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Mayday
Nejnovější supermoderní nadzvukový letoun Straton – 797 má za sebou již několik úspěšných letů. Na jeho palubě se kromě jiných cestujících nachází i John Berry – sportovní pilot dvoumístných letadel.
Let probíhá klidně, ale během několika okamžiků se změní v tragédii. Americká armáda totiž provádí tajný test nové zbraně – rakety Phoenix – C7. Kvůli utajení o něm ví pouze několik lidí, což znamená, že posádka Stratonu nemá o testu ani tušení.
Peter Matos, pilot, která má střelu vyzkoušet, si nešťastnou náhodou splete Straton s cvičným cílem. Raketa prorazí trup letadla a způsobí silnou dekompresi. V důsledku podtlaku mají všichni cestující poškozený mozek a jsou stále agresivnější. Jediný, kdo srážku ve zdraví přežije, je John Berry, dvě letušky a dva cestující. John Berry se ujme řízení letadla.
Když se Matos dozví, že omylem zasáhl Straton, jeho velitel mu rozkáže, aby letoun sestřelil, protože jinak by se o testu dozvěděly sdělovací prostředky. Matos se stále nemůže rozhodnout, ale když zjistí, že Straton někdo řídí, rozhodne se počkat...
Berry se zatím spojí s letištěm, ale to mu úmyslně dává špatné instrukce...
Let probíhá klidně, ale během několika okamžiků se změní v tragédii. Americká armáda totiž provádí tajný test nové zbraně – rakety Phoenix – C7. Kvůli utajení o něm ví pouze několik lidí, což znamená, že posádka Stratonu nemá o testu ani tušení.
Peter Matos, pilot, která má střelu vyzkoušet, si nešťastnou náhodou splete Straton s cvičným cílem. Raketa prorazí trup letadla a způsobí silnou dekompresi. V důsledku podtlaku mají všichni cestující poškozený mozek a jsou stále agresivnější. Jediný, kdo srážku ve zdraví přežije, je John Berry, dvě letušky a dva cestující. John Berry se ujme řízení letadla.
Když se Matos dozví, že omylem zasáhl Straton, jeho velitel mu rozkáže, aby letoun sestřelil, protože jinak by se o testu dozvěděly sdělovací prostředky. Matos se stále nemůže rozhodnout, ale když zjistí, že Straton někdo řídí, rozhodne se počkat...
Berry se zatím spojí s letištěm, ale to mu úmyslně dává špatné instrukce...
352 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1987
2 people are currently reading
36 people want to read
About the author
Thomas Block
54 books16 followersThomas Block has written a number of aviation-oriented novels, many which have gone on to acquire best-seller status in numerous countries. His novel writing began with the publication of "Mayday" in 1979. That novel was rewritten with his boyhood friend, novelist Nelson DeMille in 1998 and remains on DeMille's extensive backlist. "Mayday" became a CBS Movie of the Week in October, 2005.
Several of the other novels by Block include "Orbit" (a top bestseller in Germany, among other nations), "Airship Nine", "Forced Landing" (also done as a radio serialization drama in Japan), "Skyfall", "Open Skies" and "Captain". Thomas Block is still writing both fiction and non-fiction, and has edited and updated his earlier novels into ebooks in all the major formats and also into new full-sized (trade soft cover) printed versions.
Block's magazine writing began in 1968 and over the next five decades his work has appeared in numerous publications. He worked 20 years at FLYING Magazine as Contributing Editor, and as Contributing Editor to Plane & Pilot Magazine for 11 years. Block became Editor-at-Large for Piper Flyer Magazine and Cessna Flyer Magazine in 2001. During his long career as an aviation writer he has written on a wide array of subjects that range from involvement with government officials to evaluation reports on most everything that flies.
An airline pilot for US Airways for over 36 years before his retirement in April, 2000, Captain Thomas Block has been a pilot since 1959. Since 2002, he has lived on a ranch in Florida with his wife Sharon where they board, compete and train horses. Complete information (including direct links to booksellers) is available at http://www.ThomasBlockNovels.com or through the author’s additional website at http://www.FlyingB-Ranch.com. For Facebook users, complete information about Thomas Block Novels can also be found at two interlinked Facebook sites:
http://www.Facebook.com/Captain.by.Th...
http://www.Facebook.com/ThomasBlockNo....
