The thunderstorm appeared in front of the Boeing 747 without warning. At 33,000 feet, in a calm, clear night over the Pacific Ocean three hours out of Honolulu International Airport, it should not have been there.

"It always happens during dinner," grumbled the captain of United 58, the redeye from Honolulu to San Francisco International. "There wasn't anything on the radar five minutes ago."

First Officer Jordan Cady set aside her half-eaten meal and leaned forward to adjust the weather radar display. On an otherwise black screen loomed a bright oval with crisp edges and a solid center soaked in hues of magenta, red, and yellow. A radar return of that size and color indicated an intense, isolated storm cell. "It's about sixty miles off the nose," she said.

Captain Wendt lifted his dinner tray off his lap and slid it onto the empty cockpit seat behind him. "So much for an uninterrupted meal. Get us a heading around it."

Jordan typed the request to veer off their assigned flight path to air traffic control, using one of the three cockpit keyboards. UAL 58 REQUEST 100 NAUTICAL MILES TO THE LEFT FOR WEATHER.

As the captain lifted the hand-microphone to his mouth and transmitted over the PA, "Ladies and gentlemen, fasten your seatbelts," Jordan scrutinized the radar screen. Other than the bright, multi-colored blob, periodic sweeps of green speckles showed a storm-free sky, an ideal night to fly over the Pacific.

A chime announced the incoming message from ATC: clearance to skirt the storm. The captain turned a knob connected to the autopilot, banking the 747, while Jordan lowered the lighting in the cockpit and peered into the night.

One good peek outside is worth a thousand sweeps of the radar. That was an old saying among pilots of the modern era. And it was usually right. Far below, tiny puffs of clouds glowed in the light of a quarter moon. Below the clouds, the sea was smooth. No lightning flashed on the horizon. Nor did Jordan see any towering cumulous clouds to back up the radar's warning. Yet, on the odd chance the thunderstorm was too far away to be seen or was obscured by wispy cirrus clouds, standard operating procedures dictated that they circumvent it. Common sense, too. And whatever common sense Jordan wasn't born with, she'd learned. Sometimes the hard way.

For eight years, she'd been flying around the world, and through more bad weather than she cared to remember. Even one-million-pound jumbo jets couldn't risk flying through thunderstorms. She knew -- she'd read the post-accident reports of those who'd tried. There was no faster way to end up as a smoking hole than to think you could out fly Mother Nature. Hail punched holes in hulls and snuffed out engines; lightning knocked out electrical and communication systems; extreme turbulence wrenched off wings. Jordan preferred her life to be less exciting.

A lot less.

She had enough on her plate as a single mom who juggled flying for a living with raising a six-year-old. Flying paid the bills. But every heartbeat, every breath, every cell in her body was devoted to her daughter. That wasn't to say that at thirty-two, Jordan wasn't proud of her accomplishments -- graduating flight school, getting hired by the airlines, making sure she was good at what she did -- but existing as one of the many anonymous cogs in United Airlines' global transportation wheel was fine with her. Unlike her retired fighter pilot father or her fire chief older brother, she didn't go looking for action. Dull as it sounded, glory was not her goal. Maybe the limelight might have appealed to her, once. But these days, her idea of adventure was braving the Saturday afternoon checkout lines at Costco.

The captain aligned the aircraft on a safe heading. Jordan reached for her dinner tray and balanced it on her lap. "I don't care how many times we have to go around phantom thunderstorms tonight," she said. "Nothing's going to ruin my mood. The minute we land I'm officially on vacation."

"Big plans?"

"Two weeks in paradise -- Colorado. My family owns land along the Front Range. Two hundred acres."

Brian whistled. "Ranchers?"

"Not even close. My father's a retired Air Force officer...went to the Academy in Colorado Springs, class of sixty-six. Started buying the land when he was a freshman, and kept adding acreage, a little at a time." A wry smile played around her mouth. "Until he met my mother, who wasted no time telling him he was insane if he thought she'd leave the suburbs for the wilderness. But Dad couldn't bear to part with the land. So there it sits, undeveloped. Waiting...."

For me, she mused, conjuring an image of aspen-covered foothills, the glorious backdrop to the property. By now, the slopes of the Front Range would be pure gold. If it wasn't for needing the money, she'd quit flying, move to Colorado with her daughter and never come back. Someday, she'd find a way to make that dream come true.

"So," she said wistfully, "camping's the plan. My daughter Roberta and I. Poor kid -- Boo, I call her -- stuck in the wilderness for two weeks, while I drone on and on about the ranch I want to build and the horses I want to raise."

Luckily, Roberta was into horses. They were on her backpack, her socks, her bed, and in plastic miniature form all over the house.

"Horses." Brian had perked up. "I didn't know you rode."

"Well, actually, I don't."

He gave her a funny look. They always did. She smiled sheepishly and tore open a packet of vinaigrette, sprinkling it on her salad. "It's a dream of mine, though." And in her dreams, she did know how to ride, flying across sun-soaked meadows with long fragrant grasses, the sun on her back, the wind in her hair --    

A ripple of turbulence dragged her attention back at the radar. The glowing oval was in the same relative position. "That's weird." She leaned forward. "We turned left. The storm cell should have shifted to the right. But, look, it's still off the nose."

