Jerry D Young
03-13-2009, 07:29 PM
Ultra-light – A Vignette – Prolog
Miles underground, beneath the mighty Mississippi the earth was undergoing changes. For millions of years, the North American tectonic plate had been under tremendous stress as the west edge went one direction, and the east edge went another. Like stretch marks in the belly of the earth, the surface of the ground spread slightly every day, and the opening filled over the same millions of years with the silt from surface between the Appalachians and the Rockies.
But as the surface was filled with good old dirt, and the Mississippi River kept the filling going on, the underside, also being thinned, had magma filling the gap. It was only a matter of time when this weak spot in the center of America failed. Each terrible earthquake over the eons in the area had simply brought the event closer to being. Then one day the mantle was breached, the magma meeting the dirt fill, almost right under the Mississippi River.
Ultra-light – A Vignette
Jennie Foster loved to fly. Especially her Quicksilver MX Sport single seat ultra-light. The open cockpit, tricycle gear, fixed wing plane couldn’t go as fast as many of the other planes she’d flown and flown in, but none of them could go where she could go with the MX Sport. She could take off and land in any large open grassy area.
She flew whenever she could, usually with friends in their own ultra-lights. But Jennie had a secret life that none of her flying friends knew about. She was a closet prepper. Living in the New Madrid Seismic Zone in the Bootheel of Missouri was the reason she started.
But as she learned more and more, she realized that anywhere in the US, and literally the world, there were natural hazards. And human caused disaster could certainly affect any place one might choose to live. A person that wanted to get through a disaster as easily as possible needed preps, no matter where they lived.
She loved the open spaces of SEMO, the beautiful fields of various crops grown in the bountiful ex-swamp ground. Flying in the area could be a bit tricky, as storms could develop quickly, but with her preparedness mentality, Jennie always had a NOAA Weather Radio with her. She never tried to fly when there were watches out, much less warnings.
Unlike all of her friends that flew, Jennie kept a backpack strapped in the MX Sport that was her aircraft BOB. If, heaven forbid, she went down anywhere when she was flying, she had the means to take care of herself for three days easily, while getting back home, with or without help.
Being a slim, trim, 5’2” and 102 pounds gave her plenty of weight allowance for the BOB in the MX Sport, while still being able to carry a maximum fuel load, and still have the weight well below the maximum rating for the ultra-light.
Today, she was headed to Kennett from her home outside of Senath, to take a flight on her friend’s newly acquired Sky Yacht personal hot air blimp. Dr. Helen Druthers shared the same love of flight as Jennie and the two had taken flight training together, when Jennie was just old enough to, and Helen, several years older, was looking for some adventure after a bad divorce.
While Jennie made a decent living, Dr. Druthers came from a wealthy family, and did very well on her own as one of the preeminent doctors in the area. She had two ultra-lights, a conventional four-seat single engine plane, and now the Sky Yacht.
Jennie made it to the far corner of the airport where Helen had been given permission to unfold, inflate and launch the air ship. Helen was waiting for her, a big grin on her face. “You’re going to love this, Jennie!”
The two women hadn’t seen one another for a few weeks and shared a quick hug. Both were excited and looking forward to the flight. Getting the framework unfolded and the fabric adjusted took a little while, but soon enough the propane burners were filling the envelope with hot air.
The air ship looked fairly conventional, as air ships go, except for being slightly stubby and fat looking. Helen did a thorough walk around, checking everything carefully, just as she’d been taught at the Sky Yacht headquarters when she bought the Sally Sue.
When things were ready, the two women, helmets in place, strapped themselves into/onto the platform suspended from the air ship framework at the front of the craft. The engine, mounted on the very tail end of the ship, fired right up and after clearing for takeoff by radio, they were off the ground.
Helen headed away from the airport flight path so she could begin showing off the capabilities of the air ship for Jennie. Flying well above the tree tops, but slowly, Helen cut back the throttle and maneuvered downward.
Jennie sucked in her breath slightly when Helen brought the Sally Sue to a hover. “Grab a leaf,” Helen said with a laugh. Jennie grinned and reached out. She carefully pulled loose the very top leave of the fifty foot high tree as Helen slowly brought the rear end of the air ship around, keeping the front almost stationary.
“Wow!” Jennie shouted and laughed. Helen joined in the laughter and then put the Sally Sue on a climbing course toward Senath. When they reached Jennie’s modest property a couple miles out of town, Helen landed in her front yard, and they began to deflate the envelope.
When it was safe to leave the craft, Jennie took Helen inside and fixed lunch for the pair of them, talking animatedly about the Sky Yacht. Naturally, on the way back to the airport in Kennett an hour later, Jennie got her chance to handle the air ship. She put it through its paces under Helen’s strict tutelage.
When they landed and had the Sally Sue deflated, folded up, and stored on the trailer, Jennie thanked Helen and headed home, wondering how she could ever afford one of the air ships herself. “Sure is nice to know friendly people with money,” she said into the wind whipping her hair as she drove the New Bug convertible home.
Jennie thought about the flight a few times over the next few months, but things never seemed to work out to get another chance to fly with Helen. Jennie managed to fly her MX Sport several times during that time and decided as much as she liked the Sally Sue, fixed wing was her game.
But with the bad economic situation that seemed to just keep getting worse, Jennie was putting in more and more hours at the shiny new motel that Senath boasted. Finished a year previously, just as Jennie came home with a year’s experience in a Mexican resort, after her schooling for hotel management concluded, Jennie snagged the assistant manager’s position for the new motel.
Rather doubtful of the success of such a large operation in Senath, Jennie had fought for and received a pretty much ironclad no-lay-off, guaranteed-for-five-years contract. The place could go belly up the day after it opened and she’d still get paid for five years. Either quarterly payments or a lump sum, at the company’s choice.
While the suggestion was that she might sabotage the operation so she could collect her pay without working, there was a bonus clause in the contract. If the motel did a certain amount of business during the five-year period and lasted the full five years, Jennie would get a huge bonus and the managerial position, with a similar type of contract.
