“Jack! Here, hold
Sophie.”
The distinct accent of
the young couple with the baby told flight attendant Victoria Yu that they were
Australian. She knew from experience that Australians were regulars on this
flight. They were mostly affluent tourists returning home after a holiday in Europe.
She checked the flight
manifest. Over two-thirds of the passengers in the flight were from the
Netherlands. This was natural considering that MH 71 was a scheduled flight
from Amsterdam to Kuala Lampur. She also made a mental note that there were three
infants on board, one of them in her section.
This was important.
Passengers traveling with infants needed to be seated such that the other
passengers did not complain. Tired travelers were not expected to be tolerant
of babies.
Victoria would be attending
to the passengers in Business Class. She was one of the senior attendants on
board and was in fact among the most experienced attendants in Malaysia
Airlines. She had joined as a young flight attendant ten years ago and had
slowly grown up the ranks. She was also three months pregnant and was about to
go on parental leave next week.
Victoria adjusted the
upper part of her uniform, her kebaya on top of her stomach. Her lithe frame
ensured that her baby bump did not protrude too much.
She inspected the
business class section. The Australian couple was occupying the first row of
seats on her left hand side. The baby was now back with her mother who had
finally settled down.
“What an
adorable girl! She must be 2 years old”, Victoria thought. The afternoon sun
was shining through the windows and bouncing off the girl’s golden hair.
“Sophie”, her father said when Victoria asked the girl for her name. Victoria
asked the couple if they wanted something. They did not. They were busy trying
to put Sophie to sleep.
Victoria returned to
the entrance. There was a rush of passengers entering the aircraft and the
attendants at the front were having a hard time distributing enough smiles.
Based on the manifest, her section would accommodate a Dutch Senator and a
handful of old doctors. It was going to be an interesting flight.
Victoria walked back
to her station. She had made the mandatory checks. Seatbelts fastened, tray
tables and seats upright. She also performed the flight safety demo to the
passengers and suppressed a smile when she got to the part where she mentioned
that a passenger should secure his own oxygen mask before trying to assist
someone.
As she finished her
demo, she looked at the rows of eyes looking at her. Some bored, some without
an alternative and some, not looking at her but lost in their displays. Sophie
was drifting in and out of sleep and her mother was throwing cautious glances
around the cabin. Victoria looked at Sophie. She looked angelic. Victoria’s
right hand instinctively ran over her stomach. She quickly adjusted her kebaya
and sat down at her station and fastened her seatbelt.
The Captain was on the
microphone.
“Ladies and gentlemen,
welcome onboard Flight MH 71 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lampur. We are currently
third in line for take-off and are expected to be in the air in approximately
seven minutes time. We ask that you please fasten your seatbelts at this time
and secure all baggage underneath your seat or in the overhead compartments. We
also ask that your seats and table trays are in the upright position for
take-off. Please turn off all personal electronic devices, including laptops
and cell phones. Smoking is prohibited for the duration of the flight. Thank
you for choosing Malaysia Airlines. Enjoy your flight.”
Victoria heaved a
sigh. These would be the last few minutes of relaxation she would get this
afternoon. She had duties to perform as soon as the flight went up in the air
and the “Fasten Seatbelt” sign was turned off. To serve food and
beverages, to help aged passengers with their seatbelts and to sell airline
merchandise to uninterested passengers. The aircraft was now taxiing down the
runway. It picked up speed and took off. In a few minutes, the Captain was back
on the microphone.
“Good afternoon,
ladies and gentleman.This is your Captain speaking. We are currently cruising
at an altitude of 30,000 feet at an airspeed of 400 miles per hour. We’re flying
over Germany. The cabin crew will be coming around in about twenty minutes to
offer you a light lunch and a drink, and the inflight movie will begin shortly
after that. I'll talk to you again before we reach our destination. Until then,
sit back, relax and enjoy the rest of the flight.”
Victoria drew the
curtains of the Attendant’s section and powdered her face. She pulled out the
meal trolley. Food that had been prepared almost half a day earlier and served
with “Made Fresh!” stickers on it. Not that the passengers would know. Their
sinuses were clogged and taste buds numbed due to the change in air pressure.
She began serving vegetarian and non-vegetarian meals based on passenger
request. Sophie was now asleep and her parents took a vegetarian meal each. She
lodged the meal trolley in place and picked a handful of bottles to serve water
to all those who had summoned her.
