ‘
… all areas dry, very warm and mainly sunny, although the sunshine may he rather hazy at times. Maximum temperatures twenty-six centigrade (seventy-nine Fahrenheit). Winds light, south-westerly …
'

But Mike needed a more detailed forecast and one specifically for flying conditions. So he phoned the regional meteorological office, who reported that there was likely to be very little or no cloud that day and consequently the freezing level would be very high, approximately ten thousand feet. The south-westerly winds would be light and variable.

It was a disappointing forecast for Mike for without the lift provided by the thermals to cloud base, it was unlikely he would be able to achieve the kind of height he needed. Still, perhaps if he could be one of the first off the ground he would have the whole day in front of him.

When Mike propped up his bike at the side of the airfield, he could see that one or two members of the gliding club were already there bringing out the gliders from the hanger. The landrover towed the office, a blue-painted caravan affectionately known as ‘the box', to the north-east corner of the field from where they would be launching today into the wind.

In one end of the caravan, positioned today to face to the south-west, were two huge lights, like searchlights, which were flashed to give signals to the winchman. Across the field, almost three quarters of a mile away, were the two buses, a double-decker and a single-decker. These had been converted to run a winch each. On each winch were two drums with a cable on each one, making four cables in all. A tractor with a frontal bar and hooks took the four cables at once across the field to the launching area and dropped them in a square marked with bollards and then returned to the buses to repeat the operation when all four winch cables had been used.

Mike joined in bringing the ready-rigged gliders out and across the grass to the east side of the field to wait in line for each launch. Several more members began to arrive, some with their own gilders packed in thirty-foot trailers behind their cars. These would need to be rigged by at least three people. Each member of the club took his turn in helping with the ground jobs connected with launching, recording, signalling and so on, and helped rig and de-rig the various sailplanes.

Mike approached the duty pilot of the day, Dave Armstrong. ‘Any chance of me being first away today, Dave? I'd like a shot at my diamond height.'

‘Ah, Mike. Sorry, but I've had to put you down for winch duty today. Chris was down to do it, but his wife rang me this morning. He's got one of these summer flu virus things. In a hell of a state, he is.'

Mike pulled a face. ‘I was hoping to get away early. There'll not be much lift today anyway and …'

‘Look, just do it for the first hour, will you? I'll get someone to take over from you at eleven and I'll put you down for launch at eleven-thirty. Okay?'

There was no arguing with Dave Armstrong, so Mike nodded reluctantly and went to the office to book his flight time. Every flight had to be recorded and each award attempt declared before take-off, and logs completed.

‘Can I book the Blanik for an eleven-thirty launch, Toby? And can I borrow your barograph, mate? I want to have a shot at diamond height today.'

‘You can borrow the barograph, Mike, but I'm afraid the Blanik's booked. Harry's instructing in it today.'

‘Oh damn!' Mike muttered. ‘What is available then?'

Toby Wingate consulted his list. ‘ The ASK 13 is the only twin-seater available. There are two single-seaters—the K6 and the Pirat.'

Mike gave a click of annoyance. ‘I don't like any of them. They don't handle like the Blanik. Oh well, book me down for the ASK 13.'

‘Right.' Toby wrote the details on his list. He looked up at Mike again and asked tentatively, ‘ I don't suppose you'd take a visitor up first, would you?' He nodded towards the window of the caravan. ‘That girl out there wants two flights. She's paid her day membership fee and flight fee.'

‘Well, I can't do both,' Mike snapped. ‘ Have a go at the diamond
and
take someone up who's likely to throw up all over me and want to come down after ten minutes, can I? Besides, Dave's put me on winch duty till eleven.'

‘Aw, come on, Mike, don't be like that.' Toby Wingate was one of those placid people who didn't seem to mind however much he was put upon by the others. It seemed, Mike thought, as if Toby spent most of his time doing the ground jobs. To Mike's idea, Toby Wingate was a fool to himself.

Mike remained silent.

Toby sighed. ‘All right then, I'll ask one of the others.'

Mike stomped away across the field towards the buses.

For an hour Mike winched other flyers into the air, watching with envious eyes as they soared off into the sky. Anxiously he scanned the cloud formations trying to plan his flight. But the sky remained annoyingly blue without any building cumulus to be seen. Every ten minutes he glanced at his watch whilst the hands crawled towards eleven o'clock.

Agitatedly he kept a look out for someone coming to relieve him on the winch and at ten minutes past eleven he saw one of the club members sauntering across the field towards the buses.

‘Come on, Dan,' Mike shouted, ‘ I've a flight booked at eleven-thirty.'

Dan grinned, but did not quicken his pace, ‘
Awf'ly
sorry, old chap. What's all the hurry?'

‘I was hoping to get a shot at the height for my first diamond.'

‘Haw, haw, medal-hunting again, are we? All right, old boy, off you scoot.'

Scowling, Mike ran across the grass towards the ASK 13 waiting next in line. He couldn't take the ribbing some of the members liked to hand out. They could not understand why Mike constantly chased all the awards available, whilst he, in turn, could not understand their being content to drift aimlessly around the sky without achieving some goal.

Quickly he carried out the routine daily check and climbed in. One of the club members held the sailplane level and after completing the cockpit checks and attaching the cable, the necessary signals were given and Mike was away across the grass, bumping slightly for a few yards until, with the aid of the flaps, the glider lifted from the ground and soared upwards. For the first hundred feet Mike kept the angle of the climb gradual but then he gently steepened the climb to the optimum angle of about forty-five degrees.

At eight hundred feet there was a sudden snapping noise and the glider jerked dramatically. The airspeed indicator began to fall anti-clockwise, though the nose of the glider still pointed upwards.

‘Blast!' Mike said aloud. ‘A cable break! The last bloody thing I want now.'

Immediately he eased the stick forward so that the nose of the plane dropped to prevent the sailplane going into a stall. The airspeed indicator began to rise again and Mike eased the glider into a normal gliding position and began to calculate whether he had enough height to make a complete circuit and bring the plane down on the launching area again.

He operated the cable mechanism to release the portion of cable which would no doubt still be attached to the plane, though from his position in the cockpit he could not see how much remained. Deciding that he had insufficient height to be able to make the complete circuit to bring him back to the launch point, he turned towards that part of the field frequently used by the glider pilots when they failed to complete a normal circuit.

Here, the field was by no means as smooth as the launching area and the glider bumped and clattered on landing, jolting Mike and almost making his teeth rattle. He brought the glider to a standstill only five feet from the hedge and for a moment he sat back in the cockpit and sighed with relief. Then the anger at being thwarted yet again in getting away early made him thump the control panel in a moment of sheer frustration.

Toby Wingate drove over in his car, jumping out and galloping towards him as Mike climbed out of the cockpit.

‘Bloody cable break,' Mike greeted him shortly.

‘You all right?' Toby panted.

‘ 'Course I'm all right, just bloody mad, that's all!'

‘Let's tow her back then, shall we?'

‘I suppose so,' Mike replied moodily, ‘ but I shan't get another launch in time today though, shall I?'

‘Cheer up, mate,' Toby said cheerfully. ‘There's tomorrow—and Monday. That's the best thing about a Bank Holiday weekend, at least we've got an extra day's flying.'

‘Yes, I suppose you're right,' Mike agreed grudgingly. ‘And damned if I'll be fobbed off tomorrow. Tomorrow I'm
first
away!'

‘It's all your bloody fault,' Blanche Milner screeched, her fists pummelling her husband's shoulder. ‘You should ' ave let the dinghy down.'