Jennie was amazed that she got almost all the elements in the contract she wanted, but the area was depressed and good help, always hard to find, was even more difficult to find in the area, especially with someone with Jennie’s education and already fairly extensive experience in handling a motel environment.
But things were difficult, and she had to lay off three of the twelve person staff. She picked up the slack, working ten to twelve hours a day, often at night, for ten to fourteen days straight.
But the salary she’d negotiated was huge for the area, and she felt an obligation to make the operation a success, only in part because of the bonus clause. So she took on the extra duties of the laid off employees.
She finally had a three day weekend, in part because the motel had absolutely no reservations for the time frame. And the regular business they did get, mostly from truckers and other regular travelers on US 412, could be handled by the rest of the staff for three days.
Jennie, after a day of catching up on housework in her neat little two bedroom bungalow, reassembled the MX Sport from its storage mode, packed a lunch, and took off from her open back yard.
It was a glorious day and Jennie let out a whoop of joy as a flock of birds juked in unison to get out of her way. To get as far away as possible from the daily grind, she put the ultra-light in an economical climb rate. She wanted maximum time at maximum height.
It was August, and the fields were in all their productive glory. Having done the same thing many times before, Jennie still felt the draw to document the area for advertising for the motel. So she had her little video camera with her. At maximum altitude, she held the cameral steady and turned the craft in a wide circle, taking in the entire horizon.
Something caught her eye just as she let the camera hang back down on her chest. “Oh, no!” she thought, “a fire!”
She brought the walky-talky up to her lips, but hesitated before she reported the smoke to the authorities.
Instead, she changed course slightly and headed for the column of smoke. It didn’t look quite right to be smoke from a wheat field fire. There was just something about it. That was when she noticed a car on US 412 run off the road. Then another and another. “What in the world?” Jennie asked herself.
Then when the ground ahead of her erupted and a column of wet sand shot into the air three hundred feet high she realized what was happening. The New Madrid Seismic Zone was acting up. An earthquake. Perhaps the long dreaded “Big One”.
There was nothing she could do at the moment, so she lifted the camera again and began to document the event from the air. It was only when she got close to that one particular column of smoke that she suddenly dropped the camera on its leash and turned the MX Sport around and headed for home at the highest speed she could achieve. Her face was deathly white. This wasn’t just a simple earthquake, “The Big One” or not.
No. This was Parícutin, Mexico all over again. A volcano was forming right beside US 412 half-way between Senath and Kennett. Only instead of the middle of a corn field, it was in the middle of a soybean field. And instead of a small hole initially, there was already lava flowing from the small mound already in evidence.
Her hand was shaking when she lifted the walky-talky to her lips again. She keyed the mike, finally got someone to answer her, and explained what was happening. They simply didn’t believe her. Earthquake, yes. Volcano no. They were dealing with the earthquake and had no use for someone pulling a prank at the time.
Frowning, Jennie landed the MX Sport and idled it up near the house. She ran a ragged course that short distance. The ground was moving erratically. She saw the large crack at one corner of the house and hesitated before she went inside.
Things settled for a moment and Jennie decided to risk it. A glance to the north just before she went inside had her hurrying even more. Always a neat person, Jennie’s preps were neatly stored. She couldn’t take everything, she knew. She was prepared for any number of different disasters. A volcano was way down on the list, but it was on the list.
Repacking the large Kifaru EMR back pack with the things she wanted to take, and carefully reclosing and stashing the totes in the small storm cellar at the edge of her yard, Jennie took a good twenty minutes to get ready. The house had been groaning eerily with each new ground shake and Jennie finally stopped moving things to the shelter, realizing they weren’t important things. Everything truly important was already in the storm cellar.
She couldn’t help it. Jennie screamed when a sand spout shot up across the road to the north. She felt the moisture from the wet sand as the wind swirled around. Struggling under the weight of the pack, Jennie took it to the MX Sport and strapped it into place just as she’d practiced before. She topped off the craft’s fuel tank, and then, hesitating because it was strictly against the rules, strapped that partial can of fuel, plus the other full one she had, to the framework of the ultra-light.
“Good thing you lost that five pounds,” she whispered as she put on her helmet again, pulled on the leather jacket she’d brought from the house, and then strapped herself into the ultra-light again.
Her shoulders hunched when a loud cracking sound behind her, audible even over the sound of the ultra-light’s engine, brought her attention to her house. But just for a moment. The house was now a mound of rubble, and the sand from the sand blow was already across the road and would soon engulf it, if the sand blow continued.
Putting the thoughts of the house behind her, Jennie started her takeoff run. She thought she’d made a serious mistake, adding as much weight to the craft as she had. The MX sport felt sluggish and didn’t seem to want to lift off the ground.
Jennie screamed again when she saw the ground lifting ahead of her in a rolling motion. But as it passed under her, the lifting motion of the land wave launching the MX Sport into the air. Throttle at maximum, Jennie climbed as fast as she could, while turning to the east.
She had to juke once, barely avoiding going into a nose dive, when she quickly changed course as yet another sand spout erupted right in front of her. Particles of wet sand peppered her leather jacket and helmet as she flew past the column, which was at least fifty feet higher than the altitude she was flying.
Continuing to climb, and headed northeast toward Kennett, Jennie watched the horror unfold below her. She could see wave after wave of the land below traveling across the landscape all the way to the horizon. It had been going on, off and on, for twenty minutes and showed no signs of stopping. The motel, like her house, was rubble. She could only hope everyone got out.
Glancing to her left, the northwest, Jennie saw the smoke from the fires the lava was starting in the fields. There was a distinct mound now, even as far away as she was. Jennie had the presence of mind to use the video camera and take some more footage of the volcano in its birthing phase.
She didn’t think she’d make it through when she hit what felt like a wall in the air. The winds were from the west, and she was passing due east of the emerging volcano. Fortunately there wasn’t much ash, though there was some, but there were hot gasses.