The relatively smaller
size of the business class meant that Victoria had fewer requests. In a little
over an hour, she was back to her station for a brief break. Time passed.
Victoria was resting. The flight was now flying over Poland and the dull drone
of the engines was faintly audible. She knew that the pilots must have had
their meals, the pilot and co-pilot eating different meals to minimize the risk
of food poisoning.
Although she knew them
both professionally, the pilot was a close friend. They had both started at
Malaysia Airlines around the same time and had grown together. He had built a
reputation for being a crisis handler. She felt safe traveling in his flight.
Victoria was jolted
awake by the sound of crying. Yes, it was Sophie. She was up and for some
reason, unhappy. Her parents were trying to pacify her with offers alternating
between chocolate and her father’s hair. She preferred the latter at the moment
and was channeling her frustration onto it. Her mother feared that if not
pacified soon, Sophie was going to make her father bald.
Victoria strode to the
seat. The mother looked at her apologetically. The other passengers were
beginning to throw disturbed glances in her direction. Some pushed their
earplugs deeper inside and tried to get back to sleep. The Senator was smiling
cautiously. One of the doctors was looking at Sophie with admiration.
Victoria knew this had
to be sorted out fast. She looked at the mother and then at the father. They
were trying their best. She went to her cabin and returned with a trinket the
airline was selling as a souvenir. She tried to distract Sophie by waving it in
front of her face. Sophie took it from her, looked at it closely, and threw it
on her father. Obviously, he was responsible for whatever was bothering her.
She turned around on her father’s lap, jabbed at the seat in front and started
a fresh spurt of crying.
Victoria saw what the
problem was. Sophie was pointing to the display. One of the movies on the
inflight entertainment was a movie about a baby. The baby on screen was
climbing skyscrapers, playing with gorillas, and giving his kidnappers a hard
time. And all poor Sophie could do was sit on her mother’s lap and look at it
while clouds were speeding past her. No wonder she was agitated. The noise was
bothering other passengers. Victoria did not know what to do. She felt the
aircraft gently rise. She knew what was happening. The pilot was doing a “Step
climb”. He was gaining altitude and flying to thinner airspace in order to save
fuel. As the flight burnt more and more fuel and got lighter, it was more economical
to fly higher to reduce air resistance. Not many of the passengers would notice
or know the importance of it. The passengers here would notice it even less
with all their attention now focused on a bawling Sophie.
It was not only the
passengers who were ignorant. So was Victoria. She did not know that the flight
could not have flown at a lesser altitude even if the pilots had wanted. The
flight had entered Ukraine airspace at 32,000 feet and was slowly ascending to
35,000 feet. Since July 14, the airspace above this part of Ukraine was closed
below 32,000 feet for all aircraft. The unrest on the ground that necessitated
these restrictions made the turbulence of the skies look far less menacing.
Sophie continued to
cry completely ignoring all the effort that was on to calm her down. The bright
afternoon sun that was making the pilots wear their sunglasses was peeping in
through the few open windows of business class. Sophie pointed outside through
one of the open windows. Victoria’a attention was drawn to it.
It was then that they
all felt it. The aircraft started shaking. The seatbelt sign was back on.
Victoria instructed that the passengers return to their seats, and waited for
the Captain’s announcement. It came a moment later.
“Ladies and gentlemen,
we are now crossing a pocket of turbulence. Please return…”
He never completed
that line. The aircraft started shaking more and more violently. It got hotter
and hotter. And before any of the passengers could fish out a tissue to wipe
their sweat, there was a blinding flash of light and it felt like the aircraft
was speared through its abdomen and was being roasted on a coal pit. And all of
this occurred within seconds.
The caged air was now
rapidly escaping the pressurized cabin through the rear of the aircraft that
had been ripped apart. The Captain pleaded for order while his seat struggled
to break free. But his voice never left him. The forces of physics conspired
with each other to rip and burn the aircraft at the same time. The seatbelts
had firmly bound the passengers to their seats. So the air which they had
breathed until now, sucked them out with the seats, into its realm.
As she clutched tight
onto the row of seats she was standing next to, Victoria felt herself being
pulled with it. Reflexively, she pushed her stomach away from the seat and
tried to hold onto the walls of the aircraft. It gave her another five seconds.
The Senator was long gone. The doctors also departed one after the other. Her
hand grip was failing. The last thing Victoria saw was the smile on Sophie’s
face as her seat was ripped off its harness. The last thought she had was Sophie
would have loved the rollercoaster ride in Kuala Lampur.
