FLIGHT 418: THE GHOST OF PHOENIX RISES AT 30,000 FEET

At twenty feet above the runway, the Boeing 737 was flying faster than any commercial airliner was ever meant to touch the earth.

The ground effect caught the massive wings, floating the aircraft along a cushion of high-pressure air, exactly as Sarah had predicted. But without flaps or slats to slow them down, the plane was floating down the runway at blistering speed, eating up thousands of feet of concrete in mere seconds.

“SINK RATE! PULL UP!” the ground proximity computer screamed.

"Cut right engine to idle!" Sarah ordered. "Let her settle!"

Reed pulled the throttle back. The cushion of air collapsed.

CRASH!

The main rear tires slammed into the soaked asphalt with an earth-shattering impact. Two of the four main tires exploded instantly under the violent kinetic force, sending shreds of vulcanized rubber flying into the storm. Sparks showered outward into the darkness like fireworks.

"Reverse thrust on engine two!" Sarah yelled. "Full manual brakes! Diaz, pump the brake accumulator pedals!"

Diaz stomped on the toe brakes with all his might. The remaining brake pads clamped down on the glowing steel discs, screeching in agonizing friction.

The aircraft screamed down the runway at 200 knots, trailing a massive rooster tail of water, foam, and white-hot sparks.

"The nose is coming down!" Reed yelled, hauling back on his dead control column in a useless instinct to keep the unlatched nose gear from smashing into the tarmac. "We can't hold it up any longer!"

"Brace for the slide!" Sarah roared, grabbing the fuel cutoff switches.

The nose tilted downward. The unlatched front landing gear buckled instantly on contact, snapping backward with a deafening metallic boom.

The steel underbelly of the forward fuselage hit the concrete at one hundred and sixty knots.

A horrific screech tore through the cockpit floor as bare metal met asphalt. Sheets of orange flame erupted along the bottom of the plane. Inside the cockpit, the floor buckled upward, throwing Sarah, Reed, and Diaz violently against the ceiling and instrument glare shield.

The world outside the cockpit windows spun into a blinding blur of foam, fire, and flying rain.

The aircraft began yawing violently toward the right edge of the runway, threatening to cartwheel into the grass field where fuel tanks would rupture and ignite.

"Left brake only!" Sarah shouted through a mouthful of blood as her forehead struck the compass mount. "Lock the left wheel! Drag the wing!"

Diaz stomped the left pedal to the floorboards. The left main gear dug in. The plane skidded sideways, drifting along the runway in a massive, screeching sideways slide.

Ten emergency fire engines chased the burning metal beast down the strip, spraying millions of gallons of high-density fire-retardant foam across its blistering metal skin.

The aircraft slid past the four-thousand-foot marker... three-thousand... two-thousand...

With one final, shuddering groan of tortured steel, the Boeing 737 ground to a complete halt, angled forty-five degrees across the runway centerline, resting peacefully in a deep bed of white extinguishing foam.

Inside the cockpit, the deafening noise stopped.

The engines were dead. The sirens were silent.