Chapter 32
As I took her hand and helped her down on to the weather deck my stomach started to churn, funny - I had never been sea sick before. When all her team were finally on board I waved to the crane driver to remove the offending item, as there wasn’t going to be time to argue the toss with Ms Bolting and try to get her to leave, we had to leave right now, anyway if she became too much of a handful I could always clap her in irons; now that might be fun. Fortunately Scott was nearby and I handed the team over to him as he had been gazing open mouthed at Lucy, and seemed to be suffering from sea sickness as well. He led them off, to sort out their up-links or something, and it was then back to the business at hand (and to try and stop thinking about that hair), I had been helping Doc Martin sort out some of the down loaded medical supplies from the Fort Brockhurst before we hit the open sea, until I had been so rudely interrupted. When I had equipped the new wing out at the Health Centre in San Miguel I had added the funding of two Doctors and four Nurses on their must have list. They were to be additional to the regular compliment of medical staff, and their primary duties were to be ‘available’, one at a time, for embarkation on the Lady S when she went to sea for any period of time. When not waterborne then their first priority was to look after El Campo’s employees (one thing I didn’t want was for my employees to be sat around half the day waiting to see a doctor), if after that they had nothing to do (the majority of the time) then the Health Centre could use them to their hearts content. Doctora Clara Botella and two of the Nurses had done their stint down to Cape Town, and now it was the turn of Doctora Raquel Martinez Goñi (of course everyone called her Doc Martin) and the other two Nurses. Both Doctora’s had, until recently been Doctors with the Spanish Navy, and fortuitously Doc Martin’s last posting had been with a Search and Rescue unit. When we finally got all her goodie boxes down to the sick bay, which, if I do say so myself is a pretty damn fine sick bay, and once everything was stowed away it was time for me to get to the bridge before it got really lumpy, and on arrival I noticed two things immediately.
Number one: - Pontius still had the con, wasn’t he supposed to be on his way back to Gib? No, apparently his pilot cutter had developed engine trouble (two days ago) so he was along for the ride, and coincidentally he also just happened to have a very large overnight bag along with him to.
Number two: - which for some reason was much more important Sa.. sorry Ms Bolting had put on some fresh perfume.
Scott, for the past week had been playing, not chess or Rummikub but with my satellite bits and pieces. He had been in contact with the engineers at Sky and between them they had devised a wireless network around most of the Lady S, and after quickly connecting a couple of extra boxes that the cameramen had brought out with them (fortunately not in their underwear bags), the three of them started to cheer away in one of the rooms behind the bridge, a TV monitor above my head burst into life, and there was Scott in glorious colour, and then he was in stereo. Apparently when both cameras were switched on there was a split screen option – yawn. As I watched the screen they made their way through to the bridge and Scott quickly explained that this particular screen was not the one to worry about, that was the ‘internal’ monitor; it was the one next to it, which was currently showing Sky news.
‘Why?’ I naively asked.
‘Because in ten minutes time the Lady S Broadcasting Corporation is going on air’.
Ten minutes later, as we exited the Straits of Gibraltar, and out into the raging storm, Sandra, dressed in a rather fetching ‘one size fit all’ bright orange one piece survival suit started the first live broadcast from outside on the Port Bridge Wing. I, and a few million other people watched as her hair flew in every direction, until a passing wave plastered it to her face, and she was laughing uncontrollably. This was definitely not the old Sandra Bolting that we all loved to hate! This first transmission was mainly to check that the up-link to the satellite was working correctly, as apparently among all the hi tec gadgetry that I had on board were giro stabilised satellite dishes (at this rate I will soon be sound asleep), but it also served another unexpected purpose, it caught the attention of an awful lot of other broadcasting stations around the world as at the moment the world was very quiet, news wise. An hour later, as it was quickly getting dark, her next live broadcast had an estimated viewing figure of around fifty million. As Sarah was strutting her stuff the rest of us were battening down the hatches, literally. The pool had been drained and a hefty cover had been slid over the hole, all the shutters over the cabin windows were down and locked, and everything that could be tied down - was, and the observation room was packed.