Jennie held her breath until she thought she would pass out, the MS Sport at full throttle, in a shallow dive to get more speed, to get out of the stream of death coming from the volcano. She finally had to take a breath. It was cold, clear air. She opened her eyes, saw the ground approaching and pulled the craft out of the shallow dive.
Climbing back to cruising height, Jennie set a bee-line course to Dr. Druthers’ home on the northern edge of Kennett, circling around the city proper when she got there. Flying over habitation was also against the rules.
Jennie landed the craft expertly, despite the high weight. The machine took it and was ready for more when Jennie turned off the motor. Jennie staggered slightly on her way to the house, terrified at what she might find. The constant earthquakes were just as bad here as at Senath. Helen’s house was in the process of crumbling, just as Jennie’s had. Jennie wondered just how wide spread the destruction would be.
Helen met her at the back door. “I heard you coming in. Can you believe this? I think this qualifies as “The Big One”.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Jennie said. She opened up the screen on the video camera and played back the footage of the volcano.
“What do we do?” Helen asked. “We have to help. I have to get to the hospital!”
“Yes. I agree. But there is a limited amount we can do. There isn’t a bridge standing that I could see. The only transport going more than a mile or two is going to involve a boat or a helicopter. Or an ultra-light or blimp. We have to maintain the ability to move. I can’t carry passengers, but the Sally Sue can.”
“What are you saying?” Helen asked, disbelief on her face.
“We get the supplies we can, get somewhere safe, and set up an aid station. I’ll use the Sally Sue to ferry whoever needs it the worst to you to work on.”
“But the hospital… The equipment there…”
“Won’t be working. If the generator even runs, they don’t have that much fuel. And it is doubtful the building will survive. It was built before enough people understood the dangers and insisted on earthquake resistant building codes in this area. I’m not sure that would have helped, anyway. Houses and barns and other structures are tumbling down everywhere you look.”
Another huge shock rocked them and Helen’s house sank some more. The ground was liquefying with all the shaking motion. “Let’s grab what we can and figure how to get you to the airport to get the Sally Sue.”
“It’s here,” Helen said. “I’m going… was going to sell it and brought it home.”
“That’s even better. Let’s get the things out of the house and get the air ship ready to fly.”
They were only able to get inside twice each before the house became too dangerous to enter. They spent precious minutes getting the airship ready. Fortunately the house had not tumbled onto it when it began to fail.
The houses on either side of Helen’s, and those across the street, all were suffering the same fate.
“You ready?” Jennie asked Helen when the envelope of the airship was full of hot air and they were ready to fly.
Helen bit her lower lip. “I guess. Are you sure we’re doing the right thing?”
“I can only speak for myself, Helen. I think so.”
Helen nodded then and Jennie added, “Just like we discussed as we got her ready.”
Helen nodded again and strapped herself on the airship control platform.
A few minutes later and they were landing in the parking lot of what was left of the hospital. Jennie had to really lay on the brakes to stop the ultra-light when it landed. There was just enough room.
“Do what you need,” Jennie called over to Helen.
“Aren’t you coming?” Helen yelled back as the ground shook again.
Jennie looked around her at the desperate people. “No.” She lifted the edge of her leather jacket and showed Helen the handgun holstered there. “There could be problems.”
Helen blanched, but a surviving doctor grabbed her and began pulling her toward the remains of the hospital. “We have injured and the sick… What do we do?”
Helen came into her own then. The doubt was gone. Though they were already fairly organized and trying to recover the living, the dying, and the dead from the hospital as it continued to fail, Helen put a fine point on a few things.
She saw one of the surgical nurses and barked a command. “Get all the supplies you can get to out here.”
“But the patients…”
“Aren’t going to survive without supplies and equipment. Get going.”
The woman nodded and hurried into the hospital building again as an orderly helped an elderly man out of the building.
The orderly looked at Helen. She gritted her teeth. “Everyone goes through triage.”
The orderly nodded and helped the man over to the triage area. Knowing the color code, she saw the doctor doing the triage decisions have the orderly placed in the “Those Likely To Die, Even With Treatment” section. The man was one of those that Helen had treated and brought back from the edge of death a month before.
When the nurse came back with her arms full of the supplies, Helen directed her to put half with the supplies they were already using at the hospital aid station set up outside, and the rest on the Sally Sue platform.
Though she hesitated, the nurse finally did as asked. And went back for more. She made three more trips before the hospital completely collapsed, sinking halfway out of sight in the liquefied soil. Most simply closed their ears to the screams from those inside. At least they didn’t last long.
When Helen headed for the Sally Sue shortly after that, the senior doctor at the hospital stopped her and asked, “Where do you think you’re going? We need you here!”
“You need someone where it is safe to take those that can be helped. Jennie here will be transporting people to wherever we can find a safer place.”
The doctor thought about it and finally nodded. “How many can you take?”
“Just one at a time, plus a few pounds of supplies. If you can get someone to make the rounds at the Wal-Mart and all the pharmacies, have them take everything we might use here.”
“What if they refuse to give up the supplies?” the doctor asked.
“Use some persuasion, if you must. If you can’t convince them, go elsewhere. I’m not going to start a war over supplies.”
When Helen turned around she saw Jennie facing a group of about a dozen people. She had the pistol out, in her hand, and looked ready to use it. “Get someone loaded and let’s get out of here. We need to find a spot before dark.”
Helen nodded, grabbed the same nurse that had been getting supplies and between them carried a patient over to the Sally Sue and got him buckled in. Two minutes later the two craft were airborne, headed west.
The devastation was awful, everywhere they looked. People that saw them waved and shouted, but Helen and Jennie held their course. They were headed for Dyersburg, Tennessee. It was close to the Mississippi, but hopefully far enough away to be immune from the problems the river would cause, and on solid enough ground that the earthquakes wouldn’t liquefy it. They might be in poor shape there, but it would be better than anywhere in the Bootheel. It was rapidly becoming a swamp again, Helen and Jennie saw as they traveled east.
They landed amidst a stunned group of survivors at the hospital. It looked like it had suffered some damage, and there were groups all around it, but it was still standing and people were going in and out.
