Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8 by Robert Zimmerman Read Free Book Online Page B

that he could see more details of the ocean surface. Below him was a faint greenish streak trailing out across the inky waves. As the carrier plowed its way through the ocean it churned up phosphorescent algae, illuminating the ship's wake in a dim gleam. By aiming for the head of the green wake, Lovell finally found his fellow wingmen. All three planes were once again together, circling above the carrier.
Now came the really hard part. Somehow, Lovell was going to have to land his plane on the tiny aircraft carrier deck while holding a penlight in his mouth.
He listened to the radio as the two other planes dropped to the carrier deck, snapping to a halt as the cables grabbed their tailhooks.
Now it was his turn. In order to hit the deck safely, he had to carefully lower his altitude from 250 to 150 feet just before he crossed over the deck.
In order to do that, however, he needed to read his instrument panel, and in order to do that, Lovell had to hold his penlight with his teeth while his hands flew the plane.
His first attempt almost rammed the side of the aircraft carrier. "Pull up, November Papa One, pull up!" the landing officer screamed at him.
     

Page 36
"You're way too low!" Suddenly Lovell saw the side of the carrier loom up like a wall. With a desperate pull on the stick he ripped his plane away, barely missing the deck as he shrieked upward.
On his second attempt, Lovell decided that rather than risk a collision with the ship, he would drop down from 500 feet. With the ship screaming at him to lower his altitude, he cut his engines and plummeted like a rock towards that tiny carrier deck. Hitting the surface with a horrible thud, Lovell's plane bounced once, blew two tires, and then screeched to a jarring halt as the deck cables grabbed his tailhook.
When the first deck crewman opened his hatch, he looked at Lovell and calmly said, "Glad to see you decided to come back aboard."
Lovell found it hard to speak. "Yeah. Glad to be back." 14
Anders
The horn went off suddenly, wailing a loud banshee cry throughout Keflavik Air Force Base. First Lieutenant Bill Anders and his radar operator had five minutes to get their plane skyborne, and all around him men climbed into battle array in anticipation of armed attack.
Radar had picked up an unidentified airplane approaching Iceland from the northeast, apparently coming from the Soviet Union and heading right towards what military people called the Air Defense Identification Zone. This zone, surrounding Iceland, was considered sovereign territory, and any intrusion by an unauthorized airplane could be considered an act of war.
Anders sprinted into the hangar, strapped his lifejacket on, and climbed into his cockpit. Gunning the engines of his F-89 Scorpion interceptor jet, now armed with over one hundred missiles, he pulled out onto the runway and screeched into the air.
The year was 1958, and it was Bill Anders's job to identify that unknown plane coming out of Soviet Russia and to destroy it if it had hostile intentions.
Born in Hong Kong to a Navy officer and a daughter of a Daughter of the American Revolution, Bill Anders had always been attracted to
     

Page 37
adventure and excitement. When he was four years old, his father had been assigned to the U.S.S. Panay , an American patrol boat policing the Yangtze River of China. As Arthur Anders patrolled the river, Muriel Anders and Bill would follow on shore, moving from city to city.
When the Japanese attacked Nanking, China in 1937, sinking the Panay , Muriel and Bill had to flee for their lives. The four-year-old was pulled from his bed to stand on a rickety wooden porch and watch bombs crash down several hundred yards from their hotel in Canton. He tried to run toward the explosions, but his mother grabbed him. The two soon boarded a steamer and slipped out to Hong Kong and on to the Philippines.
Lt. Arthur Anders, meanwhile, had also managed to escape. During the attack he had been forced to take command when the