Prime Minister Stephen Harper meets with Gordon Moul, a former pilot, in Vancouver, British Columbia. The following story is rewritten with permission. "A Flight to Freedom" by Captain Gordon Moul. "This story took place over 30 years ago, in Entebbe, Africa, in April of 1972. We will call the story "Footprints in the Sand" based on the correlation to the famous poem by Mary Stevenson in 1936. My story begins at the peak of the madness in Uganda, Africa during the maniacal regime of Idi Amin. My company, Pacific Western Airlines, was one of the companies under contract to the Government of Canada to fly the Indian population out of Uganda, as ordered by Idi Amin. The flight was the final flight authorized to complete this most tragic situation. We had been on this assignment about 3 months, based in Lagos, Nigeria. We flew the legs from Lagos to Entebbe, then across the Sahara Desert to the Canary Islands, where a crew was waiting for the flight across the Atlantic to Canada. I had made this trip many times. Idi Amin had set down very strict rules as to what goods may be taken out of Uganda. Any attempt to violate these rules was an immediate death sentence. Our crew was awakened at the hotel in Lagos about midnight with a proposed departure of 2 a.m. for Entebbe. It is about a four-hour flight across the centre of Africa from Lagos to Entebbe. Entebbe is located just about on the equator, on the north shore of Lake Victoria. The evening thunderstorms along the route over the Congo had begun to subside. We were light, without a passenger load, flight planning at 41,000 ft. so that we would be on top of most of the cloud layer, being able to steer around most of the thunder heads along the equator that often reach as high as 60,000 ft. We planned to arrive at Entebbe at dawn. We had hoped to depart Entebbe no later than 7 a.m. This is a very hot time of the year. Heavy jet aircraft do not like hot weather. Heavy jets do not like high altitude airports. Entebbe is 3785 ft above sea level. Both airport elevation and high temperature diminish the aircraft's performance. As the temperature rises, the available power to the engines decreases dramatically. We had fuelled in Lagos for a quick turnaround in Entebbe with enough fuel for our flight across the Sahara to the Canary Islands. On our previous two flights in and out of Entebbe we became aware of the rising tension and hostility. Several passengers had been stricken from the manifest. We had been told that restrictions had been violated. We were also aware of the penalty for such violations. On arrival in Entebbe the Control Tower instructed us to follow the "Follow Me" truck as we were directed away from the terminal building area to a large hangar. Upon shutdown, the aircraft was boarded by Military Police. We were advised that no one would be allowed to deplane. This was our first clue that all was not well. I advised the Officer that we would require a quick turnaround due to the rising air temperatures. He did not respond. No air conditioning was available. The temperature inside the aircraft was very warm. Soon we heard popping sounds from inside the hangar. I was aware what this meant. I did not share this information with the crew. It was now 7 a.m., our proposed departure time, and no sign of boarding the passengers. The temperature was 76° and rising. We could stand a temperature of 82° for takeoff. I knew as soon as the sun came up the temperature would rise about 8-10° per hour. Yesterday's high was 112°. 8 a.m., no passengers, temperature 82°. The Flight Engineer, Wally, was getting very anxious. He advised me that any further rise in temperature would not allow us to take off. We waited. 9 a.m., 10 a.m., 11 a.m., noon. The occasional popping sound came from the hangar. The temperature was now 114°. Just then the hangar door opened, an Officer came on board, handed us the manifest, ordering, "You go now." Forty names on the manifest had lines drawn through them. Wally said, "Captain, we are right off the take-off charts. We are at least 15,000 pounds, or 7+ tons overweight for this temperature." I weighed in my mind the possible consequences of refusing to go, or the sequence of events should I offload 75 passengers. How could I choose who would go and who would stay? It was unthinkable. I said to the crew, "We are going. Wally, there is a high speed curved taxi way leading onto this runway. We will go around the corner as fast as we dare, hopefully doing 40 knots before we even start down the runway." All this in our Boeing 707. A great plan. Wrong. I advised the Purser, "We are boarding. There are 40 missing passengers. The remaining passengers will be very distressed, ignore