Jennie stayed with the two aircraft as Helen went to meet the authorities in charge. A few minutes later she came back with five people and they unloaded the patient and the supplies. “You can’t fly at night,” Helen told Jennie firmly, having seen the look in her eyes. Jennie had not liked leaving people behind, even though it was her idea.
Jennie’s shoulders fell. “No. I know. I just... I just feel like I should be doing more.”
“You were right in your plan, Jennie. We’re both going to be able to do more, help more people, doing it the way we are than if we stayed there. Now, there is a place set up for people helping to get some rest and food. So…”
“I’m self-sufficient there,” Jennie said firmly. She was not about to use scarce resources when she had her own. “And I want to stay close to my ultra-light and the Sally Sue. We barely got away from that mob that was forming, intending to take them for their own use.”
“Yeah. I saw the gun. You do know how to use, it, don’t you?”
Jennie’s grin was a bit predatory. “Oh, yeah. I know how to use it. And when.”
Helen nodded. “I have patients that need me. Get what rest you can. I know you’ll be up early.”
Jennie nodded. But instead of eating and going straight to bed, she began to dismantle the MX Sport enough to make it impossible to fly, and unlikely to be damaged in trying. Then she took the EMR pack off, as well as the BOB, and the fuel cans, and transferred them to the Sally Sue, which was now looking rather limp, as the hot air inside cooled to ambient temperature.
Jennie set up a tight camp, ate a freeze-dried meal and drank a liter of water. She took enough time to go to the latrine that had been prepared, but hurried back to the Sally Sue. With her self-inflating mattress on the deck of the airship, Jennie laid out her sleeping bag and slipped inside, still wearing her clothes.
Twice she woke up as people moved around the airship. But they were only curious and moved on when Jennie warned them away. Early the next morning she was in and out of the latrine, breakfasted, and had the burners going on the Sally Sue when Helen walked up.
“You know I trust you, Jennie. But be careful. Even though I was going to sell her, I kind of have a soft spot in my heart for this young bird.”
“I know, Helen. How should I select who comes with me?”
“You don’t. That’ll be up to the medical personnel, or maybe other authorities.”
“Other authorities?”
“President has declared martial law in the area.”
“Oh. Okay. I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll see you later.” Jennie strapped on her helmet and strapped into the pilot’s seat of the Sally Sue. A few minutes later she was airborne, thankful for the leather jacket she wore, headed west, the sun beginning to shine down on a ravaged landscape.
Tempted as she was to try to help those stranded on the tops of their houses as the river flooded out over the flat terrain, Jennie saw boats out doing the same thing. She held her course despite the shouts and shaking fists as she passed person after person.
She couldn’t see it, but the entire area had lifted, even as much of it liquefied, due to the earthquakes and the volcano. The Mississippi on the east side, and the St. Francis on the west side, were quickly filling what was becoming a new swampy lake that made Reelfoot Lake, produced in the 1811-1812 earthquakes, look like a little puddle.
The flooding gave Jennie a new sense of urgency. So did the brief whiff of volcanic gasses as she crossed through a hot wind that was coming from the volcano. It was erupting even more violently, though there wasn’t much ash. Just the gasses and huge amounts of lava. When she approached Kennett she could see the new volcanic mountain five miles south of her.
The people in the hospital didn’t waste any time. They had a patient and four boxes of supplies loaded on the Sally Sue only minutes after Jennie set her down. A group quickly formed, but Jennie lifted off before they could make a move on the airship.
Jennie got on the radio and warned those in charge on the ground she wouldn’t land again unless the mob was under control. She was assured they would be her next trip. Jennie made several trips. As some useful supplies were gathered in and around Dyersburg, Jennie took back as much as she brought from Kennett. They managed to keep Jennie supplied with gasoline and propane.
True to their word, there was no mob on any of the other trips. What there were, were some helicopters. Civilian, TV news, and military. Jennie had to keep a sharp eye out, despite the bright colors of the Sally Sue, for none of the other pilots were expecting to see anything like the small airship in the air.
Jennie spent the next three days ferrying those that could be saved with medical help from the Kennett and Senath areas, staying well away from the volcano, until the lava began to fight with the rising water for control of the two towns.
Her final four days in the air were rescuing people stranded in the flood water. Most of SEMO was once again swamp or lake, with the volcano now the dominate feature of the flat terrain.
Jennie’s last trip to the area was to go back to her former home. The property was on one of the highest spots in the area, by Jennie’s choice. Flooding had been high on the list of disasters she prepared for. It took a while to dig down to the storm shelter through the sand that now covered it. She took her time moving the totes from the storm shelter. She could see the water rising even as she worked.
Once everything was loaded, Jennie watched the water come up to the wheels of the Sally Sue. Only then did Jennie throttle up and turn on the burners to lift the airship into the air.
Ultra-light – A Vignette - Epilog
And so, as Jennie tearfully said good-bye to Helen, and shed a tear or two over the Sally Sue, another volcano sprung up along the New Madrid Seismic Zone fault lines. Then another and another as the area up lifted and became the New Madrid Mountain Range, with the Mississippi River flowing just to the west of the range.
One had to admit that it was an amazing sight, seeing mountains form before one’s very eyes. And large numbers of people that had not experienced the process close up, first hand, flocked to the many new resorts that went up near each of the new volcanoes, for the sightseers to stay in at night after a day of watching the volcano grow another foot, or two, or twenty.
The Senath Volcano… Senath, since it was about three hundred feet closer to Senath than it was to Kennett… being the first, had the biggest and finest motel resort complex built on the western edge of SEMO Lake. The volcano was easily visible, and the quarter-a-look binoculars were occupied constantly from daylight till dark, and sometimes long into the night when a particularly brilliant display of magma shot into the sky to become lava on the volcano’s sides.
And Jennie put the terror of those few days out of her head, negotiated another no-lay-off, five-year-guaranteed, exceeding lucrative salary contract, as a bona fide survivor slash heroine tour-guide. But she still got the occasional three-day week end off and continued to fly the MX Sport, though almost always away from the volcano.