The Tonkun was now in mid Atlantic, slowly trying to make her way towards the African coast, but she had yet to face the full force of the storm. After scouring her manifest the consensus of opinion was that the explosion had originated from a container full of ‘office material’ which had been hard up against the engine room bulkhead. As the owners of container could not now be traced, this lead to the further assumption that it was not office but ‘terrorist’ material inside it, and it had become ‘unstable’ (gone bang). The Tonkun was still losing containers from her listing deck and one had, to make matters even worse, clipped one of her propeller blades on its way to Davey Jones’s locker, causing unacceptable vibrations above anything but ‘slow ahead’, and Chief Engineer ‘Jock’ McGregor’s situation was not improving either; he had been blown off a catwalk in the Engine Room by the concussion and had landed on top of the huge diesel engine, not only suffering spinal injuries, but severe burns as well. He was now strapped to a spine board but his condition was deteriorating, the ships medical ‘expert’ was doing her best, but she was not even ‘medically’ up to a qualified Nurse’s level. Along with the Captain and the Chief Engineer were another twenty-two crew members and three wives (including ‘Jocks’) but Carol estimated that it would take us over thirty-six hours to reach the Tonkun if we were not to endanger ourselves in these monstrous seas, which would mean that they, and we, would be spending two nights and a day battling the storm before we would even be in a position to try and help them. Lucy forgot all about being a presenter, temporarily at least; that rather nice Scott had found her an office and quickly turned it into a Meteorological Centre for her, and within a couple of hours she not only had the Lady S’s comprehensive weather radar information to hand, but now she was ‘talking’ directly to a Royal Air Force Sentry AEW1 that was orbiting high above the storm, downloading an even ‘bigger picture’ to her.
Lt Cdr Leahy came to the bridge to brief me on what was happening down at the ‘blunt end’. Both aircraft (call signs 411 and 412) were safely tucked up in the hangar; and were fully fuelled and ready to go. As both were winch equipped Westland Sea King HC4’s they were configured for the transport role (not anti-submarine) so each crew consisted of two Pilots and a Crewman, but no Observer (Navigator). Under-manning would not be the problem though as all three of the flight’s aircraft crews were on board, although this could very well be a moot point as in these seas it would be impossible to even range the aircraft onto the flight deck, never mind launch them into the air. Hopefully conditions would miraculously improve significantly when we neared the Tonkun.
Every hour, on the hour Ms Bolting was ‘live on air’ (now inside the bridge), and to give her her due she was very professional. She didn’t exaggerate the situation, although I doubted that our situation could ever be exaggerated, but one thing that I did notice thought was that each time she broadcast she seemed to be getting closer and closer to my chair. I had lost ‘Max the Media’ at Gibraltar, and now I was dearly wishing that he was not prone to chronic sea sickness, then, as she was winding up her last live update of the evening she turned to me (totally against all the ground rules that I had laid down), shoved her hairbrush (nee microphone) into my face and asked me what I thought the chances were of a successful rescue. I was tired, dishevelled, hungry, thinking of other things, and not in a very communicative f
rame of mind so before ‘engaging brain’ I told her to ‘go away’ and annoy someone else.
She smoothly moved the microphone back to her bright red lips (Bewitching Coral I think) and primly said into it ‘another time perhaps Mr Michaels, and now back to you in the studio Kay’. She calmly waited until the camera was switched off (and with the bridge in total silence) she glared at me, stamped her foot, burst into tears and shouted ‘thank you very much Andrew’ before storming off.
I didn’t realise that we were now on first name terms.
Apparently out of the seventy million people watching, over two hundred of them went to their local bookies and got odds of a ‘thousand to one’ that we would end up as an ‘item’ before the end of the trip, what losers!
