Flight review

Posted on Thu Apr 14th, 2022 @ 7:37pm by Lieutenant Samantha Leyton

Mission: Mission 6 - Memory
Location: E Deck; NX Atlantis
Timeline: Day 293 1910Hrs
1001 words - 2 OF Standard Post Measure

Samantha walked casually down the corridor without a general destination in mind. It was close to 2000 Hours and she found that walking throughout the ship prior to sleeping allowed her to sleep better. The hum of the deck plates as the ship traveled at warp through space was soothing to her. Right now, she could tell from the vibrations they were doing Warp Two as the dull sensations traveled though her boots as she turned down an different corridor, nearly colliding with another officer.

"Woah!" Liang Van was bent over his flight log PADD and not looking where he was going "Oh hey Boss.." ~Damn did she find out about the shuttlepod already?~ he wondered.

Samantha grinned at the officer she now recognized Ensign Liang Van. "Ah, just the ensign I wanted to talk to. How was your trip?" she asked. Out of those limited certified helmsmen available, he had been the most qualified and so far had done a good job of piloting the ship and seemed to do well so far on piloting the shuttle, yet she hadn't gotten a chance to read the flight log yet due to her duties as the ship's XO.

"Well.." His honor prevented him from misleading Leyton so he came clean. "Flight out went good, touched down in the right spot, the Science Team managed to gather their samples and explore for a bit. But I screwed up the take-off. I still don't know how it happened, but got her about two meters up and then she just crabbed sideways on me. Somehow the trim was off, either they brought back a whole load more rocks than anticipated, or something, but she was over-weight for the thrust setting and I bumped into an outcrop. No systems damage but put a ding in the hull..."

The report wasn't one she wanted to hear as she held out her hand. "Let me see the flight log," she said. For a shuttle to simply dip to one side meant three things--a system failure, external anomaly, or pilot error. She recalled the countless hours she spent basically rebuilding the shuttle after the Vrav nearly destroyed it, so Shuttle Pod Odysseus was special to her.

He handed over the PADD. "Like I said, I don't know why it happened. I didn't touch the trim and thrust settings from when we landed. Had everything set up just right and then the weight changed so much when we took off, she crabbed port on me" He was deeply embarrassed and annoyed at himself and at the science geeks for loading up so many damn rocks. "Nobody was hurt, Smith and Gerhard were on that side, but it was just a little jolt."

Samantha remained quiet as she read the report. All systems were reported operating normal and the sensor readouts gave no indication of any anomalies. She then scrolled down and looked at the weight of the shuttle during takeoff. Sure, the weight was heavy but nothing the shuttle shouldn't have been able to handle. She handed the PaDD back to Zhang. "The shuttlepod was able to handle the load, however as the pilot, it is your job to ensure it is loaded correctly. Next time you take off with a heavy load, take your time taking off so you don't overload the stabilizers. I wasn't there obviously, so I can't say for sure what happened, only educated solutions. How bad is the dent?"

"You're right Boss" Liang Van agreed with her assessment. "We were well within capacity; it's just I didn't expect them to bring so many rock samples back. We had a lift off weight over three hundred kilos more than we landed with. But no excuses I should have checked and reset the trim and thrust levels. I accept full responsibility" he admitted.

Samantha nodded. It was always a good sign when someone accepted responsibility, especially a pilot. An officer that didn't take responsibility was a useless one in her opinion as she waited for Zhang to continue with his report.

"As for the damage, well, it's a kind of dented crease in one of the panels" He held his hands about eighteen inches apart. "Maybe this big? Grazed a sort of outcrop and luckily the asteroid surface was really just a mix of frozen gravel and ice. Scuffed the paint some but didn't puncture the plating and no internal or systems damage. Already told Engineering I'd put in the time to help fix it whenever I'm off duty. I'm really sorry Boss."

Smantha took a breath, managing to grin at the man. She recalled what the Captain and Cranston had told her about being an XO. Besides, she wasn't without her own black marks from dinging a shuttlepod or two and knew she didn't have much room to criticize someone who made a mistake. Luckily it was a simple and minor mistake. "Don't be sorry. Just learn from this mistake and try not to repeat it. I've damaged more than my fair share of shuttle pods, namely flying through Sol's Asteroid belt at max speed of half impulse by using initiating a fusion overburn. I wouldn't recommend it," she chuckled.

Liang Van breathed a sigh of relief and smiled. She had taken the news better than he had expected. He was going to tell her his own fusion afterburner story, but figured this was maybe not the best time. He settled for a simple "Thanks Boss"

"You're welcome. Where are you off to by the way?" she asked Zhang.

"Going to shower, get cleaned up and have an early night" Laing Van replied "Got a bit of a headache" He was thinking it was just a bit of residual stress from the flight and fell like he just needed to get some sleep.

"Alright then." She could empathize with the man as such days required rest to get over. "Carry on, ensign. See you tomorrow." She stepped off to continue her casual walk through the ship.

 

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