End ********
Copyright 2009
Jerry D Young
Miles underground, beneath the mighty Mississippi the earth was undergoing changes. For millions of years, the North American tectonic plate had been under tremendous stress as the west edge went one direction, and the east edge went another. Like stretch marks in the belly of the earth, the surface of the ground spread slightly every day, and the opening filled over the same millions of years with the silt from surface between the Appalachians and the Rockies.
But as the surface was filled with good old dirt, and the Mississippi River kept the filling going on, the underside, also being thinned, had magma filling the gap. It was only a matter of time when this weak spot in the center of America failed. Each terrible earthquake over the eons in the area had simply brought the event closer to being. Then one day the mantle was breached, the magma meeting the dirt fill, almost right under the Mississippi River.
Ultra-light – A Vignette
Jennie Foster loved to fly. Especially her Quicksilver MX Sport single seat ultra-light. The open cockpit, tricycle gear, fixed wing plane couldn’t go as fast as many of the other planes she’d flown and flown in, but none of them could go where she could go with the MX Sport. She could take off and land in any large open grassy area.
She flew whenever she could, usually with friends in their own ultra-lights. But Jennie had a secret life that none of her flying friends knew about. She was a closet prepper. Living in the New Madrid Seismic Zone in the Bootheel of Missouri was the reason she started.
But as she learned more and more, she realized that anywhere in the US, and literally the world, there were natural hazards. And human caused disaster could certainly affect any place one might choose to live. A person that wanted to get through a disaster as easily as possible needed preps, no matter where they lived.
She loved the open spaces of SEMO, the beautiful fields of various crops grown in the bountiful ex-swamp ground. Flying in the area could be a bit tricky, as storms could develop quickly, but with her preparedness mentality, Jennie always had a NOAA Weather Radio with her. She never tried to fly when there were watches out, much less warnings.
Unlike all of her friends that flew, Jennie kept a backpack strapped in the MX Sport that was her aircraft BOB. If, heaven forbid, she went down anywhere when she was flying, she had the means to take care of herself for three days easily, while getting back home, with or without help.
Being a slim, trim, 5’2” and 102 pounds gave her plenty of weight allowance for the BOB in the MX Sport, while still being able to carry a maximum fuel load, and still have the weight well below the maximum rating for the ultra-light.
Today, she was headed to Kennett from her home outside of Senath, to take a flight on her friend’s newly acquired Sky Yacht personal hot air blimp. Dr. Helen Druthers shared the same love of flight as Jennie and the two had taken flight training together, when Jennie was just old enough to, and Helen, several years older, was looking for some adventure after a bad divorce.
While Jennie made a decent living, Dr. Druthers came from a wealthy family, and did very well on her own as one of the preeminent doctors in the area. She had two ultra-lights, a conventional four-seat single engine plane, and now the Sky Yacht.
Jennie made it to the far corner of the airport where Helen had been given permission to unfold, inflate and launch the air ship. Helen was waiting for her, a big grin on her face. “You’re going to love this, Jennie!”
The two women hadn’t seen one another for a few weeks and shared a quick hug. Both were excited and looking forward to the flight. Getting the framework unfolded and the fabric adjusted took a little while, but soon enough the propane burners were filling the envelope with hot air.
The air ship looked fairly conventional, as air ships go, except for being slightly stubby and fat looking. Helen did a thorough walk around, checking everything carefully, just as she’d been taught at the Sky Yacht headquarters when she bought the Sally Sue.
When things were ready, the two women, helmets in place, strapped themselves into/onto the platform suspended from the air ship framework at the front of the craft. The engine, mounted on the very tail end of the ship, fired right up and after clearing for takeoff by radio, they were off the ground.
Helen headed away from the airport flight path so she could begin showing off the capabilities of the air ship for Jennie. Flying well above the tree tops, but slowly, Helen cut back the throttle and maneuvered downward.
Jennie sucked in her breath slightly when Helen brought the Sally Sue to a hover. “Grab a leaf,” Helen said with a laugh. Jennie grinned and reached out. She carefully pulled loose the very top leave of the fifty foot high tree as Helen slowly brought the rear end of the air ship around, keeping the front almost stationary.
“Wow!” Jennie shouted and laughed. Helen joined in the laughter and then put the Sally Sue on a climbing course toward Senath. When they reached Jennie’s modest property a couple miles out of town, Helen landed in her front yard, and they began to deflate the envelope.
When it was safe to leave the craft, Jennie took Helen inside and fixed lunch for the pair of them, talking animatedly about the Sky Yacht. Naturally, on the way back to the airport in Kennett an hour later, Jennie got her chance to handle the air ship. She put it through its paces under Helen’s strict tutelage.
When they landed and had the Sally Sue deflated, folded up, and stored on the trailer, Jennie thanked Helen and headed home, wondering how she could ever afford one of the air ships herself. “Sure is nice to know friendly people with money,” she said into the wind whipping her hair as she drove the New Bug convertible home.
Jennie thought about the flight a few times over the next few months, but things never seemed to work out to get another chance to fly with Helen. Jennie managed to fly her MX Sport several times during that time and decided as much as she liked the Sally Sue, fixed wing was her game.
But with the bad economic situation that seemed to just keep getting worse, Jennie was putting in more and more hours at the shiny new motel that Senath boasted. Finished a year previously, just as Jennie came home with a year’s experience in a Mexican resort, after her schooling for hotel management concluded, Jennie snagged the assistant manager’s position for the new motel.
Rather doubtful of the success of such a large operation in Senath, Jennie had fought for and received a pretty much ironclad no-lay-off, guaranteed-for-five-years contract. The place could go belly up the day after it opened and she’d still get paid for five years. Either quarterly payments or a lump sum, at the company’s choice.
While the suggestion was that she might sabotage the operation so she could collect her pay without working, there was a bonus clause in the contract. If the motel did a certain amount of business during the five-year period and lasted the full five years, Jennie would get a huge bonus and the managerial position, with a similar type of contract.
