User:Capt Katie Helm USAF

Wednesday, July 14, 2010 To whomever might find this: this is a record of what I hope will only be a few days spent on the ground. With some luck, in just a few days, I’ll be reviewing the contents over a cold one in the O-club. If not…maybe, just maybe, someone will find this and can answer some questions as to what happened to me.

We were off at 2220, Fitz as co-pilot and Schlemke as loadmaster. Mission was to carry a fairly light load of 4 x 2,000 pound pallets of supplies to Fort Creedy in Malton. I checked the JPADS coordinates myself, because I didn’t want to think about defenders having to leave the walls of the fort to get their supplies from the middle of the street…like I am now. It was going to be dark as hell, and even though we were told that there are some lights on in Malton, we were to ignore any signals from the ground (as they could be diversionary) and trust the GPS to bring the chutes into the compound.

We headed south, crossed over the boundary on time, and about two minutes from the drop, wouldn’t you know it but we had a *dual* engine failure. As new as those AE2100s are, it’s pretty rare to have a single-engine failure, but both of those big spools rolled back *at the same time*, and before you knew it, we had twelve blades windmilling. I pushed the condition lever into AIRSTART and held it, but there was no light-off. We had another 5,000 feet to work with, but headed downstairs like a ton of bricks. I told Schlemke to jettison our cargo immediately—somebody will put it to good use, wherever it lands. At the same time, Fitz started his mayday call just as I was about to tell him; good CRM pays dividends.

I also wanted to get us away from Malton, so I started a 10-degree angle of bank turn to the right, veering off through the west to north, trying to get back where we came from. I felt the pallets depart, and as I retrimmed I told Schlemke to shut the door for drag. By this time, the APU was up and running, so GENERATOR – ON and CONDITION LEVER – AIRSTART again. Nothing. Those big Allison engines didn't want to light. I didn’t *want* to admit failure, but at this point it's too dark to even attempt an emergency landing, and anyway I know it’s solid city below us like downtown L.A., so I knew we’d have to jump for it if we didn’t want to come to a sudden stop at the end. So I brought the condition levers back to FEATHER, and told everyone to don chutes—quickly.

Fitz was ready in no time, and then held the controls for me. When I was done, I gave the bailout command, and told Fitz not to wait for me, just make sure Schlemke gets out, so that when I go, I know they’re together and I’m the last one out. He was gone in a flash. I gave him an audible count to five, then set the autopilot to ROLL and VERTICAL SPEED mode to our present best-glide speed, and followed right behind them out the side door.

I had my hand on the ripcord before I jumped, and was pulling it before I was even in the slipstream. Opening shock was…well, quite a shock. It was *so damn dark* that I was completely disoriented and almost claustrophobic until the chute opened and I was righted. Fitz and Schlemke were gone. There was no way I was turning on my strobe or anything, and let everyone on the ground know exactly where fresh brains were. I could just see the last few minutes of the back end of our C-27 from the interior cabin lights, still locked into its glide.

And wouldn’t you know it, the son of a bitch just managed to clear the boundary fence before it died! Of all the stupid luck!

I landed heavily, in front of a church. The name on the arch said St. Josephine's Church. I shucked off the torso harness, and (without thinking about it) abandoned the gear in the street. Part of me wanted to yell out for my crew, but I knew better. Until I was certain about the ground situation, it would be better to go into hiding. Freed of the parachute, I ran straight into the church, whose doors were wide open.

Inside, I met Brian Rhyan, a new firefighter; Leadgiver2, a new NecroTech scientist; Stiffton, a private in the military; and Tom Fo0lery, a new cop. I wanted to stay, but didn’t feel safe. I learned that there was a police station to the north. All I had was my pistol and two clips, and I really wanted more. I set off for the police station.

Halfway there, I ran across the St Wilfrid’s Hospital. There were a few survivors inside, and I chatted with them briefly while looking for first aid kits—I found three. I also found this notepad. And then I moved on.

When I got to Brentnall Grove Police Department, it was so heavily barricaded, I couldn’t find any way in. This was a major blow. I was really disappointed. How was I supposed to survive if I couldn’t get into these vital supply points?

I headed straight east, passing the Maria General Hospital, which was also too heavily barricaded to enter. I was beginning to get genuinely concerned that I’d either have to sleep out on the street, or head all the way back to St. Josephine’s Church.

Just as I was starting to get really concerned, I passed the Eatwell Walk Fire Station, which was also extremely heavily barricaded! Now I was almost panicked. I saw there was one more police station ahead, a few blocks away, the Lamport Walk Police Department. I could see the lights on inside from a block away, and let me tell you, *nothing* made me feel safer. I crawled over the barricade, and joined about a dozen other survivors inside. I think I actually fell asleep standing up.

After a short, much-needed sleep, I scratched out these lines in my little journal here. Like I said, I hope that in a day or two, I’ll be laughing about this whole thing. If not…mom and dad, I love you very much and hope that I made you proud. My life has been an adventure up to this point, and everything I’ve done has been worth it. I wouldn’t trade a second of flying to reach this point.