Several of the other novels by Block include "Orbit" (a top bestseller in Germany, among other nations), "Airship Nine", "Forced Landing" (also done as a radio serialization drama in Japan), "Skyfall", "Open Skies" and "Captain". Thomas Block is still writing both fiction and non-fiction, and has edited and updated his earlier novels into ebooks in all the major formats and also into new full-sized (trade soft cover) printed versions.
Block's magazine writing began in 1968 and over the next five decades his work has appeared in numerous publications. He worked 20 years at FLYING Magazine as Contributing Editor, and as Contributing Editor to Plane & Pilot Magazine for 11 years. Block became Editor-at-Large for Piper Flyer Magazine and Cessna Flyer Magazine in 2001. During his long career as an aviation writer he has written on a wide array of subjects that range from involvement with government officials to evaluation reports on most everything that flies.
An airline pilot for US Airways for over 36 years before his retirement in April, 2000, Captain Thomas Block has been a pilot since 1959. Since 2002, he has lived on a ranch in Florida with his wife Sharon where they board, compete and train horses. Complete information (including direct links to booksellers) is available at http://www.ThomasBlockNovels.com or through the author’s additional website at http://www.FlyingB-Ranch.com. For Facebook users, complete information about Thomas Block Novels can also be found at two interlinked Facebook sites:
http://www.Facebook.com/Captain.by.Th...
http://www.Facebook.com/ThomasBlockNo....
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Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
January 25, 2025
UFF! Toto bola jazda mnohých skorumpovaností, pokrytectiev, klamstiev, VRÁŽD, drám, šokov, strachu a mnohého ďalšieho..
naozaj úchvatne napísaný dej, nemohla som knihu veľakrát ani odložiť a to sa mi stáva naozaj málokedy.
“Nič tak rýchle nezdruží ľudí ako spoločný úspech.”
”Traja neprezradia tajomstvo, ak dvaja z nich sú mŕtvi.”
“Usiluje sa ho okydať špinou, aby sa on cítil lepšie.”
“Zhovárať sa s človekom alebo s ľudmi, čo sú v tej miestnosti, by bolo ako kričať o pomoc na človeka, ktorý ťa sotil do vody aby si sa utopila.”
naozaj úchvatne napísaný dej, nemohla som knihu veľakrát ani odložiť a to sa mi stáva naozaj málokedy.
“Nič tak rýchle nezdruží ľudí ako spoločný úspech.”
”Traja neprezradia tajomstvo, ak dvaja z nich sú mŕtvi.”
“Usiluje sa ho okydať špinou, aby sa on cítil lepšie.”
“Zhovárať sa s človekom alebo s ľudmi, čo sú v tej miestnosti, by bolo ako kričať o pomoc na človeka, ktorý ťa sotil do vody aby si sa utopila.”
January 1, 2022
Although it is a bit dated considering it is now 2021, I found it a real heart pounder. Found myself almost racing ahead to keep the 'rush' going. Hated when the author slowed it down by switching over to update you on one of the other characters. Many of the characters are black and white, either you like them or hate them and if you hate them you really do--no middle of the road in this story. A good story to spend New Years Eve finishing off!!!!
February 9, 2024
This is the third time I have read this novel over the course of roughly twenty-five years. I think that says a lot about the book. I have thought about it many times in the intervening years. It is focused on one of the most common tropes in disaster literature—the big jet plane that no longer has a pilot who can land it. There is something about this circumstance that just about everyone seems to be able to relate to. Lives are immediately at stake. The circumstances are incredibly severe. And yet, even those of us with no pilot training believe we would have at least a chance to be talked successfully through the landing by the control tower.
One of the things that makes this book so exciting is that contact with the control tower has been lost and the people that are communicating with the jet want it to crash.
The problem begins when a secret and illegal military test of a new missile mistakes the airliner for a target drone and blows a hole in the middle of the plane. So right from the start, a career protecting naval commander is trying to work things so that the fighter pilot who launched the missile will finish the job and down the plane at sea where no one will ever find it and be able to report what happened.