My bridge highchair was of the fully reclinable variety, with a built in five point harness for good measure, but by midnight I’d had enough. Everything was running smoothly (except for the ship) so I bade everyone left on the bridge a fond farewell and retired to my sea cabin. ‘Switch that bloody light off you pig’ drifted up from a dishevelled duvet on my bunk as I switched on my cabin light, now that did surprise me, I had never heard a duvet talk before, and from beneath its mass a tousled head of blonde hair appeared, and in a more subdued growl she explained that as I had all the right connections (electronics wise) in my sea cabin - she had commandeered it as her ‘Press Office’.
I gave her ten minutes to vacate my premises and then went off to ablute.
On re-entering my cabin I found it in darkness, a good start, and blindly made my way to the bunk. As bunks go it was quite large, almost a double size, and I was in serious need of some zzzzzeds, but as I wrapped myself in the duvet I felt an object lying beside me. As it was at body temperature I gathered that my last words to her had fallen on deaf ears so with a ‘humf’ I turned my back on her back, and was asleep in seconds.
About one o’clock I woke up for a second and noticed that she had turned in her sleep and was now curled up into my back, damned woman!
At two o’clock I awoke to find that I had turned in my sleep and now had a face full of hair, the ‘crew cut’ really had a lot going for it!
At three o’clock I woke to find that the duvet had gone on a voyage of discovery of its own and she was now laying with one arm across my chest, and a leg crooked over mine. Somehow my arm had also gone up and around her shoulder; I would definitely have to have a word with that arm in the morning!
At five o’clock I awoke and found that apparently we hadn’t moved a muscle, the only thing that was different was the fact that we were now both stark naked – then I remembered four o’clock!!!
Sandra’s alarm was set for six thirty (mine was set for eight o’clock, could this be a sign of things to come?) so that she had time to prepare herself physically (makeup) and factually for the first live broadcast of the day at eight o’clock, BUT IN THE REAL WORLD, at three minutes to eight she flew onto the bridge and grabbed the prompting notes out of Lucy’s hand (who had been dragged out of her ‘Met Office’ moments before as no one could find Sandra), and quickly glancing through them she raised her head just as the Director said ‘live in five, four, three, - , -, -, and the odds immediately plummeted to ‘evens’, and two minutes later there ‘wasn’t a hope in hell’s chance’ of placing a bet anywhere on the planet when I walked onto the bridge. She stopped mid flow to watch me (enigmatic smile on her face) walk to my chair, according to the Producer it took me eight and a half very long seconds to get there. A poll taken later estimated that 55% of the eighty-five million viewers watching went ahhh, and 60% of the male viewers had their wildest fantasy blown out of the window.
Once the broadcast was out of the way it was down to the serious business, but there wasn’t a lot of it. The Tonkun was still afloat, although her situation was getting steadily worse, Chief Engineer McGregor was ‘stable’ but in considerable pain, and the weather was becoming evil; everyone was running out of superlatives for it. The only glimmer of light that we had was that Lucy, who had been up all night (with ‘her’ Scott to keep her company) had spotted an ‘anomaly’ in the downloaded weather charts. She thought that it looked as though an ‘eye’ might be starting to form in the storm, and using her copious skills (and with Carol’s invaluable input) she ‘estimated’ where it would be at ‘R’ hour (rescue hour). If the eye did indeed fully form, and continued on its current track the Tonkun would enter it around eight o’clock tomorrow morning, if everything went right, dedos cruzados (fingers crossed). The chances of that were very slim but we had to hope for the best, and so Carol altered course slightly and increased the Lady S’s speed by five knots, and for the next twenty two hours life on board became almost unbearable, but by the end of that time the Lady S had slipped around in front of the Tonkun (so as to miss her debris field, hitting a floating forty foot container could seriously damage, or even sink us) and we were now just entering the perfectly formed eye. We of course were fortunate and could stay in the eye for as long as we wanted to, but the Tonkun would only clip the edge of it for about an hour or so (her rudder was now totally seized so she couldn’t manoeuvre at all) but hopefully that would be long enough.