the seating chart, spread them out, get them seated as quickly as possible. Advise me on taxi as soon as the cabin is secure. We will not be stopping prior to the takeoff roll." From this point on this had very little to do with me as a Pilot. I had never, in a very long airline career, ever put my aircraft in danger, nor had I ever risked the life of my crew. What was about to unfold was truly in the hands of God. We closed up, received our airway's clearance to cross the Sahara, and asked for clearance to start and taxi. The tower advised, "Wind's light, runway 16 in use, temperature 112 degrees." As we slowly taxied away we completed all of our briefings and checklists. Bernie, the Purser, advised the cabin was secure. I asked the First Officer to get takeoff clearance. Advise Tower we will take it on the roll. The Tower cleared us for take off, saying, "Contact Nairobi Centre after take off," adding the word, "Goodbye." I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Runway 16 is 11,000 ft long with a slight uphill grade to start, then a slight downgrade towards the water out over Lake Victoria. We used the last chart values to calculate the takeoff speeds. V1 at 165 knots, (200 mph). V1 is the speed that should an engine fail on takeoff prior to reaching this speed, you must abort the takeoff as there is not sufficient power to continue. After V1, you must continue as there is not sufficient runway remaining to stop. This is the critical point on all takeoffs. VR, or rotation, is @ 178 knots, (215 mph) and is the speed at which the aircraft is rotated, or the nose brought up to become airborne. We knew none of these figures were valid, as we were beyond the values that would compute for an airport 3800 ft above sea level, with temperatures over 100 degrees. We were simply too high, too hot, and too heavy to fly. We started our takeoff roll well back on the high speed taxi way crossing the runway threshold at about 60 knots with full power on all four engines. I thought this was a bonus, as I had hoped to start the roll at 40 knots. Wrong. The acceleration was slow to the crest of the runway. Then, starting down the grade towards the lake, it improved slightly, but not really what we had hoped for. Along the side of the runways there were large markers indicating the distance remaining to the end of the runway. I saw the 4000 ft marker go by, we were not close to V1 speed. I saw the 3000 ft marker and we were only doing 152 knots. We weighed over 300,000 pounds. If we rejected at this point we would surely end up in Lake Victoria. With about 1000 ft of runway remaining, speed well below even V1, let alone VR, rotation, I eased back on the control column, the nose came up, the aircraft ran along on the main wheels. Everything became quiet. WE WERE AIRBORNE! We didn't strike any of the light pylons off the end of the runway. Suddenly we were out over the lake. The radio altimeter read 150 ft. The airspeed 162 knots. We were 10 knots below the stall speed of the aircraft. We should not be in the air at all! There was not enough lift to sustain flight. The stall warning should be sounding. It was not. The stick shaker should be warning me to get the nose down. It was not. The nose was way too high. We could not accelerate. The Flight Engineer advised me we were over the redline on all four engine temperatures. Don't touch the power, or we'll stall. Lake Victoria is about 50 miles across. We would have to turn before we reached the south shore. We were burning fuel at a great rate at takeoff power setting, nearly 500 pounds a minute. We were into our tenth minute. As the fuel burned off, our weight became less and the nose of the aircraft began to lower. Ten miles from the shore I decided to try a flat turn to start us back up the lake. Even the slightest bank would cause the aircraft to stall, and crash. We had sacrificed about 100 ft of altitude trying to lower the nose. We were now only about 50 ft above the water. Wally was standing up as we started our turn. "Gord, look at the jet blasts on the water!" I dared to move my eyes for a fraction of a second from the flight panel. I saw "The Footprints on the Water," and knew that a greater power than us was at work. The nose came down, the speed increased, and the Lord gave this aircraft back to Bernoulli and his principles of flight. He did not abandon us that day. I believe that I was a mere instrument of His Will that day so long ago. This is a true story and not easily shared. I hope you enjoyed that story. If you have something positive to say, please do. If not, take it somewhere else. Merry Christmas to all.".
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