For Cody...

Jimmy's First Flight


I was sitting in the bar at the New Stanley Hotel in Nairobi with Captain Jim Harrison and one of our flight engineers, drinking Tusker one fine afternoon. We were having a good time, talking shop about flying into the Sudan and the bullshit that management forced us to tolerate.

When, just then, in walked Ted Putwain, our Project Manager. He confronted our table with his fists on his hips, and looked hard at me and said, "Your new co-pilot's here." He wasn't smiling. I said, "So?" He replied, "Yeah, it's Jimmy Hathcock." That sent a chill down my spine.


I knew Jimmy Hathcock. He had previously been a loadmaster with Southern Air Transport. Loadmasters are the guys, often highly skilled, who are in charge of loading and securing the cargo in the fuselage of the aircraft, and also dropping the loads from our low flying aircraft over the Sudan in the wet season. But they're not pilots. And the next words out of Putwain's mouth were, "He only has an hour and a half in the airplane."

I thought, what kind of management insanity is this, to send me a totally untrained, totally green first officer to fly dangerous missions into a fucking war zone? Harrison and I stared at each other. We could not believe that this former loadmaster had become a pilot and had been sent, totally inexperienced, to fly the Sudan with highly experienced crews. Fools, particularly management fools, abound.


I had spent my early years with Southern Air flying the States, up and down the East Coast in the middle of the night in lousy weather with some very tough Captains, down to Panama in Central America across the Caribbean, into Puerto Rico and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba with that hairy approach, west to San Antonio, all right seat time, paying my dues. When I first upgraded to Captain in late 1989, which took two years of hard work, I was based out of Chicago O'Hare, flying transcontinental trips over the Rocky Mountains into both San Francisco and Los Angeles, California in all kinds of weather. The Chicago winters are particularly severe.


I first got assigned to Africa in 1987 after two months on the line, to Ethiopia, as a first officer with a great captain, Terry Wagner, and we had a lot of fun. By then, I had acquired a couple of hundred hours in the airplane. We also had a very narrow escape, but that is a story for another time.


Here was Hathcock, fresh as a daisy out of training, dumped into my lap in bloody Afrika.
We African crews called ourselves The Afrika Corps. We knew how to survive in extreme conditions. We did not suffer fools gladly. There was no weather forecasting. It's like we freight dogs used to say, who cares about the weather. We're going anyway. We made the company a lot of money.


I thought, Fuck it! That's what they want, then that's what they'll get. I must admit I drank too much that evening, anticipating the trials of the upcoming day, and finally went to bed.


So the next morning very early and slightly hungover, I got up and got dressed and went down to breakfast. There I met Jimmy, dumb as dirt. He had very little to say. There was nothing to say. I got my food and sat down with him and briefed him. I told him to follow my lead and do what I told him, to listen to the engineer if he said something, to remember the procedures he had been taught in flight school, to shut the fuck up and follow instructions, and maybe we would live. He readily agreed. I was half kidding, but I could see the fear in his eyes.


That really bothered me. If you are afraid, then you can't function. All I needed was a totally inexperienced first officer in my right seat, going into a very short and difficult strip, in the middle of a war zone, scared shitless.
So the three of us caught the crew van and made it to the aircraft the next morning and damned near ran over a big cobra in the dark at the airport. The Flight Engineer knew the situation with Hathcock because I had briefed him to be on the alert and watch for mistakes, and he must have been sweating it, but he never said a word. He just jumped into his seat and began throwing his switches. I wish I could remember his name. He was a good man.


We were given the destination coordinates on our flight plan. I plugged them into the Omega navigation system, crosschecked both units to ensure the numbers agreed, and said, "Okay, I have no idea where this place is, but we'll give it a shot."


We launched out of Nairobi International, or Jomo Kenyatta, whichever you prefer, for the southeastern Sudan. We flew up the Rift Valley, above Lake Nakuru with its flamingos, over Navaisha, and, once we got north of the Uganda border, turned northwest into Sudanese airspace. The Omegas directed us, but since they were not precision navigation systems like GPS, which didn't exist at the time, we had to use the Mark One Eyeball to locate the strip. The Omegas got us successfully to the area, and the Mark One Eyeballs took over.