It was still dark but the ship was a hive of activity, even I was up and about. Down in the hangar, as the sea state quickly subsided the two cumbersome ‘Forth Road Bridge’ frameworks (so nicknamed because of all the tubes that made up their assemblies) were removed and the Sea Kings were readied for flight. First Chalky carefully eased 412 out onto the still pitching deck, although it was now within tolerable limits thanks to the Lady S’s stabilisers, and the aircrew started its number one engine. After spreading the main rotors Spiv then started number two engine and released the rotor brake. This was the most dangerous part of the operation as the heavy blades could flex considerably in the gusty conditions and hit the deck, but years of practice paid off and he had her safely ‘burning and turning’ in seconds.
Once 412 was stable Doc Martin (now engulfed in a slightly oversized immersion suit) and the extra’ crewy (crewman) ducked down under the thrashing blades and ran to the aircrafts steps. Once they were inside and securely strapped in 412 sprang into the air and came to the hover just off the port quarter, she was now acting as plane guard for 411. Twenty minutes later 411, with Calvin strapped in its right hand seat, and 412 made their way in loose formation to the Tonkun, it was now daylight and they were all fervently hoping that she would soon be sufficiently stable for them to carry out the rescue, and sitting in the rear doorway of 411 was Sandra and a cameraman, and they were going out live to over one hundred million viewers worldwide. We had of course had a very ‘full, frank, and meaningful’ discussion about her going on the flight but eventually I reluctantly came round to her way of thinking (not that I had much choice), after all it was her job, it was what she had trained years for, and last but not least it was her ‘fifteen minutes of fame’; I hoped that it was not also going to be her swan song. Spiv had been dragged into the ‘discussion’ and pointed out, from a safe distance, that there was not a logistical problem with her going along as each HC4 was capable of carrying 27 fully equipped Booties (Royal Marines) over four hundred miles (and good P.R. for the Royal Navy was always very welcome). As both she and the cameraman had recently done a piece on the North Sea oil rigs they were both fully up-to-date with their ‘dunker’ training (underwater escape training from a helicopter simulator), they had to be before they had been allowed to fly out to the rigs, and they would also be spending several hours with ‘Tug’ and ‘Muddy’, the two crewies, in the back of 411 before it got ranged, going through what they could and could not do. One breach of the agreement and she would find herself filming water.
As the Lady S had been battling her way to the Tonkun Spiv had been on the radio, discussing with its Captain how the rescue would go down, to the very last detail. From who would be ‘first down’ to the ‘last up’, but first the Tonkun’s crew would have to rid as large an area as possib
le of any overhead obstructions, and as the ship was now listing heavily to port that would have to be the starboard bridge wing. Whip aerials had been hacked down and rigging from the mast had been dumped ignominiously overboard so when Spiv judged the seas to be at their calmest he eased 412 into a hover just above the waiting crew.
First down the winch went Tug, the spare crewy, and once he was safely on board he slipped the rescue strop under the armpits of the first of the waiting wives and she was whisked safely away. An estimated one hundred and twenty million people gave a cheer, as 411 was hovering safely to one side ‘just in case’, with Sandra and her cameraman covering the whole scene from its doorway. The next down was Doc Martin and her bag of tricks and then the air-transportable stretcher, and Doc Martin got to work on Jock (and the burns of the engineer that had dragged him clear of the engine) as Tug dispatched the Tonkun’s crew with practiced ease.
After eighteen lifts the strain was starting to tell on Spiv so he and Calvin swopped places, becoming 411’s plane guard - and then finally it was the turn of Jock’s wife, and then the Captain. After they were safely inside 411 it was planned that Tug would bring the stretcher up, with Jock now firmly strapped into it, and once that was safely on board he would return down to the Tonkun to ‘double lift’ Doc quickly back up to the aircraft, as she needed every second of time to prepare Jock for the transfer.
As the winch was taking the Captain up Tug helped Doc lift the stretcher into the open, and just as the returning hook came within his reach there was a muffled explosion from deep below in the bowels of the ship, and the vibration from its giant engine ceased. Tug quickly hooked the stretcher on and slipped into his harness; his job was now to protect Jock as he rose up to the waiting aircraft, Doc should be fine until he returned. As he signalled Muddy to hoist away, the ship underneath him gave a violent shake, but then he was safely airborne, or so he thought. They were at the end of the very long cable, and a gust of wind caused them to swing away from the ship, which was good, but as the winch was only hauling them up slowly the return swing could easily slam them against the Tonkun’s mast, which was bad.
