Stardust by Blue Hour Press

S ta r d u s t b y k at e l o r e n z

Interview

I. “One of the first concerns is to preserve the scene…” The plane crashed in the mountains in 1947. Post-World War II, and the Londoners craved some Chilean sun, and the Chileans in London had decided to return home. The plane stopped in Buenos Aires. The engines – four, Rolls Royce – were good. An airplane, enveloped in ice, preserves itself. II. “We like to arrive as early as possible because some of the evidence is fragile by nature…” Arrive by mountain climber’s back, by air balloon’s basket, by ski lift, legs dangling. Arrive as early as possible, except the plane crashed into a mountain, and the ice sucked it in, and didn’t spit it out for fifty years. Some of the evidence is fragile by nature: carbon, oxygen, human.

III. “The spread of wreckage over the ground considered in the context of the local terrain can tell us quite a lot about the arrival of the aircraft…” The spread of metal into ice was silent. The cracks formed quickly at first, then extended in rivulets around the plane, out from the fuselage, extensions of wing and tail that were there before the smashing, the compacting. And the cracks filled in, light blue on white, and the plane stayed where it landed. IV. “We want to understand in as much detail as we can what has happened…” Stardust crashed into the mountain, and disappeared. Stardust sent a signal: morse code, coded. STENDEC, from the cockpit, meaning anything, meaning nothing. Of course, an anagram: descent. Of course, a mix up of dots and dashes, an attempt to scream its own name. Sent only once. The mountains jumped up and surprised it.

T r a n s l at o r

... - . -. -.. . -.-.

stendec

-.. . ... -.-. . -. â&#x20AC;&#x201C;

descent

.. - / ... . -. â&#x20AC;&#x201C;

it sent

.- / .-- --- .-. -..

a word

.- / ... .. --. -. .- .-..

a signal

.-- .. .-.. .-.. / .-. . - ..- .-. -.

will return

..... ...--

fifty-three

-.-- . .- .-. ...

years

..-. .-. --- --

from

.. -.-. .

ice

Definition

Lan·cas·tri·an [lang-kas-tree-uhn] noun The kind of airplane wrapped in ice. The kind of airplane that disappears. With Rolls Royce engines, inside a mountain, cooling, then cooled. An airplane with contents, captured. A nesting kind of airplane – not the kind that flies. An airplane that is lost, and lost, then found.

Interview

V. “When we map out the wreckage distribution at any scene it is, of course, to give us the precise location of the aircraft components…” The precise location of the aircraft components: inside the mountain. Map out the ice, the inside, the side turned in away from the world. Run a finger down this crack to find a tail, a finger, a wing. Give directions to this place; an airplane waits. VI. “Establishing the angle of impact helps us to focus in particular areas for the remainder of the investigation…” Look here: scientists. There are charts, angles, degrees. Did the plane land on its nose? Did it spin like a top, the smoke like yarn, spinning? Like a web? When the ice cracks, the steam rises slowly.

VII. “Icing can occur when the temperature outside the aircraft is low enough…” Icing can occur when the mountain breathes, shudders. Icing can put out the fires. Icing can take drops of sweat, condensation, and turn them into stars. Icing can create sharpness, a point. Icing can fill in, fix up, build a house. Icing can obscure, display. Ice can hold on for as long as it wants. VIII. “Serious ice accumulation on aircraft has a number of direct effects…” Serious ice accumulation: weighs down, slows, deadens. mutes, softens, paints blue, then black and white. absorbs moisture, drinks deeply, catches breath, collects.

Forecast

Buenos Aires 1300 hrs. – August 2nd 1947. Forecast for route Buenos Aires to Santiago: State of Sky – dispersed cloud. shifts, obscures. Cloud Base – the tip of the mountain. Horizontal Visibility – whatever you see is not there; passes closed. Upper Winds – W. 17/22 knots rotating toward the mountain. Special Phenomena – snowstorms. a burial. Conditions of flight – visual contact with the ground which is not the ground; conditions in the passes unfit for visual contact.

Definition

moun路tain [moun-tn] noun A mountain folds rock over again, turns it, rises. Ice-capped; breathes sky. A mountain touches cloud, understands. A mountain stays still, then jumps, reaches. It catches and holds tightly. Cradles. A mountain blames the ice for what was done.

Map

Find the spot: Here, the plane, for fifty years, stuck in the mountain, preserved. Here, the smallest parts still: a shard of glass from the aircraft windshield; a chip of paint from the fuselage; a chip of a passengerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fingernail; a glittering. Zoom out: The top of the mountain. The reds and browns of earth, the oozing white of coldness. The mountain breaks and heals, fractures and forms, and the lines in the rocks run deep with what they have taken. Where the plane crashed: all white. Zoom out: The mountain, a fist. The mountain, a reptile with a ridged back. The mountain, a fist, which snatches from the air and summons the ice and holds hostage: a boulder; a falcon; an airplane. Zoom out: The mountain, a jungle. Brown leaves, white veins, and an airplane in the middle, swallowed when the canopy bends. Zoom out: Green, twenty kilometers to the West. Green, forty kilometers to the East. Peculiar cloud formations across a mountainous terrain can turn green into white: a kilometer into eternity. Zoom out: The ocean, not far. Water: blue and moving. Zoom out: Chile. 1947.

Performance

Maximum speed: still. Range: from the edge of the ice to the edge of the mountain. nose to tail. wing to wing. Service ceiling: rises with a freeze. falls when the mountain gives. Rate of climb: the speed of time. a gallop. a crawl.

Interview

IX. “Peculiar cloud formations across mountainous terrain can deceive pilots as to what is ground and what is sky…” The clouds formed roses. The clouds formed the homes in which each of them were born. The clouds formed a bomb. The clouds formed a baseball diamond. The clouds formed a runway, a flatness. The clouds formed Santiago. Formed a welcome. A deception: one whiteness is ground, the other sky. X. “The wreckage trail can virtually be reversed, in that if the mountain continues to descend…” The snow builds under a wing. Lifts. The wing shifts, upward, toward the sky. The snow fills cracks; hardens. Ice descends, a hand caressing the windshield, filling veins, clear like glass. Cold fills veins, turns blood blue like glass.

XI. “The wreckage will tend to fall backwards in the direction from whence it came…” The tail rises first, as if pulled by a string. Woolen threads reattach, fuse, weave. A wing reaches. Hair falls into place, strand by strand. A wheel, turning, almost rolls. Hands lift from floor to forehead. Engines think heat, think speed, think air. Wine flows back into the bottle. Ice lets go. There, a plane. XII. “A sense of how the aircraft arrived offers us the chance to project the aircraft back into the sky…” A sense of how the aircraft arrived offers us the chance to project the aircraft back into the sky.

NOTE Found language taken from NOVA. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/