Chapter 3 — Climbing Through the Storm

Twenty-three hours and seventeen minutes, the grid monitoring screen in the dispatch room flashed red continuously, each square representing the transformer stations changed from green to orange to red in less than ten minutes.

"Loss of signal at Vàm Sương transformer station." The shift leader read it out loud and quickly typed on the keyboard to confirm a second time. "The signal was lost in the entire section from column 38 to column 50, Hải Lộng - Vàm Sương route."

Outside the glass door of the control room, the wind was howling at such an intensity that no one in the room could hear each other's voices clearly without shouting. The rain whipped sideways, no longer falling straight down, but flying in a direction almost parallel to the ground, hitting the storm-proof glass, creating a sound like someone was continuously throwing sand at the window.

Thắng stands in the dispatch room, which is not his permanent position, but tonight he was called up to monitor the situation because he knew each route by heart better than anyone else in the branch.

"Which column is it?" He asked, his eyes glued to the digital map screen that was automatically delineating the power outage area in gradually expanding red.

"Undetermined, Mr. Thắng. The surveillance cameras in that area have lost signal for twenty-two hours." The shift leader replied, his voice tense but still maintaining the rhythm of his work, a kind of calmness forged through many years of sitting in this position. "But based on the automatic cut-off protection signal at the beginning of the line, there is a high possibility that the wire will break or the pole will fall in that section."

The desk phone in the room rang continuously, three at the same time, and three different staff members were listening while quickly taking notes on the incident form. Outside the district, a large area was in darkness, with only the occasional flicker of flashlights and oil lamps flickering through the cracks in the doors of houses that had been closed against the storm since the afternoon.

"Hải Lộng Medical Center called." Another duty officer shouted, pressing the speakerphone so everyone could hear.

A woman's voice rang out through the line, there was noise in the background, the sound of machines whirring continuously.

"This is Doctor Thục, Hải Lộng Medical Center. We just lost power completely at twenty-three: fifteen. The backup generator has automatically started, currently supplying power to the entire treatment area." Her voice was steady but there was a pressure behind each word, the tone of someone trying not to let worry overwhelm her expertise. "I need information, when will the power grid be restored to this area?"

The shift leader looked at Thắng, a look of implicit help, because this was a question that no one in the room could answer accurately at this time.

"Doctor Thục, this is Thắng, the leader of the line operations team." He took the receiver, his voice changed, slower and firmer, like the way he always spoke to Khánh Thi on the practice pole. "We haven't determined the point of the problem because the storm is still raging and we can't go to the scene yet. Let me ask, how long can the hospital's generator run with the current amount of oil?"

There was a short silence on the other side of the line, Mrs. Thục sounded like she was calculating or asking someone next to her.

"According to the technician's calculations, if we run at full capacity for the entire intensive care unit and ventilators, we will have about thirty hours of oil reserve," she replied. "After that, if there is no refueling or no power grid, we will be forced to consider the option of transferring seriously ill patients to a higher route, but the current route is flooded and fallen trees are blocking many sections."

Thirty hours.

Thắng looked at the clock on the wall of the dispatch room. The hand pointed to twenty-three: twenty. He calculated in his head, thirty hours means the deadline is around five o'clock tomorrow afternoon, if the generator runs at full capacity continuously without interruption.

"We will do everything we can to have power restored to the hospital within that time frame," he said, trying to keep his voice steady even though his mind began to run through a series of scenarios, from the wind being too strong to climb the poles, to the backup supplies not being enough if more poles collapsed than expected. "Doctor, can you tell us more about how many patients are currently on ventilators?"

"Eleven patients were on direct ventilation, three of whom could not be removed from the ventilator for more than five minutes without endangering their lives," Mrs. Thục replied, her voice for the first time had a small tremor that penetrated the veneer of professionalism. "Not to mention the patients on dialysis, in need of oxygen support, and about fifty people who were just evacuated here to take shelter from the storm, including pregnant women about to give birth."

Thắng closed his eyes for a second, envisioning the room across the line, eleven ventilators whirring steadily, attached to eleven chests that were rising and falling thanks to an electric current running through a fragile diesel wire.