Below them Doc picked herself up off the deck and looked towards the bow of the Tonkun; it was disappearing fast but the aft end of the ship wasn’t, the ship was breaking in two, so as the stern of the Tonkun rose into the air, Doc, standing on the edge of the bridge wing, rose with it, and as the structure reached the highest point in its final journey, before it plunged beneath the waves forever, she found Tug and the stretcher less than a metre away from her. She flung herself between the lifting wires and landed on top of the stretcher, but fortunately with its high sides Jock was protected, and she very quickly assumed a very unladylike position, wrapping her arms and legs around the stretcher and hanging on for dear life. At this point close to one hundred and fifty million people around the world started to breathe again. As there were now three people plus a stretcher on the end of the thin wire Calvin decided to not tempt fate by trying to hoist them all up, instead he slowly flew them back towards the waiting Lady S, the stretcher and its compliment just a few metres above the waves; as recorded from above by the Cameraman of the Year. As 411 approached the Lady S the runner up in the Cameraman of the Year category recorded, from his vantage point on the flight deck, every second of Lt Cline USN slowly easing his precious load up, and then over the edge of the rolling deck. Calvin then skilfully stopped any swing and gently lowering it to the waiting flight deck crew, on split screen of course. As his feet and the stretcher touched the deck Tug quickly disconnected the winch hook and 411 was off, to recover the winch wire in her own time, and once Doc Martin had been prised off the top of the stretcher it was bodily lifted up and gently taken down to the sick bay, for Doc to continue her ministrations on him, but this time she had a fully equipped sick bay at her disposal, and the extra burns treatment medication that the Fort Brockhurst had sent over would help her immensely. As soon as the deck was clear 411, hook cable now fully rewound was skilfully re-directed back in and Calvin lowered her onto her spot. Once she was safely chocked and lashed down, but with the blades still turning, first Jock’s rescuer was lead off to the sick bay for treatment, and then the remainder of the survivors filed out. As each vacated the aircraft they were collected by a member of the Lady S’s crew, whose instructions were clear, ‘look after them as if they are your own granny’. Fortunately all the crew members involved had a happy family life so they were all well looked after, although most of the survivors just wanting a hot shower, some food, and a good day’s sleep. As Sandra jumped down from 411’s cargo door I rushed in and gave her a very ‘public’ hug and kiss, in fact it was estimated that 78% of the one hundred and eighty million people watching thought that we would make beautiful babies together. They must be joking, baby making was for the younger generation; but we would certainly keep in practice - just in case I changed my mind. Once the aircraft was empty of all its passengers the lashings were removed and Calvin was quickly airborne again as there was no time for him to shut his aircraft down and move it into the hangar, there was another helicopter full of survivors waiting in the wings.
With all its passengers safely on their way below Spiv shut 412 down, and after the maintainers had given the insides of her engines a fresh water wash to get rid of all the salt she was carefully eased back into the hangar, and then the whole process was repeated all over again with 411. These were the real unsung heroes of the whole operation, the maintainers and handlers, without their tireless work the aircraft would never have even left the hangar, never mind got into the air; even though there was a tiff or two (spit, spit) amongst them.
Sandra, after exiting 411, had gone directly to the bridge, where for the next four hours she remained live on air (with her lipstick ever so slightly smudged) re-telling the story over and over again, but each time from the viewpoint off a different person that was directly involved in the rescue. The Pilots and Crewies, Carol, Lucy (in her capacity as the weather lady), the Captain of the Tonkun, Jock’s wife (some holiday this had turned out to be), and then as the viewing figures started to decline - me, but fortunately not for long, ‘atmospheric interference’ suddenly interrupted us (thanks Scott, I owe you one) so Sandra quickly handed over to the studio and collapsed into my arms. She had been running on pure adrenalin for almost eight hour and was absolutely exhausted, so with the help of David we bundled her into my sea cabin, and she was sound asleep before I had peeled the immersion suite off of her.
