Charles Lindbergh: The Lone Eagle Page #3

from the American heartland,

with the fastest plane in the sky.

In the Spring of 1927, three aircraft

and their impatient pilots

are lined up in the race to be

the first to Paris.

Charles Lindbergh's

Spirit of St. Louis,

Richard Byrd's rebuilt America,

and Clarence Chamberlin's

repaired Columbia.

All three are ready to go, but bad

weather keeps them on the ground.

The fliers maintain a link of

friendship and respect.

The national hero Byrd is courteous

to Chamberlin

and the young outsider Lindbergh.

Each understands that the best man

and the best machine will win.

And that any, or all of them

may die trying.

Charles Lindbergh gives the press

the story they've been waiting for.

The underdog,

the farm boy,

the Flyin' Fool.

Lindbergh is besieged.

On one day alone,

of the gallant young American pilot.

Publicity is good for the cause of

aviation, so Lindbergh complies.

"The journalistic atmosphere

has reached fever heat.

The moment I step outside the hangar

I'm surrounded.

The attention of the entire country

is centered on the flight and me.

We've helped focus everybody's eyes

on aviation and its future."

His mother arrives in New York

to see her son off.

Cameras turn as the two

pose stiffly together,

a moment they both know may be

their final goodbye.

Commander Byrd admires Lindbergh,

and praises his undeniable courage.

But he is certain that a single engine,

and a single flier,

cannot possibly endure

a 3,600 mile flight.

Seven days pass and the weather

holds the frustrated pilots down.

"The sky is overcast.

Rain is falling.

It may be another week or two

before I can take off.

I feel depressed at the thought".

May 19, 1927.

Bored and restless, Lindbergh accepts

an invitation to a Broadway musical.

Before reaching the show,

he receives a forecast of

clearing skies over the Atlantic.

He races back to his hotel, hoping to

catch a few hour's sleep before dawn.

But Lindbergh is far too excited

to rest.

At 2:
30 AM, already awake

for twenty hours,

he begins preparing for

the 36-hour flight ahead.

At dawn, the Spirit of St. Louis

is towed out to the runway.

Five hundred soaked spectators gather,

eager to be witnesses to history,

or tragedy.

"My plane lurches backward

through a depression in the ground.

It looks awkward and clumsy.

It appears completely incapable of

flight-shrouded, lashed and dripping.

It's more like a funeral procession

than the beginning of

a flight to Paris."

Fully fueled, the plane weighs

two and a half tons.

Lindbergh has never attempted

a takeoff at this maximum load.

The commotion has awakened

Commander Byrd.

Byrd himself would not dare attempt

a takeoff in this wretched weather.

But the pilot nicknamed "Lucky"

is willing to take the gamble.

A reporter asks Lindbergh

if he has brought enough supplies to

live on for nearly two days in the air.

He has packed just five sandwiches

and a gallon of water.

He answers with a grim joke.

"If I get to Paris

I won't need anymore,

and if I don't get to Paris

I won't need anymore either."

Loaded with explosive fuel, on a

the Spirit lumbers into position.

It is a vital moment in the history of

human technology, and human courage.

A tiny silver plane, straining

and roaring a lone pilot

who has passed the point

of aborting his flight.

He will take off, or he will crash.

Lindbergh clears wires at the end of

the runway by just twenty feet.

And Lindbergh is gone.

As the Spirit of St. Louis disappears

into the clouds,

Commander Richard Byrd

estimates soberly that

the odds against Lindbergh's survival

are three to one.

As his thirty-six hour odyssey begins,

Lindbergh sets his course.

over the New England coast.

He alternates fuel tanks every hour

to balance his load,

and keeps a careful log of speed,

altitude, and course.

The Spirit's engine is the most

powerful ever built for flight:

It must perform perfectly for almost

two days nonstop,

fourteen million explosions in

its nine cylinders.

As he leaves Massachusetts behind,

Lindbergh heads over open ocean

for the first time in his life.

to Nova Scotia,

a preview of the 2,000 mile ordeal

across the Atlantic ocean.

He flies low, and faces the sea.

"I come down to meet the ocean,

asking its favor

the right to pass for thousands of

miles across its realm.

The earth released me on Long Island;

now I need approval from the sea."

The skies clear.

But in the sun, Lindbergh begins

to suffer the tortures of fatigue.

He already regrets staying awake

all night before departure.

New York is just five hours

behind him.

As he soars over Nova Scotia,

the journey has barely begun.

Navigating by a simple compass heading,

he is only six miles off

his planned course.

But as each hour passes,

the drone of the engine,

and the monotony of the waves,

dull his consciousness.

Urging surrender, demanding sleep.

Twelve hours after takeoff,

still a day away from a seemingly

impossible touchdown,

he is over Newfoundland.

One quick wingover,

and the vast Atlantic awaits.

"North America and its islands

are behind.

Ireland is two thousand miles ahead."

Now, Lindbergh has only his compass

and his courage to guide him.

Caught between sky and sea,

no traveler in history

has ever been so alone.

The first night of his journey begins.

"I've given up a continent and taken on

an ocean in its place, irrevocably."

Over the North Atlantic,

not far from where the Titanic sank

just fifteen years before,

Lindbergh spots icebergs.

He dreams of landing and sleeping.

If he drifts off,

even for a few seconds,

he will tumble into the waves and die.

"Sleep is winning."

At this moment,

at Yankee Stadium in New York City,

a heavyweight boxing match.

The announcer asks the audience

for a moment of silence for Lindbergh.

All 40,000 join as one.

Over the Atlantic, Lindbergh

flies into dense clouds.

He climbs above them

for better visibility.

But at ten thousand feet,

the air is colder.

He has made a dangerous mistake.

"I pull the flashlight from my pocket

and throw its beam onto a strut.

Ice!"

His only hope is to dive for warmer air

and pray the ice clears

before the Spirit falls from the sky.

After ten perilous minutes,

he triumphs.

A nation flies with him,

sleepless and anxious.

The New York Times receives 10,000

telephone calls, asking for updates.

But there is no news to print.

Lindbergh flies alone, without a radio,

over the desolate ocean.

Nineteen hours out, he estimates that

he is halfway to Paris.

But his body is numb,

beyond hunger and thirst.

"My greatest goal now is to stay alive

and pointed eastward

until I reach the sunrise."

He abandons his log book,

too weary to care.

In New York,

the newspapers can only repeat

stale bulletins from Newfoundland.

No one on earth knows where Lindbergh

is, or the agony he endures.

"This is the hour I've been dreading.

I know it's the beginning

of my greatest test.

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