As I stumble to the shower, my brain in boot-up mode, I glance at the time and pretend to comprehend. It's 3:50 AM. No matter what time I wake, my routine hasn't changed much since the Academy. There's always some iteration of shower, breakfast and coffee. Just before I leave the apartment a few miles west of St Louis, I stuff my cooler full of plastic containers, Cliff Bars, bagels and various other dry foods and snacks that I'd prepared the night before in anticipation of my 3-day trip.
With my car packed, I get in and check the time. It's 4:30 AM. It'll take me 30 minutes to drive to the parking lot, ride the bus, and walk through the airport to the gate where my airplane is sitting. As planned, I'll arrive about 15 minutes before my scheduled check-in time of 5:15 AM. The highway is nearly empty at this time of the morning, and even with the patchy fog, I manage to arrive earlier than planned. Once I get off the bus at the terminal, I check my mail to see if any of the manuals need updated (for my missile friends, think T.O. changes). Today there are none.
I leave the mailroom and walk toward the security checkpoint. At this time of the morning, the line is long but I walk around to the back where there is a special crew checkpoint. After my credentials are verified, I bypass security and make my way through the airport to gate where my airplane is parked. Approaching the podium, I see that the flight is "On-Time" with a scheduled departure of 6:00 AM. The boarding area is full of passengers and most look up and stare at me as I approach the door. I can imagine some are sizing me up, trying to determine with a glance if I'm qualified for the task at hand. Their empty looks make me want to smile and wave. Instead, I walk to the door, input my code, and walk down the jetway to the airplane. When I reach the end, it is clear that I'm the first one to work this morning because the airplane is completely dark and cold. Well, time to get to work, I say to myself.
After stowing my bags, I hop into the front of the airplane and begin flipping switches and pushing buttons. Have I ever mentioned how much I enjoy pushing buttons and turning switches? Well, I do and there are plenty of good heavy buttons to push here. I run through the power-up sequence or "flow" as we call it to bring the airplane to life. I turn on the batteries, fuel pumps, lights, and do a quick Fire-Detection test. On batteries, the airplane would go dark again in minutes so I reach up and start the auxiliary power unit (a mini jet engine in the tail of the airplane) to provide power and heat/air conditioning to the airplane.
Once everything is up and running, I grab my checklist and run outside to do the external inspection. I shine my flashlight in the wheel wells, at the engines, on the wings, and various other places to ensure nothing is broken. Once I make it all the way around, I walk underneath the terminal to grab the Release paperwork before heading back to the airplane.
Back in my seat, I glance at my watch. There are still 45 minutes before departure so I take some time to scour through the aircraft documents. This is where I review any deficiencies to the aircraft and verify that all required maintenance was completed. Once I determine everything is signed-off and in order, I sign my name to the document saying that I am "accepting" the airplane. The Captain will do the same thing once he arrives. I'm not going to wait for him though. The more I get done now, the more I can enjoy my coffee before we leave. I pull out the Dispatch Release, a 50-page document with all the details for our flight, and look it over. To the casual observer, it's completely cryptic. There are letters and numbers seemingly smashed together in a nonsensical format. To me, it's everything I could ever need and more. It has routing, fuel planning, altitudes, weather, navigational aid outages, and so-on.
Since this is the first flight of the day for this airplane, I have to do extra tests and checks that I normally don't do if the airplane had been flying. I test the auto-pilot for proper function and disconnection. The stall detection system is checked and tested. I run a few computer tests to ensure that all the sub-routines inside the Air Data and Inertial Reference Computers work correctly. I check for all the required manuals, fire suppression systems, and safety equipment before finally getting back to preparing for this particular flight.
With the checks and tests complete, I start to configure the airplane for departure. I configure our anti-icing system appropriately and move on to configuring the environmental control systems. The passengers have already started to board and the flight attendant informs me that it's still a little cold in the back. I push a few buttons and our air-conditioning/heating units screech to life. Once that's complete, I move to the flight computer. This is the most time-intensive task. It takes a little time to load the performance data and flight plan into the computer. Once complete, I start to pull up the weather in St Louis and our destination. There's a mini-printer that we use to print various things like weather and organize it for future reference. The last thing I have to do is pull up the clearance to verify that Air Traffic Control wants us to do what the company has filed in the system. I print it, set up the transponder (the oh-so-controversial piece of equipment from the Malaysia crash), and finish setting up the automatic pressurization computer.
The final passenger has boarded and with him, the Captain. He hops in his seat and starts running through his checks as I brief him on what I've done and read. The parade of people into the flight deck starts as the Gate Agent, baggage handler, and flight attendant all hand us over various pieces of paper that we look over. While the Captain looks over the paperwork, I put in the bag count into the computer and shortly after, the passenger count. We send the information and a computer somewhere crunches the data. It spits out various speeds, altitudes and headings which we need for both normal and emergency operations. I finish setting up for take-off and, once we verify that we are within weight and balance limits, tell the Gate Agent to pull the jet-bridge and the flight attendant to close the door. The bell rings as the bridge pulls away from the airplane and shortly after, our door slams shut. After a 30 minute long crescendo, it's quiet.