I looked down at miles and miles of bloody Africa and finally saw what I thought to be a strip. It was the only open space in five hundred square miles of Sudanese bush.
It was located in the middle of thick mopane with a north/south orientation, with a small village adjacent to it on the east side, about eighty miles northwest of Juba, which is located on the Nile. I figured this must be the place.


Now the Hercules is one hell of a fine airplane. It will do what you ask of it, and often much more. I had about 2500 hours in Hercs by then and had been instructed by some of the very best. I wasn't worried. But this strip was short. Very damned short, with thick bush at both ends and rough, raw dirt as a runway surface.
I looked over at Hathcock, who had been, so far, performing his duties dutifully. He had no idea of the severity of the situation.


So I told him, "Jimmy, we're gonna take a run at it. I'll go flaps fifty percent and drag the strip." Which means fly down it slowly at a very low altitude and visually inspect the runway. "Then I'll make my decision." He nodded his assent. I mean, what choice did he have? He didn't have a clue where we were precisely. Truth was, I knew within ten square miles, which was about as accurate as the Omegas got. If I had chosen that very moment to have a heart attack and had died in the seat, I very seriously doubt if he could have found Nairobi.


So we made our low pass. Jimmy gave me the flaps when I called for them and sat there, waiting. We performed the Approach check list. I rolled in at about a hundred feet and flew slowly up the strip to the north. There was no wind indicator, so I had no idea from which direction the wind, if there was one, was blowing. We saw a UN Beechcraft King Air parked by the village, but no wind indicator. Bad feeling.


The strip was about three thousand feet long, and rough, but it looked hard. So I briefed my crew that we were going to land to the north and hope the wind was in our favor.
I flew a left hand traffic pattern after climbing to about three hundred feet with half the flaps extended. I turned a three mile-long final approach and got solidly on course, aligned with the strip. I told the guys, "This is gonna be tight." And it was.
We barely cleared the bush at the south end with full flaps extended and touched down hard on the first third of the runway. I stood on the brakes and immediately hit maximum reverse thrust. I was on the brakes so hard the anti-skid kicked in, but I got her stopped well short of the departure end of the runway, arriving in a huge cloud of dust. It was just another day at the office.


We taxied clear of the runway, retracted the flaps to fifty percent as called for, and Jimmy did his job very well. He remembered what he had learned at flight school. My respect for him went up a notch.
We parked adjacent to the King Air and Jimmy flipped the brake selector switch to Emergency, which took the brake system off of the utility hydraulic system, which is powered by the numbers one and two engines on the left wing, and powers the brakes, among other things, from the electric auxiliary hydraulic pump located aft in the fuselage near the ramp and door. The reason for this is that the auxiliary pump powers the ramp and door and it was necessary for the loadmasters to open the ramp and door to download our cargo of emergency food.

I shut down the engines, the engineer started the gas turbine compressor, a small jet engine located in the left wheel well and just ahead of it, which provides pneumatic pressure to start the engines, and electrical power to run the systems. and called for the proper checklist. Everything was in order.
I set the parking brake and we exited the aircraft. I stretched my aching bones. The adrenaline generated by the landing had totally destroyed my slight hangover.
We walked around and inspected our aircraft and there was no apparent damage, so we took a look around.
Out of nowhere, or so it seemed, a British lady about 48 years old walked up to me and introduced herself. I don't recall her name, but she was Lady something-or-other, a member of the House of Lords of the British Parliament. Then a tall man in ivory-colored robes trimmed in burgundy velvet appeared, wearing a large crucifix on a gold chain. He introduced himself as the Bishop of the Cairo Diocese. It seems they were on an inspection tour to ensure that emergency relief supplies were properly delivered. There was no sign of the King Air pilot.