Following the rescue, the Lady S lazily circled around in the eye of the storm whilst Doc Martin, along with her two Nurses and Caroline worked away on Jock and his mechanic, but finally, as day turned to night they had done all they could, what they both needed now was specialist treatment shore side - and the quicker the better, so Carol eased Lady S back into the storm and we headed back in the direction of Gibraltar, but this time at a more sensible speed, Jock’s back couldn’t take the punishing gyrations of Lady S’s mad dash out to rescue him, and so thirty-six hours later, as dawn was breaking, first 411 and then 412 lifted off from the Lady S’s flight deck for the last time. Jock, his wife and Doc Martin were in the back of ‘one one’ and his mechanic, Caroline and a Nurse were in the back of ‘one two’. Although both helicopters could easily have taken more passengers it was going to be a long over-water trip, so they were acting as ‘mutual SAR’s’ (recovery aircraft) for each other, just in case one of them had to ditch. Both take-offs were made live on air, as there might just have be some insomniac watching TV at that hour, but as the storm was quickly abating it wasn’t a very spectacular event, and fortunately the time spent ‘live’ was also abating, every question that could be, had been asked what seemed like a thousand times so Sandra and Lucy (now back to being a Presenter) were slowly winding down and preparing for the real world in a day or so’s time. Sandra and I had of course by now officially become an ‘item’ (as were Scott and Lucy) but the closer we came to land the more apprehensive we were
both becoming, ‘was this just a ‘flash in the pan’, were we just ‘two ships passing in the night’ (no pun intended), so we both agreed that she would continue with her career, and I would return to El Campo to let things settle down, and then see how we felt in a few weeks’ time; but we hadn’t factored the British Prime Minister into our thinking.
The Lady S was certainly taking the pretty way home, and she wouldn’t be arriving in Gibraltar until the early hours of the next day, which to my way of thinking was a good thing, we would quietly slip in, in the dead of the night, and then get some well-deserved rest - what utter rubbish.
As Pontius, now back to being a Pilot, guided us in, at two o’clock in the morning, the ‘Rock’ (and a good chunk of Spain) became ablaze with light. One thing that we certainly didn’t need to do was switch on our navigation lights, with all the rockets and flares in the air it was brighter than day. Boats of every shape and size were coming out to greet us, and they were all crammed to their proverbial gunwales with well-wishers and film crews, and as we approached the harbour I let Sandra do the honours. She yanked down hard on the rope above our heads and then she yanked it down again and again - WHOOP, WHOOP, WHOOP. So it was two in the morning - I doubted if anyone was asleep within a hundred miles. The whooping must have been a signal that they were hopefully waiting for as even more fireworks streaked skyward, this year Guy Fawkes really was coming early, and along the side of the Fort Brockhurst, in bright multi coloured lights were the words THANK YOU, any time I thought.
As we finally slid alongside the jetty, the same one that we had left less than a week ago, I scanned it for Max and Alice. Max I had no problem spotting, he was in the centre of the media scrum earning his fee, but Alice was harder to spot. What finally gave her away were the two barking Yorkies trying to yank her arm out of its socket - but she was oblivious to them, she appeared to be crying into some young man’s shoulder. Now that was an unexpected turn up for the books! When the gangway was safely across Alice led the three of them on board, and as she reached the deck she released Bonnie and Clyde. They then did a fair impersonation of a brace of greyhounds and were soon clambering all over me, licking and slurping away, which of course I loved; but I was really intrigued by the stranger, and as he and Alice entered the bridge Alice ran happily across to me and gave me a big hug and a kiss, and there were no signs of any tears anywhere, and the stranger did the same - only to Sandra. ‘Pistols at dawn young man - unhand my wench!’ Then I realised that they were not unwanted advances, hopefully this young man was Algernon, her son.
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