Instead of acknowledging this, she turned to the NTSB investigator. “Mr. Maddox, I have two questions for you. First, was my husband’s crash an accident, suicide, or murder?”
Maddox blinked. “Well . . . I’m not sure we can answer that question. I can’t, at any rate.” He shot a quick look at Prescott, but Prescott ignored him, so he went on. “What I can do is tell you that I’ve seen no evidence of mechanical or structural failure, sabotage, explosives, or anything remotely suggesting an attack on the aircraft. I’ve also seen no signs that your husband ever lost control.” He seemed to shift gears—to take a step back into “briefing” mode—and continued, sounding more at ease. “He took off normally, made a climbing turn, changed course, and then leveled off. All those maneuvers were smoothly executed.” Maddox, too, had brought a folder of visuals to the meeting, but unlike me, he doled out the images one by one instead of giving her the whole set at once. “These are diagrams showing the aircraft’s radar track and altitude, from just after takeoff until the moment of impact.” He slid the first image across the table to her. “This one shows the radar track, superimposed on a map of Brown Field and the surrounding area. The red arrows indicate significant events in the flight, as well as the time they occurred. As you can see, the radar picks up the aircraft almost immediately after takeoff. It flies northeast for three miles—about sixty seconds. Then, over Otay Lake, it turns south, toward Mexico, shortly before leveling off. It continues south for another thirty seconds, the remainder of the flight.” She looked up, her face grim but expectant, and he slid the next page across the table. “This second diagram plots the aircraft’s altitude against the profile of the terrain. As you can see, a mile from the summit, the plane levels off at thirty-three hundred feet”—he reached across the table and, with the tip of a pen, indicated a spot on the line—“but the terrain continues rising steeply. So on that particular course, at that altitude, the collision was inevitable.” He waved the pen over the pair of diagrams, as if it were a wand, conjuring up the plane’s final moments. “Taken together, these indicate that the aircraft was in controlled flight the entire time. Again, nothing wrong with the plane, as far as we can tell at this point. Nothing obviously wrong with the pilot, either, judging from the flight path—no indications that he suffered a heart attack or seizure or stroke.” He paused briefly, then asked, “Are you aware of any medical problems that might have incapacitated him?”
“No. Richard was a strong and healthy man.”
Maddox nodded. “Let me go back to the question I said I couldn’t answer. Without any radio communications or other information that would shed light, I can’t say whether he hit the mountain accidentally or intentionally. On the one hand—the ‘accident’ hand—there’s no lights on that mountain, so even though it’s big, it’s almost invisible on a moonless night, especially if there’s any haze—and there was some haze that night. If he didn’t have a terrain warning alert on his GPS system, or if he hadn’t studied the aviation sectional chart closely—and frankly, the peak altitude of that mountain is printed in very small type—he might not have realized he was headed straight for it.” He paused, gave a pained frown. “On the other hand—the ‘intentional’ hand; the ‘suicide’ hand—if he did intend to take his life, he flew that plane in a way that would guarantee the outcome. And would minimize the risk of killing or injuring anyone else.”
“But he did,” she said. “He did kill someone else.”
“One-in-a-million odds,” Maddox replied. “One in a billion.”
To my surprise, she gave a small, ironic smile. “Not much comfort to that unlucky one.”
“No, ma’am, I suppose not.” A long silence ensued. Finally he prompted, “Did you have another question for me, Mrs. Janus?” She looked puzzled. “You said you had two questions for me. The first was whether it was murder, an accident, or suicide. Is there something else you’d like to ask me?”
“Ah. Yes. Was my husband’s death painful?”
Maddox shook his head emphatically. “No, ma’am. As I say, that mountain’s essentially invisible. He might not have seen it till the last second; maybe not at all. And at that speed—four hundred miles an hour—he would have died instantly. A millisecond. Less than the blink of an eye.”
She shifted her attention to me. “Dr. Brockton? Do you agree?”
“Absolutely,” I assured her. “He didn’t feel a thing.” I believed—and I prayed—that it was the truth.