Lake Carlopa! Calling police rescue squad! Can you read me?” He gave the plane’s number.
“Rescue squad!” came the answer. “What’s the trouble?”
“We’re going to ditch in the lake. Can you send a crash boat?”
“Roger… . Good luck!”
The plane was losing altitude fast now. Soon they were barely skimming the waves.
“Hold tight, Bud!” Tom said between clenched teeth. “This is it!”
Seconds later there was a terrific impact that jarred the boys loose from their seat belts. A cloud of spray shot high in the air.
“Outside-fast!” Tom yelled.
Bud needed no urging. He was already shoving open the door of the cabin.
With a leap, he plunged into the water and Tom followed.
“Looks as if she’s going to float a while,” Tom gasped. He managed to slam the door shut to keep the cabin from becoming waterlogged.
“Here conies the crash boat!” Bud cheered, as the prow of the police launch knifed toward them.
“Ahoy there!” yelled one of the boatmen as he readied a pair of life preservers to ease the weight of the boys’ wet clothing. “Watch out, you two!”
He tossed out the life rings and the boys wriggled into them.
“Got a towline?” Tom asked the officer in charge.
“Better than that-we brought a cradle,” he called back.
8 THE RACE TO THE MOON
It was trailing behind the police launch on a length of cable. As the steersman eased the boat around, Tom and Bud jockeyed the cradle into place under the plane’s nose and lashed it tightly to the wing struts.
“Wow-just in time!” Bud gasped. “She was sinking fast!”
Strong arms reached out to help the boys clamber into the launch.
Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129