Page 32 of Air Force One
“You did,” Commander Randy Davidson assured her. “And the answer is yes. I’m not much of an expert on jet planes but I’m guessing we don’t want this one just sitting in the water. I’m thinking we need to tow it out of here before that weather moves in.”
This time it was Jeremy who started laughing, which saved Holly the trouble. Except his wasn’t some nervous mess like her laugh had been…and her gut was. Two hours ago, she’d been watching Mike sleep with a baby girl in his arms and now she was at the site of a watery mass grave.
“I’m sorry, Commander, for what is about to happen.” Holly could tell that Jeremy was gearing up and nodded for him to go for it.
“Your ship weighs eighteen hundred long tons, that’s about eighteen-three in standard measure tons. A Boeing 747-200B, before conversion into the VC-25A, has an empty weight of a hundred and seventy-six tons. The upgrades are classified, but let’s toss in twenty tons as a working number. And that’s Operating Empty Weight, OEW. To fly to Africa, it would have carried—” Jeremy stared at the metal ceiling of the bridge.
“Twenty-eight thousand, five hundred gallons,” Miranda said.
Jeremy nodded, “Right. About that. We’ll round that off to another ninety-seven tons. And now the fuselage is filled with ocean water. Water is a non-compressible fluid weighing eight-point-three-four pounds per gallon.”
“This is seawater,” Miranda corrected.
“Oh right, make that eight-point-five-five. The volume of the 200B’s fuselage is approximately seventy-three thousand cubic feet?—”
“You forgot the tapered nose and tail. I’d estimated fifty-two thousand.”
“No, that would be sixty-one—oh wait. The non-water-permeable fittings take up some volume. And the people who are primarily water, so they aren’t going to compress much except for their lungs and stomach. So, yeah, a fifteen percent reduction of volume works, which equals fifty-two thousand cubic feet.”
“Fifty-two thousand seven hundred.”
“Right. Replace that with seawater. That’s another sixteen hundred and eighty-five tons.”
“That’s actually about four hundred-and-twenty pounds light, but it is sufficient for a first-order approximation.”
Jeremy nodded his agreement. “So the plane a) won’t float for towing, and b) it presently outweighs your ship by approximately?—”
“Enough already!” The commander rubbed his face.
“I warned you.” Holly was feeling at least a little better. But maybe letting the comedy-duo of Chase and Trahn loose was kinda inappropriate to the moment. Even by her own low-humor standards.
Davidson nodded. “So we have a hellaciously heavy waterlogged aircraft?—”
Miranda held up a hand to stop him. “Don’t forget that its nose is stuck in the mud.”
“How do you know that the nose isn’t crushed?”
“The plane hasn’t fallen over to the seabed, so something is holding it up. I expect that it is stuck like a lawn dart into the seabed.”
This time Andi had the inappropriate laugh—one that definitely leaned over into the edge of hysteria. She covered her mouth and pulled it back. “Sorry. Lawn darter is Army slang for Air Force pilots, especially of the F-16 that was known for doing a lot of high-speed nose plants during development.”
“Helmsman,” Miranda asked, “What’s the sea depth here, from the wave troughs?”
“Uh,” the man’s voice cracked at being called upon. He consulted his instruments, watching them through three waves. “It’s a hundred and ninety…three feet, ma’am.”
“So,” Miranda nodded. “Assuming minimal crushing of the nose, Air Force One is stuck thirty-eight feet into the mud. Applying mudhole parallels in a deep-water environment for strength of adhesion between differing materials isn’t well studied. There have been studies of bogs that?—”
“Miranda,” Mike finally stopped playing observer. “How about we table that calculation for now and work out how to fix the immediate problem?”
Holly could see the gears clashing in Miranda’s head. Mike could too and sent her a desperate look. Maybe messing with the commander’s brain by letting Jeremy and Miranda run hadn’t been the best idea. Holly had forgotten what it was like when the two of them geeked-out together; Miranda had screwed herself deeper into the ground than Air Force One had into the seabed.
Andi didn’t say a word. She simply stepped so close to Miranda that she almost knocked her over.
Miranda said a small, “Oh.” Then she hugged Andi.
Andi hugged her back.
After about fifteen seconds, Miranda let go and started speaking as if she hadn’t stopped—or been sidetracked by Jeremy in the first place. “First, we need to recover the black boxes. We must determine cause first and worry about recovery later. That was President Feldman’s orders. Mr. Helmsman, I see by the ping-back on your sonar that we’re missing the Number Four Engine. Commander, could you please have someone find it? It will lie somewhere east of here.”
