“For another half hour and then we’ve got to climb as far again—can’t take any chance in a mess like this—I’ve always got that Transcontinental Air Transport liner, the San Francisco in my mind when I strike into a heavy fog.”[[3]]
Perk made a queer sound with his lips as if to indicate that his feelings ran along the same groove. Indeed, many an air pilot has had that same terrible tragedy flash before him when plunging onward through an opaque wall of fog, unable to even see his own wingtips.
“I’m on partner,” said Perk as he took over the stick. “Meanin’ to get seven winks o’ sleep, ain’t you?”
“Not just now,” responded Jack, “truth is I’m not a bit sleepy so I’ll just take things easy and do some thinking while you run the ship.”
“Expected to meet up with some muck like this I guess, eh, partner?”
“Sure did Perk, only not quite so soon,” came the undisturbed reply. “It seems there’s been an unusual amount of dirty weather out this way lately and we’ve just slammed into this fog as a feeler. About four, start to head toward that higher ceiling—no particular hurry I’d say, according to the chart.”
“Okay Boss, I got you,” with which Perk relapsed in silence while the plane continued to speed along with its monotonous roar and hum.
If anything the fog was growing thicker, Perk made up his mind, although he really had nothing to afford any comparison since they were completely shut in as by a circular wall, not even a solitary star being in evidence and certainly not the faintest glimmer of a moving beacon down below where the unseen earth lay.
At such a time as this the air pilot finds himself depending wholly on the accuracy of his instruments, backed by his ability to read them without the slightest error. Perk was well up in all this and had no doubt of his judgment in carrying on. Flying blind is what these gallant sailors of the airways call such a condition, though the only recognition of the encompassing danger is a cutting down of their swift pace.
The consequent thrill that accompanies such a voyage through a sea of fog comes to every pilot; although in time they become so accustomed to the conditions that it fails to affect them as in the beginning. Should the bravest of men, though a beginner in aviation, ever experience such a wild night ride through space and heavy fog it would give him a sense of anticipation that could come through no other source, whether on sea or land.