the computer projections to propagate objects over the laser emitter or launch site to determine if there is a possibility of collision.
Sheridan was escorted into Cheyenne Mountain by Captain Dennis Murphy. The entry procedures were similar to those for the Titan sites. Once inside the giant drive-thru blast doors, they hopped into an electric golf cart that whisked them the 300 yards into the cavernous operational control center. This place looked like a launch control center on steroids. Again, everything was shock mounted and situated on huge isolation platforms. Murphy led Sheridan into one of the modules and then down a hallway into a conference room. Sheridan had to smile at the cherry wood paneling, table, and furniture. For a place built to last beyond doomsday, no expense was spared on the details and little things in life.
General Ron Giffen entered the room along with a staff of a half dozen technicians and asked, “Sheridan, do you really know why you are here?” The question took him back a little. He responded sharply, “Sir, I was told to attend a briefing on orbital tracking, space operations, and targeting algorithms.”
Giffen replied coldly, “Sheridan, this operation is classified TS and just to be clear that you know the ramifications, I’m sending you to the North Pole afterwards to implement the operational plan,” added the General. Dave didn’t see that one coming as his jaw dropped.
Giffen continued, “You’re now a world class subject matter expert on ICBM targeting and are intimately aware of the fact that launching an ICBM over the pole makes it about as accurate as my tax return. The only saving grace with the Titan is that it carries one hell of a punch. That ten megaton warhead means you only have to be close. However, we have other problems.”
The General paused for a moment for dramatic effect, “ICBMs aren’t the only thing we launch over the poles. The Space Shuttle is due to be launched out of Vandenberg from SLC-6 in a year or so. We’re going to put it in a polar orbit to augment our reconnaissance satellites that are currently in a polar orbit.”
General Giffen stood up and walked over to the wall display, “Now with that said, I want to show you something very interesting.” He had one of the technicians call up a program showing a graphical representation of the Earth and several thousand objects apparently in orbit. “Sergeant, delete all objects not in polar orbit at or below eighty degrees north latitude.” The screen now showed only a few dozen objects.
“Lieutenant, these objects represent the satellites that we and the Russians have in polar orbit. Sergeant Keen, filter out the space junk now.” Only a handful of satellites were visible on the display. “Lieutenant, there is nothing particularly fascinating about this plot. However, if you plot the orbit by looking down directly over the pole you will notice some interesting dynamics taking place. These satellites were designed to stay in orbit for seven years. There is enough maneuvering fuel on board to reposition and provide for station keeping. Now, Sergeant, show a plot of the orbits for the next five years filtering out known deviations, perturbations, precession and known errors without station keeping.”
Lieutenant Sheridan couldn’t believe his eyes. The plot looked like a kid’s Spirograph with lines spiraling off in every direction. “Okay, Sheridan, you’ve seen it. There is not enough steering fuel on board to keep these birds in a polar orbit for four years let alone seven. Clearly there are some forces acting on these satellites that are unseen and unaccounted for in our orbital calculations. They are not random errors. A statistical analysis proves there is a very perceptible left hand twist to these polar orbits. Depending upon altitude, each one of these satellites takes up to a one second degree of left hook on each orbit. At ninety minutes per orbit, this adds up to quite a deviation over a month or two. We can’t afford to keep sending up more hundred million dollar satellites every few years. Thank God, the Russians are even worse off than us.”
“Your job is going to be to figure out what the hell is going on. We’re sending you to the Greenland icecap to find out. Congratulations, Captain Sheridan,” as General Giffen handed Dave his new silver bars.
CHAPTER 3
Greenland
The C-141 Starlifter cargo plane had been in the air for about three hours heading north out of McGuire AFB, New Jersey to Sondrestrom Air Base on the west coast of Greenland. The accommodations weren’t too bad. For the grueling five hour flight, actual passenger seats were clamped onto the aluminum cargo deck in lieu of the cargo net seats. Surprisingly, there were a dozen or so passengers on this flight along with several cargo pallets on their way to the Arctic. As Captain Sheridan grabbed for a cup of coffee, he accidentally dropped it. The hot liquid literally froze to the metal floor before the crew chief could come back with some paper towels to clean it up. The pilot had announced that the outside air temperature was a balmy minus sixty-four degrees.
When he got up to use the six hundred dollar toilet seat, he took the opportunity to look out one of the door windows. He had never been this far north before. Looking above, there was a dark indigo sky without a cloud in sight. Down below, the colors and geography were magnificent and striking. The ocean was majestic blue, the icebergs and ice flows were blinding white, and the black rock cliffs along the fjords gave a foreboding, yet, tranquil appearance.
A couple of hours later, the pilot began his approach up the ninety mile long fjord into Sondrestrom. Glaciers fanned out into the ocean and adjacent fjords for as far as the eye could see. Water in the ice crevasses was a beautiful blue, like someone had poured Aqua Velva aftershave onto the ice.
Dave had studied up on Sondrestrom prior to his departure. What he found was fascinating. Beginning in September of 1941, Sondrestrom Air Base was built under the guidance of the famed Arctic explorer and aviator, Bert Balchen. During World War II, Sondrestrom was known as Bluie West 8 or BW-8, and was an alternate base for the ferrying of aircraft to England. It soon became one of the most important stopover sites for flying missions between the US and Europe, due to the fine flying conditions for which Sondrestrom became known.
The base was laid out on a sandbar near the beginning of the fjord. The fjord was about a mile wide at this point and was surrounded by thousand foot cliffs and mountains with a five hundred foot tall glacier entering the fjord a couple of miles upstream. The massive Greenland icecap, twice the size of Texas, was only twenty miles to the east. Greenland is a Danish Territory. The 50,000 residents, mostly Inuits, were in the process of voting for home rule and independence from Denmark.
It took a great deal of piloting skill to land at Sonde, as it was affectionately called. You had to be specially trained and signed off to make the risky approach and landing. There had been quite a few nasty accidents over the years. As a matter of fact, one of them involved a C-141 in the late summer of 1976. The first third of the runway here has an upslope. During landings, the rest of the runway seems to disappear over the horizon. This optical illusion may have caused the pilot to think he either overshot the runway or that the runway was very short. As a result, after touchdown the pilot evidently decided to go around for another try. During the liftoff the plane over-rotated, developed a nose-high attitude and then stalled. It crashed on the runway, killing seven crew members, and sixteen passengers. The navigator and three passengers survived.
Rumor has it, that the base chef was one of the survivors. He has now been on base for the past nine years, because he absolutely refuses to get on another aircraft.
The Starlifter made a smooth landing on the 12,000 foot runway exactly on schedule at 1100 hours on a balmy spring day in 1985.
An Air Force bus met the passengers at the plane and dropped them off at base operations. Dave was met there by the Base commander, Lieutenant Colonel Dan Snyder. “Welcome to Sondrestrom,