On board the plane, oxygen deprivation has turned the vast majority of the passengers and crew into brain-damaged zombies—and this was before The Walking Dead made the zombie genre super popular. So, the handful of functional survivors, most of whom were in the lavatory when the plane was shot and so had more air pressure as the automatic pilot brought the plane down to breathable altitudes, have to deal with increasingly difficult fellow passengers. Some of those passengers are family members. There are a lot of emotions involved.
At the same time, the insurance executive responsible for covering the flight has learned about the brain-damaged passengers and has calculated that their situation will cost the company infinitely more money (rest of their life medical care) than if the plane just goes down at sea and they have to pay death benefits to everyone. So, he convinces a high-ranking official at the airline to help him trick the man trying to pilot the plane home into cutting off fuel to the engines and downing the plane.
All of these threats combine to create an exciting novel that has stayed in my thoughts for twenty-five years. If you like airplane disaster books and movies, you're going to love Mayday.
One of the things that makes this book so exciting is that contact with the control tower has been lost and the people that are communicating with the jet want it to crash.
The problem begins when a secret and illegal military test of a new missile mistakes the airliner for a target drone and blows a hole in the middle of the plane. So right from the start, a career protecting naval commander is trying to work things so that the fighter pilot who launched the missile will finish the job and down the plane at sea where no one will ever find it and be able to report what happened.
On board the plane, oxygen deprivation has turned the vast majority of the passengers and crew into brain-damaged zombies—and this was before The Walking Dead made the zombie genre super popular. So, the handful of functional survivors, most of whom were in the lavatory when the plane was shot and so had more air pressure as the automatic pilot brought the plane down to breathable altitudes, have to deal with increasingly difficult fellow passengers. Some of those passengers are family members. There are a lot of emotions involved.
At the same time, the insurance executive responsible for covering the flight has learned about the brain-damaged passengers and has calculated that their situation will cost the company infinitely more money (rest of their life medical care) than if the plane just goes down at sea and they have to pay death benefits to everyone. So, he convinces a high-ranking official at the airline to help him trick the man trying to pilot the plane home into cutting off fuel to the engines and downing the plane.
All of these threats combine to create an exciting novel that has stayed in my thoughts for twenty-five years. If you like airplane disaster books and movies, you're going to love Mayday.
October 11, 2019
Yet another proof of reading books is important - filmization of a book can never offset the excitement of this book about the "velvet interests" on the ground and powerlessness of Berry, Sharon and the girl Linda who do their utmost to get the whole world back to earth.
Mayday is still a very exciting and nerve-wracking thriller, where it is self-evident all the time that the plane reaches the ground, but is uncertain how many survive. My re-reading in 2019 has certainly not disappointed. This is still a thriller of international format.
In this novel Thomas H. Block and co-writer Nelson DeMille are mastering the habits of aviation-oriented novels.
Mayday is still a very exciting and nerve-wracking thriller, where it is self-evident all the time that the plane reaches the ground, but is uncertain how many survive. My re-reading in 2019 has certainly not disappointed. This is still a thriller of international format.
In this novel Thomas H. Block and co-writer Nelson DeMille are mastering the habits of aviation-oriented novels.
October 29, 2024
This is a good read. Not exactly a page turner, but still worth reading. I'm an aviation buff so this was right up my alley. There are some tense moments and some slow parts, but it evens out. You can't help but root for the good guys.
October 7, 2021
Ze začátku jsem myslela, že knížku odložím…
Předčítání se mi nelíbilo…
Ale byla jsem zvědavá…
Bylo to napínavé…
Akorát ta hudba v audioknize byla vážně děsná…
Předčítání se mi nelíbilo…
Ale byla jsem zvědavá…
Bylo to napínavé…
Akorát ta hudba v audioknize byla vážně děsná…
June 29, 2022
Dobře se to četlo, mělo to spád, zajímavé téma. Váhání mezi 4-5*. Nakonec plný počet
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June 28, 2025Feb-1998
November 8, 2008
Gripping suspense as various guilty parties try to save their careers at the expense of the survivors of a botched secret missile test. And did I mention the 300 or so brain damaged passengers (and co-pilot) loose on the damaged jetliner?
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews