Up and Down (41 page)

“Given my vast experience with in-orbit surgery, I thought you looked in control the whole time.”

“It was easier to focus after that know-it-all flight surgeon shut up,” Landon noted.

“Well, he never actually shut up,” I clarified. “You just couldn’t hear him after you pulled off your headset. I can report that he was still talking, actually shouting.”

“I acted in self-defence.”

“Um, Landon, you should know that as of right now, no one outside of Mission Control, Launch Control, and the White House knows that you made medical history yesterday.”

“Good. Let’s keep it that way,” Landon replied.

“Sorry to disappoint you, but if Hainsworth is still doing well in about an hour, the whole world will know, complete with video, audio, and the full force of the great American heromaking machine.”

“Well, the commander fits the bill. He already looks like a hero. He’ll wear it well.”

“Hello? Earth to Landon – and for once in my life I mean that phrase in its truest sense –
you
are the hero. This is all about you, so get ready.”

“Don’t I have any say in it?” she asked. “What if I don’t want this news to be released?”

“You’re kidding, right? You can’t be serious,” I replied. “Landon, from
NASA
’
S
perspective, the most creative Hollywood screenwriter could not have come up with a better storyline than the one you’ve written in the last twenty-four hours. It’s
Apollo 13
all over again, but this time, a seventy-one-year-old Canadian bush pilot and doctor has the starring role. It’s going to be big, so you’d better prepare yourself. And no, you don’t have any say over it. Not this time, it’s too big, and it’s as good as done.”

Mission Control broke in.

“Sorry to interrupt, but Dr. Percival has another call coming in so you’ll have to terminate,” said the flight director. “It’s the president from Camp David.”

“Shit.”

I don’t think I’d ever heard her swear. I hoped it wasn’t the first word the president heard. I broke our connection in favour of the leader of the free world.

I assumed it hadn’t even occurred to
NASA
to contact the prime minister, so when Landon got on the line with the president, I called my former minister on her cellphone.

“Minister, it’s David,” I opened.

“David, I’m just heading into a meeting. What’s up?”

“I think you’re going to want to hear this.”

In under four minutes, I described the drama that had unfolded in Earth orbit the day before, and the media juggernaut that Kelly Bradstreet was about to unleash.

“Amazing. This will get the full American treatment, and the fact that she’s Canadian will be lost on the world.” The minister sighed. “They’ll turn this into a star-spangled extravaganza and the maple leaf will be nowhere in sight.”

“That’s why I’m calling,” I explained. “This is going to be huge. The Prez is on the blower with Landon now.
NASA
is going public in a big way with this in just under an hour. I think you should book the National Press Building and call a news conference for the same time. You can pipe in the live feed from the
NASA
newser, then add your praise for Landon’s heroic performance, and announce that she’ll be coming to Ottawa at the earliest opportunity following her return from space. We can give her the hero’s welcome she deserves but make it a distinctly Canadian affair. Why not give her the Order of Canada?”

“I like it. But we’ll need help,” she replied.

“I’ll brief my Turner King colleagues in our Ottawa office and we’ll help make this happen.”

“Okay, brief my staff at the same time, will you? I’m calling the
PM
right now.”

I hung up, stepped outside, and called Amanda. I went through the same incredible story with her, finishing by briefing her on my call to the minister.

“So I want us to do a three-way with the minister’s chief of staff,” I said.

“I know our relationship is going well, David, but I think suggesting a three-way with anybody at this stage is a little premature,” she deadpanned.

I put her on hold, then conferenced in the minister’s chief of staff.

Kelly dropped the big bomb at a Houston news conference with the chief of astronaut training, Scott Chandler, and the flight surgeon, Dr. Phillips, beside her. I watched the whole thing from Launch Control. Despite the
NASA
firepower at the table, Kelly was firmly in control of this story. She took the lead and welcomed the dozens of reporters in the media briefing room and the hundreds more worldwide tuning in online.

“Welcome and thank you for being available on such short notice for this emergency briefing. Over last twenty-four hours, a dramatic life-or-death story has been playing out on the
International Space Station high above the Earth. I’m very pleased to report that after some very tense moments, the danger has passed, and the crew of the shuttle
Aeres
will soon land safely in Florida. There was a medical emergency on board the
ISS
affecting the commander of the
Aeres
that could have been extremely serious. Only the skill, experience, and courage of Dr. Landon Percival, one of our citizen astronauts, saved the day, and very likely saved the life of the commander. We have pulled together an edited package of video highlights that really speaks for itself. We’ll watch it now and then throw open the floor for questions for Mr. Chandler and Dr. Phillips.”

