The aircraft is down there. They made it. They made it down. Grace didn't move. They're saying the anchor pressed her earpiece harder, listening her professional composure cracking.
They're saying the aircraft was landed by a passenger, a former Air Force fighter pilot who happened to be on board. Details are still coming in, but a passenger took control after the captain suffered a fatal medical emergency and and landed the plane himself. We don't have a name yet, but Dad, Grace whispered. Honey, her aunt started. That's my dad.
Grace was on her feet now and she was shaking and she was smiling and tears were pouring down her face all at once. That's my dad, Aunt Deb. They don't have a name, but I know that's him. He flew fighter jets. He never tells anybody, but I know that's my dad.
And then it hit her all at once. The fear and the relief and the 12 years of watching the world call her father a criminal when she knew she knew and she sat back down hard on the floor and sobbed. He kept his promise. He said he'd come home and he he saved everybody. Aunt Deb, he saved everybody.
Her aunt pulled her close and Grace cried into her shoulder and on the television the anchor was still talking, still marveling, still saying a passenger, a former fighter pilot, a hero. And Grace thought fierce and proud and breaking. He was never a passenger. He was my dad. He was always this.
You all just never looked. In the cockpit, Kayn Brooks wiped her face with the back of her hand and laughed a wet, disbelieving laugh and looked at the man beside her. "How? " she said. "How did you 30 ft Ethan 30 ft from the end on one engine, no flaps? How did you do that?
Ethan was staring straight ahead through the windscreen and he didn't answer for a moment. His hands were still shaking. Now that it was over, now that the airplane was still and the danger was past everything he'd been holding on that high shelf was starting to come down, and it was heavier than she could know. I had somebody worth landing for, he said finally, quietly. That's all it ever is.
You find the one thing worth living for and you hold it and you don't let go and you fly the airplane. He turned to look at her and his eyes were wet. You did that, too. You had your captain to honor. That's why you didn't quit.
That's why we're alive. Both of us held on to something. The radio crackled. 447 Thule. You are stopped on the runway and I'm looking at you out my window and I got to tell you, brother, that is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
That was a hell of a piece of flying. From all of us down here, welcome home 4001st. Welcome home. Ethan keyed the mic and his voice cracked and he didn't try to hide it. Thank you, Thu.
Couldn't have done it without you talking me in. You did it with your own two hands, Carter. Don't let anybody tell you different. Emergency vehicles are rolling out to you now. You just sit tight.