Jennie was amazed that she got almost all the elements in the contract she wanted, but the area was depressed and good help, always hard to find, was even more difficult to find in the area, especially with someone with Jennie’s education and already fairly extensive experience in handling a motel environment.
But things were difficult, and she had to lay off three of the twelve person staff. She picked up the slack, working ten to twelve hours a day, often at night, for ten to fourteen days straight.
But the salary she’d negotiated was huge for the area, and she felt an obligation to make the operation a success, only in part because of the bonus clause. So she took on the extra duties of the laid off employees.
She finally had a three day weekend, in part because the motel had absolutely no reservations for the time frame. And the regular business they did get, mostly from truckers and other regular travelers on US 412, could be handled by the rest of the staff for three days.
Jennie, after a day of catching up on housework in her neat little two bedroom bungalow, reassembled the MX Sport from its storage mode, packed a lunch, and took off from her open back yard.
It was a glorious day and Jennie let out a whoop of joy as a flock of birds juked in unison to get out of her way. To get as far away as possible from the daily grind, she put the ultra-light in an economical climb rate. She wanted maximum time at maximum height.
It was August, and the fields were in all their productive glory. Having done the same thing many times before, Jennie still felt the draw to document the area for advertising for the motel. So she had her little video camera with her. At maximum altitude, she held the cameral steady and turned the craft in a wide circle, taking in the entire horizon.
Something caught her eye just as she let the camera hang back down on her chest. “Oh, no!” she thought, “a fire!”
She brought the walky-talky up to her lips, but hesitated before she reported the smoke to the authorities.
Instead, she changed course slightly and headed for the column of smoke. It didn’t look quite right to be smoke from a wheat field fire. There was just something about it. That was when she noticed a car on US 412 run off the road. Then another and another. “What in the world?” Jennie asked herself.
Then when the ground ahead of her erupted and a column of wet sand shot into the air three hundred feet high she realized what was happening. The New Madrid Seismic Zone was acting up. An earthquake. Perhaps the long dreaded “Big One”.
There was nothing she could do at the moment, so she lifted the camera again and began to document the event from the air. It was only when she got close to that one particular column of smoke that she suddenly dropped the camera on its leash and turned the MX Sport around and headed for home at the highest speed she could achieve. Her face was deathly white. This wasn’t just a simple earthquake, “The Big One” or not.
No. This was Parícutin, Mexico all over again. A volcano was forming right beside US 412 half-way between Senath and Kennett. Only instead of the middle of a corn field, it was in the middle of a soybean field. And instead of a small hole initially, there was already lava flowing from the small mound already in evidence.
Her hand was shaking when she lifted the walky-talky to her lips again. She keyed the mike, finally got someone to answer her, and explained what was happening. They simply didn’t believe her. Earthquake, yes. Volcano no. They were dealing with the earthquake and had no use for someone pulling a prank at the time.
Frowning, Jennie landed the MX Sport and idled it up near the house. She ran a ragged course that short distance. The ground was moving erratically. She saw the large crack at one corner of the house and hesitated before she went inside.
Things settled for a moment and Jennie decided to risk it. A glance to the north just before she went inside had her hurrying even more. Always a neat person, Jennie’s preps were neatly stored. She couldn’t take everything, she knew. She was prepared for any number of different disasters. A volcano was way down on the list, but it was on the list.
Repacking the large Kifaru EMR back pack with the things she wanted to take, and carefully reclosing and stashing the totes in the small storm cellar at the edge of her yard, Jennie took a good twenty minutes to get ready. The house had been groaning eerily with each new ground shake and Jennie finally stopped moving things to the shelter, realizing they weren’t important things. Everything truly important was already in the storm cellar.
She couldn’t help it. Jennie screamed when a sand spout shot up across the road to the north. She felt the moisture from the wet sand as the wind swirled around. Struggling under the weight of the pack, Jennie took it to the MX Sport and strapped it into place just as she’d practiced before. She topped off the craft’s fuel tank, and then, hesitating because it was strictly against the rules, strapped that partial can of fuel, plus the other full one she had, to the framework of the ultra-light.
“Good thing you lost that five pounds,” she whispered as she put on her helmet again, pulled on the leather jacket she’d brought from the house, and then strapped herself into the ultra-light again.
Her shoulders hunched when a loud cracking sound behind her, audible even over the sound of the ultra-light’s engine, brought her attention to her house. But just for a moment. The house was now a mound of rubble, and the sand from the sand blow was already across the road and would soon engulf it, if the sand blow continued.
Putting the thoughts of the house behind her, Jennie started her takeoff run. She thought she’d made a serious mistake, adding as much weight to the craft as she had. The MX sport felt sluggish and didn’t seem to want to lift off the ground.
Jennie screamed again when she saw the ground lifting ahead of her in a rolling motion. But as it passed under her, the lifting motion of the land wave launching the MX Sport into the air. Throttle at maximum, Jennie climbed as fast as she could, while turning to the east.
She had to juke once, barely avoiding going into a nose dive, when she quickly changed course as yet another sand spout erupted right in front of her. Particles of wet sand peppered her leather jacket and helmet as she flew past the column, which was at least fifty feet higher than the altitude she was flying.
Continuing to climb, and headed northeast toward Kennett, Jennie watched the horror unfold below her. She could see wave after wave of the land below traveling across the landscape all the way to the horizon. It had been going on, off and on, for twenty minutes and showed no signs of stopping. The motel, like her house, was rubble. She could only hope everyone got out.
Glancing to her left, the northwest, Jennie saw the smoke from the fires the lava was starting in the fields. There was a distinct mound now, even as far away as she was. Jennie had the presence of mind to use the video camera and take some more footage of the volcano in its birthing phase.
She didn’t think she’d make it through when she hit what felt like a wall in the air. The winds were from the west, and she was passing due east of the emerging volcano. Fortunately there wasn’t much ash, though there was some, but there were hot gasses.
Jennie held her breath until she thought she would pass out, the MS Sport at full throttle, in a shallow dive to get more speed, to get out of the stream of death coming from the volcano. She finally had to take a breath. It was cold, clear air. She opened her eyes, saw the ground approaching and pulled the craft out of the shallow dive.
Climbing back to cruising height, Jennie set a bee-line course to Dr. Druthers’ home on the northern edge of Kennett, circling around the city proper when she got there. Flying over habitation was also against the rules.
Jennie landed the craft expertly, despite the high weight. The machine took it and was ready for more when Jennie turned off the motor. Jennie staggered slightly on her way to the house, terrified at what she might find. The constant earthquakes were just as bad here as at Senath. Helen’s house was in the process of crumbling, just as Jennie’s had. Jennie wondered just how wide spread the destruction would be.
Helen met her at the back door. “I heard you coming in. Can you believe this? I think this qualifies as “The Big One”.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Jennie said. She opened up the screen on the video camera and played back the footage of the volcano.
“What do we do?” Helen asked. “We have to help. I have to get to the hospital!”
“Yes. I agree. But there is a limited amount we can do. There isn’t a bridge standing that I could see. The only transport going more than a mile or two is going to involve a boat or a helicopter. Or an ultra-light or blimp. We have to maintain the ability to move. I can’t carry passengers, but the Sally Sue can.”
“What are you saying?” Helen asked, disbelief on her face.
“We get the supplies we can, get somewhere safe, and set up an aid station. I’ll use the Sally Sue to ferry whoever needs it the worst to you to work on.”
“But the hospital… The equipment there…”
“Won’t be working. If the generator even runs, they don’t have that much fuel. And it is doubtful the building will survive. It was built before enough people understood the dangers and insisted on earthquake resistant building codes in this area. I’m not sure that would have helped, anyway. Houses and barns and other structures are tumbling down everywhere you look.”
Another huge shock rocked them and Helen’s house sank some more. The ground was liquefying with all the shaking motion. “Let’s grab what we can and figure how to get you to the airport to get the Sally Sue.”
“It’s here,” Helen said. “I’m going… was going to sell it and brought it home.”
“That’s even better. Let’s get the things out of the house and get the air ship ready to fly.”
They were only able to get inside twice each before the house became too dangerous to enter. They spent precious minutes getting the airship ready. Fortunately the house had not tumbled onto it when it began to fail.
The houses on either side of Helen’s, and those across the street, all were suffering the same fate.
“You ready?” Jennie asked Helen when the envelope of the airship was full of hot air and they were ready to fly.
Helen bit her lower lip. “I guess. Are you sure we’re doing the right thing?”
“I can only speak for myself, Helen. I think so.”
Helen nodded then and Jennie added, “Just like we discussed as we got her ready.”
Helen nodded again and strapped herself on the airship control platform.
A few minutes later and they were landing in the parking lot of what was left of the hospital. Jennie had to really lay on the brakes to stop the ultra-light when it landed. There was just enough room.
“Do what you need,” Jennie called over to Helen.
“Aren’t you coming?” Helen yelled back as the ground shook again.
Jennie looked around her at the desperate people. “No.” She lifted the edge of her leather jacket and showed Helen the handgun holstered there. “There could be problems.”
Helen blanched, but a surviving doctor grabbed her and began pulling her toward the remains of the hospital. “We have injured and the sick… What do we do?”
Helen came into her own then. The doubt was gone. Though they were already fairly organized and trying to recover the living, the dying, and the dead from the hospital as it continued to fail, Helen put a fine point on a few things.
She saw one of the surgical nurses and barked a command. “Get all the supplies you can get to out here.”
“But the patients…”
“Aren’t going to survive without supplies and equipment. Get going.”
The woman nodded and hurried into the hospital building again as an orderly helped an elderly man out of the building.
The orderly looked at Helen. She gritted her teeth. “Everyone goes through triage.”
The orderly nodded and helped the man over to the triage area. Knowing the color code, she saw the doctor doing the triage decisions have the orderly placed in the “Those Likely To Die, Even With Treatment” section. The man was one of those that Helen had treated and brought back from the edge of death a month before.
When the nurse came back with her arms full of the supplies, Helen directed her to put half with the supplies they were already using at the hospital aid station set up outside, and the rest on the Sally Sue platform.
Though she hesitated, the nurse finally did as asked. And went back for more. She made three more trips before the hospital completely collapsed, sinking halfway out of sight in the liquefied soil. Most simply closed their ears to the screams from those inside. At least they didn’t last long.
When Helen headed for the Sally Sue shortly after that, the senior doctor at the hospital stopped her and asked, “Where do you think you’re going? We need you here!”
“You need someone where it is safe to take those that can be helped. Jennie here will be transporting people to wherever we can find a safer place.”
The doctor thought about it and finally nodded. “How many can you take?”
“Just one at a time, plus a few pounds of supplies. If you can get someone to make the rounds at the Wal-Mart and all the pharmacies, have them take everything we might use here.”
“What if they refuse to give up the supplies?” the doctor asked.
“Use some persuasion, if you must. If you can’t convince them, go elsewhere. I’m not going to start a war over supplies.”
When Helen turned around she saw Jennie facing a group of about a dozen people. She had the pistol out, in her hand, and looked ready to use it. “Get someone loaded and let’s get out of here. We need to find a spot before dark.”
Helen nodded, grabbed the same nurse that had been getting supplies and between them carried a patient over to the Sally Sue and got him buckled in. Two minutes later the two craft were airborne, headed west.
The devastation was awful, everywhere they looked. People that saw them waved and shouted, but Helen and Jennie held their course. They were headed for Dyersburg, Tennessee. It was close to the Mississippi, but hopefully far enough away to be immune from the problems the river would cause, and on solid enough ground that the earthquakes wouldn’t liquefy it. They might be in poor shape there, but it would be better than anywhere in the Bootheel. It was rapidly becoming a swamp again, Helen and Jennie saw as they traveled east.
They landed amidst a stunned group of survivors at the hospital. It looked like it had suffered some damage, and there were groups all around it, but it was still standing and people were going in and out.