In seven minutes, the skilfully edited video took the assembled reporters through the last twenty-four hours. It started with clips of the initial conversation the commander and Landon had with Mission Control. Then there followed shots of the crew’s preparations for the surgery under Landon’s leadership as the commander floated in considerable pain. Next, the world watched as Landon performed the first invasive surgical procedure in space. From the look on Eugene’s face in the footage, he took his suctioning duties very seriously. Finally, we saw the commander’s dramatic recovery over the course of twenty-four hours or so. It closed with video of the commander in conversation with Mission Control when command of the
Aeres
was handed back to him. It was powerful stuff. All that was missing was a moving John Williams symphonic soundtrack, but even Kelly agreed it would have been a bit over the top. But don’t think she hadn’t considered it.

The questions from the assembled reporters took over an hour to answer. But the timing of the news cycle closed it down as we were heading up to the top of the hour and live remotes and standups had to be organized to break the story. Both Chandler and Dr. Phillips tried to bask in Landon’s aura. Phillips claimed to have guided Landon’s hands from start to finish. It wasn’t long before he was forced to modify his position when it leaked that Landon had in fact performed the surgery unassisted with her headset floating well out of earshot. Scott Chandler having been opposed to the very idea of putting civilians in space, I was keen to hear how he would respond to reporters’ queries. He was very smooth and had suddenly become a staunch supporter of Landon and the Citizen Astronaut program. He beamed throughout and offered very minor variations on the “key messages” Kelly had drafted.

“Landon Percival is exactly the kind of citizen astronaut we were looking to send into orbit. Hell, if she hadn’t been on board, there’s no telling what might have happened. It’s quite possible the commander would not have made it back alive,” Chandler responded to one open-ended question. “So I’m very proud that our training program put Dr. Percival in a position to perform so well under such intense pressure.”

Yeah, right. It was all about the training. I thought back to the rigorous weeks of preparations and could not recall a single session focused on zero-gravity appendectomies.

Commander Lee Hainsworth landed the
Aeres
in Florida, five hours later. Kelly arrived from Houston on a
NASA
plane about an hour before the shuttle touched down so she could herd the largest contingent of reporters and cameras ever to record a shuttle landing. She brought Dr. Phillips along with her. The
Aeres
circled high above the tarmac bleeding off speed before finally diving to touch down on the runway, its drag chute then deploying to trail behind. I watched from the
VIP
viewing stand and was feeling quite emotional about it all. I had to keep blinking to deal with my unaccountably watery eyes. No one seemed to notice. The
Aeres
ended up at the far end of the runway, so I turned my attention to the large flat-screen
TV
monitor nearby.

An ambulance joined the usual convoy of emergency vehicles racing down the runway to greet the returning astronauts. Tendrils of smoke rose from the heat shield on the underside of the
Aeres
. The media hordes were not usually permitted on the tarmac but would pick up the
NASA
camera feed. But Kelly had arranged for a cordoned area a mere fifty metres or so from the
Aeres
. She was really milking this for all it was worth. After all, that was her job. Kelly herded cameras, tripods, and dozens of reporters into the area, straining the ropes that contained them. After about twenty-five minutes of shut-down procedures, a metal staircase was driven up to the main hatch at the nose. Dr. Phillips and Kelly Bradstreet were first up the steps while the director of the Kennedy Space Center waited on the tarmac below. When the hatch was opened, they disappeared inside. I assumed
Dr. Phillips was examining the commander to make sure this was indeed a happy ending.

A half-hour passed before Kelly and Dr. Phillips descended the staircase again. Kelly stood at the bottom and thrust her hand into the air to signal the media that the big entrance was at hand. She is a pro and had choreographed this moment perfectly. A few moments later, the commander and Landon emerged and waved, no doubt as they’d been instructed to. The crowd of
NASA
officials on the runway clapped along with a few reporters. The commander towered over Landon and twice reached down to give her a hug. Landon looked a little uncomfortable but seemed to understand this had to be done. I could see Kelly waving at Landon to encourage her to keep waving. With a put-upon look, Landon kept her hand moving through the air in kind of an imitation of a wave. The hero had come home.

The next week seemed more hectic than any before or during the mission. Kelly and the
TK
team in New York and Washington laid on a media tour that took Landon and the commander to all the major talk shows on
NBC, CBS, ABC
, Fox,
MTV, CNBC, BBC, CNN
, and all the rest. Landon was so grateful to have been part of the mission in the first place that she dutifully acquiesced, though she was clearly not comfortable with the adulation heaped on her and the rose petals strewn in her path. I was with her every step of the way. In fact, it
was my idea to have Commander Hainsworth display his incision to bring the ordeal alive for the audience. Letterman loved it. The commander? Not so much. Eugene Crank and Martine Juneau handled the second-tier media outlets and they did a great job. Eugene managed to make it seem that the key to successfully completing the emergency appendectomy had been his suctioning skills.