"It's a radar problem," Brian surmised.

"I'll write it up when we get to San Fran."

Then the airplane rolled abruptly to the left. Jordan grabbed her tray to keep it from sliding off her lap. Her mineral water spilled and salad dressing splashed onto her tie. "So much for blaming the equipment." Choppy air meant the storm was real.

Another call chime rang. This time from the cabin. Cleaning herself with a napkin, Jordan picked up the phone. "Yes?"

"Jordan, Ben. How long is this turbulence going to last?"

"Not too long," she told him. Ben was the chief purser, in charge of all eighteen flight attendants. He needed to stay updated on all aspects of the flight. "There's a little weather up ahead. But after that it's clear."

"Good. Find me some smooth air and I'll bring you guys a couple of frozen yogurt pops."

"Ooh. Incentive. You got it, Ben."

A sudden, sharp jolt sent the captain's dinner tray careening off the rear seat and onto the cockpit floor. The smell of Thousand Island dressing mixed with the odor of overcooked steak. Ice cubes skittered over the carpet.

"Seat the flight attendants," the captain ordered.

Jordan made the announcement. "Flight attendants take your seats." Brian slowed the big airliner from the faster speed used for cruise to what was recommended to penetrate turbulence. Jordan turned on the ignition, lighting a continuous fire in the engines, insurance against all four huge turbofans flaming out should they plow into heavy rain or hail.

"Tell ATC we need --" Brian calculated the distance and direction they'd need to skirt the rapidly intensifying storm. "Eighty more to the left."

Jordan busied herself doing what he'd asked. The bright oval shape had increased in size and clarity. But something had covered the slice of moon, making it impossible to see if something was actually outside, in front of the airplane. According to the radar, there was clear air to either side of the storm, which would allow the luxury of a wide girth as they went past.

A chime sounded. Jordan answered the incoming call and passed along the message to the captain. "ATC says -- yes. We can deviate."

Again, they went through the routine of circumventing the storm. But the crisp-edged ovoid mirrored their evasive maneuvers, almost as if it didn't want to let them pass by. A crazy thought. Yet, a flicker of unease prickled inside Jordan, a whisper of apprehension. It was that first hint of inner acknowledgement that something wasn't going right, that a situation might not pan out as planned.

Promise? Jordan could almost hear Boo's husky little voice, could feel her skinny arms in a death grip around her neck. You'll come home, right, Mommy?

Jordan winced, pressing her lips together. Her husband Craig died five years ago. But she was lucky to have parents nearby who were happy to watch Roberta several times a month when Jordan worked. Roberta loved staying with her grandparents. Never once had she needed reassurance that her mother would return for her. Stranger still was that Roberta had balked at this trip, a mere overnight to Hawaii. It was a short jaunt compared to the three-day trips she typically flew. Had her daughter sensed that something might go wrong?

Jordan's spine tingled. Before 9-11, an airline job was fraught with the usual risks: bad weather, mechanical malfunctions, and air traffic control errors. Now, she fought on the frontlines in the war on terror -- whether she wanted to or not. She'd never wanted to be a soldier, or a hero. But it seemed that sometimes life had different ideas. 

"I promise," she had whispered into Boo's hair.

Jaw tight, Jordan scrutinized the sky ahead. She almost missed it, at first. Black against black, looming in front of the plane, was an oval of the same relative shape as the storm depicted on the radar screen. It didn't look anything like a thunderstorm. It appeared...solid. "Is that an aircraft?"

"An aircraft?" Brian peered into the night. "What kind of aircraft?"

"I have no clue. I don't see any lights. Or wings." And it looked larger than their 747. Much larger. "I can try calling them on Guard."

"Do it," he ordered.

Jordan radioed in the blind on Guard frequency, 121.5, monitored by all aircraft all over the world. "Aircraft on track Bravo, this is United Five-Eight. Do you read?"

There was no answer, not from the known airplanes in the vicinity or any others. She repeated the call. No one replied.

It was deathly quiet. The moon winked out of view. The black shadow loomed. Jordan felt like a field mouse in the shadow of a hungry hawk.

"Do you read United Five-Eight?" she transmitted on the radio. "Do you have us in sight?" Slowly, her hand fell away from the microphone button. "I don't think they can hear us. I don't know, Brian; I don't think anyone can hear us."

Promise, Mommy? Jordan gave her head a quick shake and tried to block thoughts of her little girl.

The object rushed out of the darkness. St. Elmo's fire slithered along the oval's smooth edges. Framed in blue-white streamers of electricity, the object yawned open like a nightmarish Venus Flytrap. At five-hundred knots, they hurtled toward its shadowy maw. Jordan's thoughts bogged down in disbelief. Whatever was out there, they were going to hit head on. Death would be instant.  

"I can't turn away," the captain yelled, banking the airplane hard to the left. Several blinding flashes of light filled the cockpit. "Here we go."

No! The primal urge to survive exploded inside her. She didn't think. She reacted. Her hands shot out. Her boots hit the rudder pedals. But she barely had time to brace herself before the shadow engulfed the airplane and swallowed them whole.

 

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