The flight deck door is closed, locked and parking brake released. With the drop of the handle, the clock starts and we are now getting paid for our work. The Captain calls for me to run a few checklists to ensure we accomplished everything we were supposed to and within a minute, we're being pushed away from gate. "Rough morning, eh?" I ask the guy next to me, the first non-canned interaction we've had since he introduced himself as he sat in his seat.
"You wouldn't believe how bad it's been," he replied. The moment was brief as we clear the gate area and are told to start our engines. Back to the practiced routine of call-outs, checklists and briefings. Even as we taxi to the runway, we run more tests and checks that we haven't been able to do since the engines were off. Everything is running and operating normally. I finish reading the "Taxi Checklist" when the Tower gives us our take-off instruction. I rush to call the flight attendant, unlock the flight controls, run the last test and turn the transponder to its flight mode. As we pull onto the runway, I finish the last checklist with a quick, "Before Takeoff Checklist, complete."
The lights of the runway are bright as the Captain lines up on the centerline. He awakens the engines and we roar down the concrete toward a wall of black. At 140 MPH, he pulls back on the controls and we quickly fly into nothingness. It's quiet and dark as we race into the still-night sky. "Waterski, Contact Departure. Good Morning," the tower tell us. "Departure. Good morning." I confirm.
Within a minute, we've turned back toward the east as we climb higher into the pre-dawn sky. At 6:10 AM, the rest of Missouri is just beginning to stir from the warmth of their beds. We leave the light-polluted area of St Louis behind and instantly the stars become visible, a white-paint splatter on a black canvas. It's beautiful. The rural lights on the ground and the stars meld together and I imagine myself flying through the blackness of space. Its beauty is simple but pales in comparison to what happens next.
When we reach 4 miles above the earth, the blackness is parted by a deep blood red streak on the horizon as if our takeoff had nicked the night sky. I slide my chair back, grab my coffee and just stare out the window to enjoy the show. It's still early and the radios are quiet. I sit in near silence as I enjoy the panoramic, unobstructed view of the sun rising over the East Coast.
As the earth turns toward the sun, the sky above the bleeding horizon begins to change. At first it's a barely a hint of a blue streak resting above the growing red light but soon begins to spread. I watch a deep blue sea surge over us as it battles the retreating blackness with its army of stars. Between sips of coffee, I look in every direction and witness the daily war between night and day. I glance back toward the still black horizon where the deep cherry smear is oozing in every direction creating an almost crimson backlight against the charcoal-blue backdrop of the sky.
Where the sun will rise, the red is the brightest. Like a volcano's lava spilling onto the rounded sides of the mountain below, the red bulges as it spreads to my periphery. Above the bubbling lava, the dull blue sea, successful in its objective against the night, has now begun a transformation to beige; a newly spawned bright layer of orange has perched itself on top of the deep crimson contaminating the blue ocean above. The purest of blue only remains high in the sky as it mixes below with the orange and red. My eyes follow the seemingly unnatural colorful spectrum of light as it changes from shadowy black to red to orange to beige to deep blue. This journey brings my gaze behind the airplane where a hazy, hanging wall of red is now visible as if we had literally flown into the deepening wound of the night sky. Between the wispy hanging red tendrils I can still see the blackness, the last remaining vestige of night as we fly through the solar terminator. I chuckle to myself as I consider the term and mouth "I'll be back."
In an instant, the entire cockpit fills with a bright red light. Up until this point, the sunrise was merely colors on a canvas. Like the flipping of a switch, the sun has decided that it has waited long enough and begins to launch itself from behind the horizon. I watch as it emerges from the volcano an oddly flattened crimson ball. The beige buffer between the blue and orange has widened and is nearly filling the windshield as it just now begins to illuminate the terrain. Blackness below has transformed into shadowy rivers, lakes, and a three-dimensional landscape of clouds. The sun continues to accelerate into the sky, moving at a perceptible pace. Its effort appears to be changing its chemistry as the now tangerine colored orb bathes everything in the cockpit in orange. Minutes later, the sun is clear of its night prison and basks us in early morning light. The crisp, clean white light nearly blinds us as it chases away every shadow in the airplane.
The show is over and with it, our flight. The Captain brings the power back as we begin descending toward the now colorful land below. When we pull up to the gate, the engines are shut down and final checklists are run. Once the last passenger has left, I hop out of my seat to begin the process again. It'll be repeated three times today. Following the final iteration, we will park the plane or give it to someone else so they can begin their day. By the time we get to the hotel at any number of cities across the country, the sun will have already begun to set.
Tired from a long day, I'll walk into my hotel room, take off my uniform and reflect on the day. Some days are stressful and frustrating, others are monotonous and boring. One thing I can't deny is that I have the most beautiful office in the world. I get to watch the sun rise over the east coast from well over 6 miles in the air. I get to fly over the tallest buildings of Chicago, DC, St Louis, Houston, Cleveland and others missing them by a mere few thousand feet. It's a perk that I will make every effort to appreciate. To just sit in silence, no matter how bad the day, and appreciate the natural beauty that most will never get to see.
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