Word: hensch
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...Hensch tried the ropes, which were taut against the nine tons of cargo filling a ridiculously small part of the enormous interior. The two pilots went into the cockpit and started to warm up the engines. "They had a pretty good lunch in there today," said Baker to Hensch. "It was fish, but it was good." They had a little informal conversation with the control tower. (British pilots are still lost in wonder at the informality of U.S. communications. One British pilot walks around Berlin shaking his head and telling everybody he overheard a U.S. airman on the strip...
...planes head for Darmstadt. Then they turn northeast for Aschaffenburg and then pick up the Fulda radio range. After Fulda they can fly either on the northeast leg of the Fulda radio range or the southwest Leg of the Tempelhof range. In the Russian zone, just past Eisenach, Hensch's plane flew over one of the Red army training grounds. There were tank tracks through the fields and vehicles lined up next to the forest. Said Hensch: "I'd like to come over here with 20,000 pounds of rotten tomatoes some day instead of this load...
...Baker, with nothing to do, took a box from the ledge above the instrument panel. He unwrapped it-more presents from grateful Germans: a little porcelain snail, some flowers, and a toy walrus made out of rat's fur. There was a note addressed: An unseren Blokade Flieger. Hensch could not read it, but he said: "Wait till my wife gets ahold of that. She'll start sending them food packages. She's always sending these Germans presents...
Fifteen minutes out of Berlin we passed a big Russian airfield. Did the Russians bother them much? "They come up and take a look at you," said Hensch, "and maybe do a couple of slow rolls to show off like any fighter pilot, but they don't mean any harm...
What the Russians Sent. Hensch's plane came over the crumpled heart of Berlin to circle back for its landing under the careful coaching of G.C.A., the radar control for helping planes on to the ground when weather closes in. (Even on good days G.C.A. stays in action to keep the operators and the pilots in practice...