Both Demerest's and Harris's radios were now switched to runway control frequency.
On runway two five, immediately ahead of Trans America, a British VC-10 of BOAC, received word to go. It moved forward, with lumbering slowness at first, then swiftly. Its company colors---blue, white, and gold---gleamed briefly in the reflection of other aircrafts' lights, then were gone in a flurry of whirling snow and black jet exhaust. Immediately the ground controller's voice intoned, "Trans America Two, taxi into position, runway two five, and hold; traffic landing on runway one seven, left."
One seven, left, was a runway which directly bisected runway two five. There was an element of danger in using the two runways together, but tower controllers had become adept at spacing aircraft---landing and taking off---so that no time was wasted, but no two airplanes reached the intersection at the same moment. Pilots, uncomfortably aware of the danger of collision when they heard by radio that both runways were in use, obeyed controllers' orders implicitly.
Anson Harris swiftly and expertly jockeyed Flight Two on to runway two five.
Peering out, through snow flurries, Demerest could see the lights of an airplane, about to touch down on one seven. He thumbed his mike button. "Trans America Two, Roger. In position and holding. We see the landing traffic."
Even before the landing aircraft had bisected their own runwav, the controller's voice returned. "Trans America Two, cleared for takeoff. Go, man, go!"
The final three words were not in any air traffic control manual, but to controller and pilots they had identical meaning: Get the hell moving, now! There's another flight landing right after the last. Already a fresh set of lights---ominously close to the airfield---was approaching runway one seven.
Anson Harris had not waited. His outspread fingers slid the four main throttles forward to their full extent. He ordered, "Trim the throttles," and briefly held his toe brakes on, allowing power to build, as Demerest set pressure ratios evenly for all four engines. The engines' sound deepened from a steady whine to a thunderous roar. Then Harris released the brakes and N-731-TA leaped forward down the runway.
Vernon Demerest reported to the tower, "Trans America Two on the roll," then applied forward pressure to the control yoke while Harris used nose wheel steering with his left hand, his right returning to the throttles.
Speed built. Demerest called, "Eighty knots." Harris nodded, released nose wheel steering and took over the control yoke... Runway lights flashed by in swirling snow. Near crescendo, the big jet's power surged... At a hundred and thirty-two knots, as calculated earlier, Demerest called out "V-one"---notification to Harris that they had reached "decision speed" at which the takeoff could still be aborted and the aircraft stopped. Beyond V-one the takeoff must continue... Now they were past V-one... Still gathering speed, they hurtled through the runways' intersection, glimpsing to their right a flash of landing lights of the approaching plane; in mere seconds the other aircraft would cross where Flight Two had just passed. Another risk---skillfully calculated---had worked out; only pessimists believed that one day such a risk might not... As speed reached a hundred and fifty-four knots, Harris began rotation, easing the control column back. The nose wheel left the runway surface; they were in lift-off attitude, ready to quit the ground. A moment later, with speed still increasing, they were in the air.
Harris said quietly, "Gear up."
Demerest reached out, raising a lever on the central instrument panel. The sound of the retracting landing gear reverberated through the aircraft, then stopped with a thud as the doors to the wheel wells closed.
They were going up fast---passing through four hundred feet. In a moment, the night and clouds would swallow them.
"Flaps twenty."
Still performing first officer duty, Demerest obediently moved the control pedestal flap selector from thirty degrees to twenty. There was a brief sensation of sinking as the wing flaps---which provided extra lift at takeoff---came partially upward.
"Flaps up."
Now the flaps were fully retracted.
Demerest noted, for his report later, that at no point during takeoff could he have faulted Anson Harris's performance in the slightest degree. He had not expeeted to. Despite the earlier needling, Vernon Demerest was aware that Harris was a top-grade captain, as exacting in performance---his own and others---as Demerest was himself. It was the reason Demerest had known in advance that their flight to Rome tonight would be, for himself, an easy journey.
Only seconds had passed since leaving the ground; now, still climbing steeply, they passed over the runway's end, the