"We understand," he said. "Thirty hours. We'll try not to use all of it."

After hanging up, he turned to the shift leader, his voice immediately changed to business mode, without any softness from the previous call.

"Please give me a detailed map of the Hải Lộng - Vàm Sương route, marking all segment points that can be isolated," he said. "As soon as the wind drops below level 6, my team will start to survey the scene first."

"Still level 11 now, Mr. Thắng." The shift leader said, looking at him with worried eyes. "Going out now is suicide, let alone climbing a pole."

"I'm not saying it right now," Thắng replied. "I said as soon as possible. And I need to know exactly when 'possible' is, because that hospital only gives me thirty hours, no more."

Outside, a loud noise rang out somewhere near the harbor area, the sound of metal hitting, possibly the corrugated iron roof of a warehouse being torn off by the wind. The whole room paused for a second, then continued its work, because this night was too long to stop because of a noise.

While waiting for the map to be printed, Thắng took out his phone and dialed the house number. It rang three times before someone picked up. Thắm's voice was heard mixed with the sound of the wind whistling through her window.

"Are you still there?" She asked, not a surprising question, because after twenty-two years of being an electrician's wife, she was used to her husband always being at the scene of an incident rather than at home on stormy nights.

"Still in the control room. How's your house?" He asked, his eyes still not leaving the digital map on the screen.

"One wing of the living room window was blown open by the wind. Mr. Xúyên ran over and helped nail it. Khang called twice to check on him. He said if needed, he would come back to help. He told him to stay in the dormitory, the way back was dangerous at this hour," Thắm replied, her voice trying to stay calm even though she could clearly hear the worry behind each sentence. "Have you eaten?"

"Already ate." He lied, because from this afternoon until now he had only had time to drink half a cup of cold tea left on the conference table. "You go to sleep first, don't wait for me. I probably won't be able to come home tonight."

"I know," she replied, a short sigh coming through the line. "Be careful, you hear me? Don't be like when you're young and ignore safety procedures because of urgency."

"Different youth, different time," he said, trying to inject a bit of a joke into his voice even though he didn't feel any relief. "Now you have students, you have to set an example."

Hanging up, he stood still for a second, watching the phone screen go dark, then returned to the map that had just been printed, still hot and smelling of ink.

At the material warehouse not far away, Khánh Thi sat huddled in a corner protected by a tarpaulin, with three other employees guarding the area containing spare supplies, making sure nothing was blown away by the wind or water spilled in to damage the equipment. The corrugated iron roof above shook intermittently as if it was about to be peeled off, and every time it did, she felt her heart skip a beat.

"Have you heard of any columns falling?" Another employee asked, his voice louder than usual to drown out the sound of the wind.

"I heard that the entire Vàm Sương line has lost signal," she replied, tightening her grip on the tarp that was threatening to come loose. "There must be a fallen column in there."

She thought of column 42, of the red circle on Thắng's notebook page, of the small crack on the concrete foundation that she had seen with her own eyes the day she followed the team on patrol. She didn't know why that image appeared in her mind right now, amidst the howling wind and lashing rain, but a vague premonition made her unable to push it away.

Her phone, even though the mobile network had been intermittent for an hour, suddenly vibrated with a text message. It's from her mother-in-law, just a few words typed slowly with the shaking fingers of someone who's just learned to use a smartphone after a stroke: "Bin's asleep. The house is okay. Take care of yourself."

Khánh Thi looked at the text message for a long time, her finger slid across the screen as if she wanted to touch it, then put the phone in her raincoat pocket, zipping it up carefully to keep water from getting in.

"I keep to myself," she muttered it again, a reminder she needed to hear right now, as the familiar fear of heights now mingled with another, broader, more vague fear, of what awaited out there when morning came.

The wind was still howling, the rain was still whipping, and in the darkness that covered Hải Lộng district, there were only three places left with light: the dispatch room running on backup generators of the electricity branch, the district police station, and Hải Lộng Medical Center, where eleven ventilators were still counting down the minutes of the remaining thirty hours.