Chapter 18 — Between Two Runways

The radar screen flashed once, twice, then went completely dark, leaving an absolute black space where before there were six light dots moving in Tra Son airspace.

"Display lost!" Bach shouted, his voice cracking with panic for a split second before regaining his composure.

Boi Thu felt a chill run down her spine, her body's first reaction was the exact feeling she had eight years ago, when the small gap between the coordinate grid lines appeared on Bach Lung's screen. In that half-second, she seemed to be pulled back to that rainy night, the radio was crackling, the young pilot's voice broke mid-sentence.

But only half a second. She clearly felt the moment old memories tried to pull her down, at the same time as another, newer voice, rang clearly in her head - not Thuyen's voice, not anyone else's voice, but her own voice, from the training session with Bach in the simulation room: speak first, edit later. She didn't have time to wallow. She only had time to act.

"Go to non-radar separation immediately," she said, her voice breaking out decisively, completely cutting off the stream of memories that were trying to pull her back. "All stations, report current position, altitude, speed in the order I named them."

She called out the names of each flight, each pilot responded with the necessary information, and Boi Thu, pen in hand, quickly sketched the relative positions of all six targets on a blank sheet of paper, using the same skills she had learned early in her career, before modern radar became the indispensable default tool - skills that many controllers younger than her, accustomed to relying entirely on screens, may never have had to actually use outside of theory tests.

"How long has it been since radar?" asked sharply, his voice tense but still controlled, his hand ready with a microphone to support manual communication. He had experienced a similar radar outage many years ago, though never in high traffic and bad weather conditions at the same time as today.

"Twenty seconds," Bach said, his eyes still glued to the black screen, counting the time with the backup stopwatch that was always on the table for situations like this.

Boi Thu called down to the technical room. Her voice still maintained the necessary calm even though her heart was beating faster than at any time since the incident last month. "Radar has completely lost display on the main station. Urgent fix is needed, we are processing six targets using non-radar procedures."

"Checking," the engineer's voice replied, slightly panicked, the clacking of keyboards echoing behind his voice. "It could be due to a lightning strike near the auxiliary transformer station, causing a sudden voltage drop. We are switching to backup power, estimated at two to three minutes."

Two to three minutes. With six flights converging on a restricted area of airspace, in approaching thunderstorm conditions, two to three minutes is a frighteningly long time.

Outside the glass, the flashes became more frequent, with almost no discernible gaps between them, and the rain began to pound against the thick glass, creating an opaque curtain of water that partially obscured the view of the runway. Vong, who had just returned to the room after a call with the Aviation Department, stopped at the door when he saw the main screen go black, but he did not say anything, did not intervene, just stood back in a corner, observing, ready to act if he was really needed.

"We're without radar for at least two minutes," Boi Thu said, turning to the group, her voice, though as tense as a piano string, still maintaining the clarity needed for everyone to keep up. "I need everyone to focus as much as possible on voice communications. Van, maintain the three regular flights at the current delimited distance, do not allow anyone to change altitude or direction without clear orders from me. Sure, two flights change direction to hold the same altitude, no further approaches. Bach, stay in constant contact with the helicopter, reporting altitude every ten seconds."

Three voices answered "clearly" almost simultaneously, and the radar room, despite being immersed in the darkness of the main screen, suddenly became more alive than ever with the sound of continuously opening microphones, the sound of the pilot reporting, and the sound of pen rustling on paper as Boi Thu continuously updated the relative position map by hand.

"Victor Tango zero sixty-nine, confirm current altitude and speed," she said into the microphone, calling one of three regularly scheduled flights.

"Four thousand two hundred feet, one hundred and eighty nautical miles per hour, Victor Tango no sixty-nine."

She took notes, mentally calculating the estimated distance based on speed and time since the last report, comparing it with the positions of other targets on the hand map that was gradually taking shape.

"Hai Au is not interested, current altitude and speed," she continued calling, her voice not slowing down even though she was processing more information streams at the same time than any previous shift.

"One thousand eight hundred feet, holding steady, Hai Au is not private," the helicopter pilot replied, his voice tense but still controlled.

"Hold the same altitude, do not move further until further orders are given," Boi Thu said, then immediately turned to calling the next flight, the work pace was so intense that there was no room for any pause between commands.

Khoat, in the adjacent position, was doing the same thing with two diversions, his voice alternating with Boi Thu's voice, creating an almost synchronized communication rhythm, the two controllers simultaneously coordinating the six targets by ear and by memory, without any visual support.

Ten seconds passed. Then twenty.

"Radar is back!" Bach shouted, his voice breaking with relief when the main screen suddenly lit up again, six bright dots appeared, in positions that nearly matched the diagram Boi Thu had just drawn, only slightly off at two points.

Boi Thu did not allow himself to breathe a sigh of relief right away. She quickly compared the display position with the voice data she had just collected, confirming that no conflicts had arisen during the time the display was lost, before allowing herself to slightly relax the tension that was tightening her chest.

The two small deviations from her hand diagram, upon close inspection, turned out to be just natural errors in verbal estimates, not signs of any potential conflict. She let out a long breath, allowing her body to relax for the first time in the past twenty seconds, if only for a brief moment before having to tense up again for the next problem.

“Great job, team,” she said, not looking away from the screen, but enough for the other three to hear the recognition in her voice. "Twenty seconds of no radar, no incident, no separation error. That was the result of proper preparation, not luck."

“Radar is stable again, all stations,” she said into the microphone, her voice returning to its familiar rhythm. "Continuing with current orders, I will update the order of approach in the next few minutes."

But just as she finished speaking, a third clap of thunder rang out, close enough to slightly rattle the glass window of the bridge, and on the screen, a new warning appeared: wind gusts in the approach area at the end of the main runway had exceeded twenty-five knots, well beyond the recommended limit for most aircraft waiting to land.

Boi Thu looked at that number, then at the six bright dots on the screen, each waiting for a decision that only she could make right now — a decision that would shape the rest of this shift, and perhaps, in some ways, the rest of her career.

“Okay,” she said, taking a deep breath, clearly feeling, for the first time in eight years, that the fear present within her was no longer the thing that controlled her, but that she was holding the reins, guiding it in the right direction. "This is the really hard part. Are you all ready?"

She glanced quickly at each person in the room: Khoi nodded, her hand already on the microphone; Van, despite sweat beading on her forehead, still maintained a steady gaze; Bach's face was tense but there were no longer any traces of panic from the first weeks he sat in this position.

“Ready,” all three replied almost at the same time, and Boi Thu, looking around the small room where four people were facing together one of the most tense hours Tra Son station had ever experienced, felt something more solid than any fear — not blind confidence, but well-founded trust, built from the weeks they had spent together to get to this point.