Remote Instruction

Meanwhile, Lei Hu had received Li Zhi's file on the ground. It was only two thin pages and not very detailed.

It wasn't that more detailed information couldn't be found. Ordinary individuals or organizations might not be able to find it, but for the military and the state, there was nothing that couldn't be found. It was only a matter of time.

In the internet age, a person had no secrets apart from the inner monologue in their mind!

Though the file was fairly sparse, it contained one very important piece of information: Li Zhi had come to Yuzhou for the second round of flight academy pilot recruitment.

The fact that he had made it to the second round proved that Li Zhi and his family had trustworthy backgrounds.

Although the political background check would only formally begin after he passed the second round, some preliminary investigation had begun long before then. Otherwise, there wouldn't have been enough time.

After confirming that there was no problem with Li Zhi's identity, Lei Hu inexplicably felt a glimmer of hope.

All because he had seen the words "flight academy" in the file!

Li Zhi, on whom such "great hopes" had been placed, was feeling rather flustered.

Actually flying a plane-and a large commercial airliner at that-was completely different from playing a flight simulator on a computer. It wasn't a matter of pressing a couple of keys.

To complete the turn in a short time, Li Zhi had moved the control stick a little too far, causing the entire airliner to bank too steeply.

If that had been all, it wouldn't have been much of a problem, apart from making the passengers uncomfortable.

But the aviation book Li Zhi had read earlier had only explained the basics of controlling an aircraft, leaving out many important details.

Banking the plane to a certain angle during a turn was correct, but to maintain that angle, he had to move the stick partway back after pushing it and pull back slightly at the same time. Otherwise, the plane would gradually descend in a spiral and eventually stall!

Li Zhi had completed the turn within the twenty seconds Lei Hu had requested.

But the price was that the entire plane was banked at more than 70 degrees and plunging toward the ground at an increasing speed.

"Bank angle! Bank angle!..."

"Don't sink! Don't sink!..."

The excessive bank angle and excessive descent rate warnings sounded without pause.

Li Zhi didn't need to report it to the ground; the people there had already noticed the airliner's abnormal behavior. There was nothing wrong with the airliner itself, so the control tower could naturally monitor its performance data in real time.

Lei Hu was the head of a flight division and had been a pilot himself. Although his specialty was fighter jets, he could still read civilian aviation radar instruments.

"Li Zhi, what's going on? What happened?"

"Director Tian, is there a captain here now with extensive experience flying the same model?"

Lei Hu was getting agitated. Even when he had given the order to "shoot it down" earlier, he had been able to keep his emotions well under control, but now he couldn't.

It was like a drowning man clutching at a straw. Even knowing full well that the straw couldn't save his life, he would still hold on to it for dear life.

"Yes, yes! This is Captain Wu Lei. He has more than 8,000 hours of flight experience and has handled several emergencies!"

Director Tian brought a middle-aged man over to Lei Hu.

"Captain Wu, please, I'm counting on you!"

Lei Hu rose to give Wu Lei his place and personally helped him into the seat.

"Leave professional matters to professionals" had always been Lei Hu's guiding principle, and he treated professionals far better than he treated even his superior officers.

Captain Wu made no confident promises, nor did he stand on ceremony with Lei Hu. He grabbed the microphone in front of him and began communicating with Li Zhi.

"Comrade Li, can you hear me? The plane's descending too fast. What happened?"

Wu Lei didn't blindly tell Li Zhi to pull the plane up. The people on the ground didn't know the plane's exact situation, so naturally they couldn't give directions at random.

"I just made a turn, ... the plane is now..."

Li Zhi quickly described the plane's current flight condition and recounted every step he had taken earlier.

"Now do as I say, and keep me updated on the plane's condition. Understood?"

Wu Lei knew airliners and flying so well that as soon as Li Zhi mentioned the turn, he had already roughly guessed what situation Li Zhi was facing.

It was a problem most trainees new to civilian aviation had: they could only follow the textbook. It was also a result of insufficient experience.

"Understood!"

"You just made a turn. Now move the control stick in the opposite direction. Once the plane's attitude starts to change, make another small correction in the opposite direction. Move slowly, and don't rush!"

The plane was still falling, but Wu Lei hadn't told Li Zhi to pull it up first.

In the plane's current condition, it was possible to correct the bank angle and gain altitude at the same time, but that would undoubtedly be much harder. Wu Lei didn't think Li Zhi could do it.

He hadn't even told Li Zhi how to use the rudder pedals to coordinate the turn. He was keeping things as simple as possible. As for the passengers' experience, the main task now was to stay alive!

While Wu Lei was tensely conducting his remote "lesson," Lei Hu was facing a difficult choice.