Jennie stayed with the two aircraft as Helen went to meet the authorities in charge. A few minutes later she came back with five people and they unloaded the patient and the supplies. “You can’t fly at night,” Helen told Jennie firmly, having seen the look in her eyes. Jennie had not liked leaving people behind, even though it was her idea.
Jennie’s shoulders fell. “No. I know. I just... I just feel like I should be doing more.”
“You were right in your plan, Jennie. We’re both going to be able to do more, help more people, doing it the way we are than if we stayed there. Now, there is a place set up for people helping to get some rest and food. So…”
“I’m self-sufficient there,” Jennie said firmly. She was not about to use scarce resources when she had her own. “And I want to stay close to my ultra-light and the Sally Sue. We barely got away from that mob that was forming, intending to take them for their own use.”
“Yeah. I saw the gun. You do know how to use, it, don’t you?”
Jennie’s grin was a bit predatory. “Oh, yeah. I know how to use it. And when.”
Helen nodded. “I have patients that need me. Get what rest you can. I know you’ll be up early.”
Jennie nodded. But instead of eating and going straight to bed, she began to dismantle the MX Sport enough to make it impossible to fly, and unlikely to be damaged in trying. Then she took the EMR pack off, as well as the BOB, and the fuel cans, and transferred them to the Sally Sue, which was now looking rather limp, as the hot air inside cooled to ambient temperature.
Jennie set up a tight camp, ate a freeze-dried meal and drank a liter of water. She took enough time to go to the latrine that had been prepared, but hurried back to the Sally Sue. With her self-inflating mattress on the deck of the airship, Jennie laid out her sleeping bag and slipped inside, still wearing her clothes.
Twice she woke up as people moved around the airship. But they were only curious and moved on when Jennie warned them away. Early the next morning she was in and out of the latrine, breakfasted, and had the burners going on the Sally Sue when Helen walked up.
“You know I trust you, Jennie. But be careful. Even though I was going to sell her, I kind of have a soft spot in my heart for this young bird.”
“I know, Helen. How should I select who comes with me?”
“You don’t. That’ll be up to the medical personnel, or maybe other authorities.”
“Other authorities?”
“President has declared martial law in the area.”
“Oh. Okay. I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll see you later.” Jennie strapped on her helmet and strapped into the pilot’s seat of the Sally Sue. A few minutes later she was airborne, thankful for the leather jacket she wore, headed west, the sun beginning to shine down on a ravaged landscape.
Tempted as she was to try to help those stranded on the tops of their houses as the river flooded out over the flat terrain, Jennie saw boats out doing the same thing. She held her course despite the shouts and shaking fists as she passed person after person.
She couldn’t see it, but the entire area had lifted, even as much of it liquefied, due to the earthquakes and the volcano. The Mississippi on the east side, and the St. Francis on the west side, were quickly filling what was becoming a new swampy lake that made Reelfoot Lake, produced in the 1811-1812 earthquakes, look like a little puddle.
The flooding gave Jennie a new sense of urgency. So did the brief whiff of volcanic gasses as she crossed through a hot wind that was coming from the volcano. It was erupting even more violently, though there wasn’t much ash. Just the gasses and huge amounts of lava. When she approached Kennett she could see the new volcanic mountain five miles south of her.
The people in the hospital didn’t waste any time. They had a patient and four boxes of supplies loaded on the Sally Sue only minutes after Jennie set her down. A group quickly formed, but Jennie lifted off before they could make a move on the airship.
Jennie got on the radio and warned those in charge on the ground she wouldn’t land again unless the mob was under control. She was assured they would be her next trip. Jennie made several trips. As some useful supplies were gathered in and around Dyersburg, Jennie took back as much as she brought from Kennett. They managed to keep Jennie supplied with gasoline and propane.
True to their word, there was no mob on any of the other trips. What there were, were some helicopters. Civilian, TV news, and military. Jennie had to keep a sharp eye out, despite the bright colors of the Sally Sue, for none of the other pilots were expecting to see anything like the small airship in the air.
Jennie spent the next three days ferrying those that could be saved with medical help from the Kennett and Senath areas, staying well away from the volcano, until the lava began to fight with the rising water for control of the two towns.
Her final four days in the air were rescuing people stranded in the flood water. Most of SEMO was once again swamp or lake, with the volcano now the dominate feature of the flat terrain.
Jennie’s last trip to the area was to go back to her former home. The property was on one of the highest spots in the area, by Jennie’s choice. Flooding had been high on the list of disasters she prepared for. It took a while to dig down to the storm shelter through the sand that now covered it. She took her time moving the totes from the storm shelter. She could see the water rising even as she worked.
Once everything was loaded, Jennie watched the water come up to the wheels of the Sally Sue. Only then did Jennie throttle up and turn on the burners to lift the airship into the air.
Ultra-light – A Vignette - Epilog
And so, as Jennie tearfully said good-bye to Helen, and shed a tear or two over the Sally Sue, another volcano sprung up along the New Madrid Seismic Zone fault lines. Then another and another as the area up lifted and became the New Madrid Mountain Range, with the Mississippi River flowing just to the west of the range.
One had to admit that it was an amazing sight, seeing mountains form before one’s very eyes. And large numbers of people that had not experienced the process close up, first hand, flocked to the many new resorts that went up near each of the new volcanoes, for the sightseers to stay in at night after a day of watching the volcano grow another foot, or two, or twenty.
The Senath Volcano… Senath, since it was about three hundred feet closer to Senath than it was to Kennett… being the first, had the biggest and finest motel resort complex built on the western edge of SEMO Lake. The volcano was easily visible, and the quarter-a-look binoculars were occupied constantly from daylight till dark, and sometimes long into the night when a particularly brilliant display of magma shot into the sky to become lava on the volcano’s sides.
And Jennie put the terror of those few days out of her head, negotiated another no-lay-off, five-year-guaranteed, exceeding lucrative salary contract, as a bona fide survivor slash heroine tour-guide. But she still got the occasional three-day week end off and continued to fly the MX Sport, though almost always away from the volcano.
End ********
Copyright 2009
Jerry D Young