Final approach

By the time I had finished checking the horse had enough hay and a good enough rug on for the cold night ahead dusk had descended down the hill from Newlands Enclosure and across the fields. A low lying and billowing mist gave a blurred indicator of where Dockens Water bordered the paddocks.

On the way home I stopped near Blashford Lakes for a short walk. This was my time to think and wonder if I had done everything right at the yard. Hay, rug, check water, bolt the door top and bottom, close the windows, hay, rug, water, bolts, lights. I answered “yes” to each of these recurring anxieties.

The route I took led me through some darkening woods whose paths I knew well from the many summer walks I had done. The leaves of autumn and the frost of winter crunched underfoot. I could hear movements in the woods either side of me. It could be a deer foraging or a fox setting off on a lonely foray to pick off an unsuspecting duck that had chosen to stay on the shore for just a few minutes more than the rest of the flock. From one of the paths, I overlooked a body of water towards what was left of the old control tower for Ibsley Airfield. Normally it stood out against the night sky in silhouette like the last remaining tooth on a decrepit jaw but tonight it was different, very different.

There was a soft green light coming through one of the windows and a shadowy figure moving across it. It must have been someone from the local history group working on the renovation project. The calls of the waterfowl faded as they settled down for the night safe from any land based predators. The surface of the water gave off diffracted microbe sized green shards of light from the tower.

In the distance I heard the deep rumbling of aircraft engines that seemed to be coming from the north. This is not the usual route for any final approach into Bournemouth Airport unless it was a plane in distress. The sound got louder and when I looked towards its source I could see the lights of an aircraft barely above the trees. It disappeared from view but the noise rumbled on before suddenly appearing above the trees that line Mockbeggar Lane. Once clear of the trees it lost some height and looked like it was going to crash near the chapel but it didn’t. It continued its droning approach. I could feel the air it was disturbing rushing around me in a blind panic. It was so loud that I could barely hear the waterfowl slap the water with their wings and squawk in panic. The energetic vibrations from the engines firing at full chat gave my inner workings a visceral work out. The tormented air nearly knocked me off my feet into some undergrowth.

The plane passed between me and the tower. As it passed the tower I saw the pilot wave. The figure in the tower waved back. With a huge roaring struggle the plane pulled itself out of what could have been oblivion in the trees along Ellingham Drove. It headed towards Somerley House. I watched its lights as it tracked north along the Avon Valley, climb and then start another approach over the trees along Mockbeggar Lane again and past the control tower.

I looked towards the control tower. It appeared like it had always done, a last tooth stuck on a decrepit old jaw and in utter darkness. No green light or shadowy figure. The waterfowl had settled again for another night on the water free from the imagined stress of being predated by some huge and metallic beast unlike any bird of prey their innate memories knew about. The air was still and even colder than when I had left the yard. My insides were still recovering. The air was silent. Nature in its darkest and coldest, at its most silent moment seemed to be anticipating another airborne tsunami of disturbance.

The plane and its pilot never made that second final approach.