Of course, the entire village had turned out for our arrival. Standing on the left end of the group of villagers, was a tall man wearing a leopard skin and leaning on a long spear. The scene was right out of National Geographic. If there had ever been any doubt that we were deep within African bush, which there hadn't, it would have been dispelled by the man in the leopard skin.
According to her Ladyship, the runway had been created whole cloth out of the thick African bush by the villagers. They had chopped down all the trees with pangas and then had dug up the stumps. Then they had filled the holes with dirt dug up from other areas of the developing runway, and had packed the surface down with the hard stamp of hundreds of pairs of strong Dinka feet. It was an impressive accomplishment.
After about a half hour, the loaders had evacuated all of our cargo, under the careful supervision of our great loadmasters, and it was time to go. We said our goodbyes and boarded our aircraft.
The loadies closed the ramp and door. We took our seats, and performed the Before Start Engine checklist.
We started them up and there were no apparent problems. Everything was in the green. Jimmy set the Brake Selector Switch to Normal on my callout. I told Jimmy to keep his finger by that switch, located on the instrument panel by his left knee, and if I called Brakes Emergency, do it. Now. That was in the event of a Utility hydraulic system failure during taxi, which would mean total loss of the brakes. He performed as requested.
Now, came decision time.
It was a long Southern Air tradition to split legs. That means the Captain would fly into the initial destination and the first officer would fly out, taking the second trip leg. It was Jimmy's turn. I had given this a lot of thought, both prior to the trip and after we arrived and got a good look at where we were.
I contemplated the situation for a few seconds and decided to let Jimmy have the takeoff. It was a risk, but I was always in control of the situation.
I briefed Jimmy.
"Here's the deal. We're not gonna do this like you learned in school. We're gonna lift off slow and clear the trees at the departure end and if we lose an engine, I will take over and make the necessary callouts. I will follow you through on the controls to back you up. It is still my airplane. Coming off below minimum three-engine control speed is the only way we're gonna get out of here. So when it starts rolling, put some light back pressure on the controls and lift the nosewheels off as soon as you can. If she wants to fly, let her.  Clear the trees at the other end and then gain about a hundred feet, level off, and gain airspeed. Got it?"
He was looking at me and his eyes were the size of silver dollars. He had never thought that I would give him the takeoff. By all rights, I should have done it, but I decided to see what he was made of. This was the African bush, and jungle rules applied. You did what you had to do. We long ago had thrown the book away.
I got the chief loadmaster out of the aircraft onto a longline intercom cord and told him to watch the tail, and to keep our tail feathers out of the bush. I pulled onto the strip as tightly as I could by the end, hit reverse thrust, and backed her up as far as I could go. The loadie did as requested and told me when to stop. I wanted every inch of runway we could get.
I looked over at Jimmy. He looked calm, which was a relief. I told him, "Hold her on the brakes, they're your throttles, run them up to max power, and release the brakes. Keep the slight back pressure in on the elevators and lift the nosewheels off as soon as possible. Let her fly off on her own. I'll back you up. Don't sweat it. Just do it."
He did.
We accelerated quickly down the strip. Jimmy performed flawlessly, lifting the nose off very quickly. I was following him on the controls, covering his hand on the throttles, and very soon, we lifted. We cleared the trees at the departure end by a good margin and then he leveled off as instructed and built up our airspeed. I reached over and retracted the flaps, and Jimmy climbed out and headed for home.
I had previously set the Omegas for the route to Nairobi and he flew it, as expected.
When we arrived at Nairobi, he performed a flawless landing.
He had earned his spurs, and my respect for him increased substantially.
I admit, I had put him into a very difficult situation, just to see if he could hack it, and he did.
He was now an official member of the Southern Air Transport Afrika Corps.
We returned to the hotel, hit the bar at the New Stanley, and shared several beers. It had been a very trying and successful day.



PS  Jimmy was killed in the crash of a light homebuilt about three year ago.  No one knows why.  He launched, climbed to about 400 feet, stalled, and fell off onto the left wing and went directly into the ground.  And, so pilots die, often inexplicably.  I never grew to like him very much over the intervening years, but he should never have died that way. RIP, Jimmie Hathcock.  Fly West with your Southern Air companions who have gone before you..   I will soon follow.