Newark on Thursday

Howdy all!

Because I am junior in the Anchorage Domicile, I have very little control over my schedule. I consider myself lucky if I get the block of time off that I ask for. Very seldom to I get to fly to places I really want to go to. Last Thursday night's flight down to Newark was a prime example.

First some pilot lingo: when we are actually flying the jet somewhere, we say we are 'operating'; when we are repositioning as a passenger on another airline we say we are 'deadheading.' So Thursday night's trip was an operate to Newark, get up Saturday morning and deadhead on American to Chicago, operate to Anchorage Sunday morning trip.

I don't much like flying in and out of Newark, I don't like where we layover in Newark and I don't like deadheading. So, I really tried to trade off of this trip. Not just a token effort, I hawked the computer looking for any other trip.

I'm glad I wasn't successful. I knew it was the evening of 911 and I knew Newark is just across the Hudson from the south side of Manhattan. I've got some fairly nice mental images from years ago of sitting in the cockpit on the ramp in Newark, looking to the east and seeing the Twin Towers all lit up. Somehow, though, I hadn't put it together in my mind as we let down into Newark just after midnight what I would see.

There has a been a thick overcast over New England for days now. It was true that night. Further there was a lot of moisture in the air under the clouds - not just drizzle - the air was very humid.

Newark Liberty International was landing to the north which puts Manhattan Island out the right front of the jet......and there before us was a striking sight from a vantage point few get to have: The Twin Towers of Light. These pictures really don't do justice to what we saw. We broke out of the clouds at about 5000' or about a mile high. The lights were hitting the bottom of the clouds and producing a huge shining halo of light that must have been a half mile in diameter. Because of all the moisture in the air below the clouds, the twin shafts of light were really accentuated. I'd never seen this before except of course in the news. It is a very striking display that brings out all the confused emotions we all feel when we are forced to remember that day.

My meager descriptive skills fail to do justice to what I saw and felt there.

Of course, none of those feelings are conducive to safely operating an airplane....so I had to fairly quickly compartmentalize what I felt and get on with business; but, I would have loved to have been able to just hang there in space several miles south of Manhattan and just look for a while.

It was a very striking sight - not just a little awe inspiring and more than a little awful.

I remain,

Dad / Geoff