A Hindenburg Eyewitness

     ...From five hundred feet in the air, the nose of the airship collapsed in incandescent fire and fell to the ground, a smouldering mass of girders and scalded metal. The whole of it looked vast and hot and brilliant, as if a huge star had crashed into the Lakehurst airfield. The sky was lit with gaseous oranges, pinks and dazzling white - a roiling mass of fire and colour. Sofia felt it explode inside her with the certain truth that her aunt and uncle had perished. She started screaming.

          "Aunt Julia!"

          "It's all right, honey," said Mr. Stafford.

      It wasn't all right. She screamed against his chest, but he didn't let go his grip on her until she began to calm down. After a while she felt too exhausted to cry.

     Someone was shouting through a bullhorn: "Ground crew, give 'em a hand!" The fleeing rescuers were running back toward the wreckage, and she heard the wailing of ambulance sirens and the clang of fire trucks as they raced across the field.

          "They're going back to find them, see?" said Mrs. Stafford.

      Sofia dried her eyes, took her binoculars and scanned the scene. She'd try not to be frantic as she scrutinized passengers escaping through the windows, climbing out through the tangled girders, running away from the flames. Where were they? A yellow haze blurred her lenses, dissolving into a burning sleeve, a man's charred arm. Captain, you're on fire! Was she close enough to hear this? Another blur - someone snuffing out the flames. A blanket.