and a night. Some pilots who had
followed the flight from the West Coast claimed that the vast
lamentation of her voice was growing fainter and hoarser while she was
drifting along the line of the Mohawk Valley. She turned south,
following the Hudson at no great height. Sometimes she appeared to be
choking, the labored inhalations harsh and prolonged, like a cloud in
agony.

When she was over Westchester, headquarters tripled the swarm of
interceptors and observation planes. Squadrons from Connecticut and
southern New Jersey deployed to form a monstrous funnel, the small end
before her, the large end pointing out to open sea. Heavy bombers closed
in above, laying a smoke screen at 10,000 feet to discourage her from
rising. The ground shook with the drone of jets, and with her crying.

Multitudes had abandoned the metropolitan area. Other multitudes trusted
to the subways, to the narrow street canyons and to the strength of
concrete and steel. Others climbed to a thousand high places and
watched, trusting the laws of chance.

She passed over Manhattan in the evening--between 8:14 and 8:27 P.M.,
July 16, 1976--at an altitude of about 2000 feet. She swerved away from
the aircraft that blanketed Long Island and the Sound, swerved again as
the southern group buzzed her instead of giving way. She made no attempt
to rise into the sun-crimsoned terror of drifting smoke.

The plan was intelligent. It should have worked, but for one fighter
pilot who jumped the gun.

He said later that he himself couldn't understand what happened. It was
court-martial testimony, but his reputation had been good. He was Bill
Green--William Hammond Green--of New London, Connecticut, flying a
one-man jet fighter, well aware of the strictest orders not to attack
until the target had moved at least ten miles east of Sandy Hook. He
said he certainly had no previous intention to violate orders. It was
something that just happened in his mind. A sort of mental sneeze.

His squadron was approaching Rockaway, the flying creature about three
miles ahead of him and half a mile down. He was aware of saying out loud
to nobody: "Well, she's too big." Then he was darting out of formation,
diving on her, giving her one rocket-burst and reeling off to the south
at 840 MPH.

He never did locate or rejoin his squadron, but he made it somehow back
to his home field. He climbed out of the cockpit, they say, and fell
flat on his face.

It seems likely that