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 |   Enter your story of 300 words or less. |
Word Count 299 With the suddenness of a lightning bolt, something exploded through the cockpit windscreen on the pilot’s side. Co-pilot Stewart James sat frozen and breathless for a moment, then turned to the Captain. His head was gone, and James was vomiting in his own lap without realizing it. Half a minute later the co-pilot had recovered barely enough for his training to scream into his conscience. Stabilize the aircraft, declare an emergency, check on the crew and passengers. He recalled they had been climbing through 12,000 feet, so they needed to descend below 10,000 for breathable air. The autopilot, triggered by the missing window’s decompression, was already doing this. James automatically radioed an emergency and requested landing instructions. Then he called the Lead Flight Attendant on the intercom. She reported all passengers and crew were secure, but concerned. To avoid exacerbating the situation, James pressed the button to lock the cockpit door, offering no explanation to the Flight Attendant. In a controlled voice, he then informed the passengers a window had broken, but they would land safely in a few minutes. When air traffic control called, all the co-pilot said was that the left windscreen was gone. He refused to inflict his mental photo of the Captain to torture those in the tower. He calmly insisted he was too busy checking the plane’s controls and following the tower’s instructions. Fifteen tense minutes later, he saw the airport’s emergency vehicles racing along the roads flanking the runway. He gently set the plane down, slowed, and turned right onto a taxiway as he was told. With the plane stopped, he secured the brakes and shut down the engines. Then co-pilot Stewart James collapsed in uncontrollable shaking and sobbing until police were banging on the cockpit door. |
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