Glide Path Author:Arthur C. Clarke OUT OF THE PEA SOUP AND INTO THE FRYING PAN— — They were almost there; everything was fine. Alan felt himself reaching for his safety belt. There was the yellow glow of the burners, blasting through the fog. In thirty seconds, they'd be down. — Without any warning the aircraft shuddered violently, as if a giant hand had slapped it. At the sa... more »me instant the light from below flared up with a sudden dazzling brilliance as the concealing fog whipped away. They might have been flying above the throat of a volcano, looking straight down into the incandescent lava.
Now the wind was upon them, tearing at wings and fuselage, trying to spin them back into the sky like a child's kite. They had been caught in a man-made gale generated by the burners... ten million horsepower! How could little C Charlie counter that?« less
During World War II, as an RAF officer, Arthur C. Clarke was in charge of the first radar "talk-down" equipment, the Ground Controlled Approach, during its experimental trials. His novel Glide Path is based on this work.