It's midnight, Aug. 15, 1964. I'm 26 years old and in a hell of a mess--lost in the middle of the Libyan Sahara Desert.
I steady myself on the top of my Land Rover and look out over a barren wasteland from the crest of a 100-foot-tall sand dune, praying I'll see something to point me in the direction of the camp at Rig 2, which I left 12 hours earlier.
As the dusty blackness closes in around me, I know I'm lost. Not only am I lost, but I am in the middle of a sandstorm, and all I have is a canteen of water and a sandwich. My Land Rover is about out of gas.
How did this happen? I have been driving across this desert for months.
I think back on a day without a hint of a problem. Up at 5 a.m. and heading to the drilling rig to look at the samples. The driller hollers at me, "Ain't seen nothin' but old black shale."
My work for the day will take 20 minutes, and that's when an idea crosses my mind. I walk over to talk with Clyde McFarland, the tool-pusher.
"Hey, Clyde! How far is it to Kufra?"
Kufra is an oasis in the desert. It was the staging point for the British Long Range Desert Group in World War II. I'll be a tourist and see if the Brits or Rommel left anything of interest.
Clyde yells back, "'Bout two hours--due east, but watch out for land mines. Last week one of 'em got an Italian Jeep and killed the geologist drivin' it."
"Yeah, I heard about that. I'll watch out when I get close to the oasis."
"Well, you'll be OK once you get to the oasis ... Shoot, if you get to Kufra, you oughta go see the old Lady Be Good, the World War II B-24 bomber that got off course after a bombin' raid and landed in the desert."
"How far is it from Kufra?"
" 'Bout an hour south. You won't have no trouble findin' it."
I set my compass and soon I'm driving east toward Kufra across open desert. Closer to the oasis, I drive by stacks of land mines piled up on the edges of a landing strip. They aren't even rusty. Before the war, a tribe would move from place to place with the elders leading them. After losing a few elders to mines, the tribes started sending the camels and women out front.
I continue past the airfield toward the oasis, where I park near a group of men sitting near a water well.
"Kaifa al-haak?" I say as I walk up. That's one of the few Arabic phrases I know; a greeting that means, "Hello, how are you?"
The men all stand and greet me, spewing out Arabic that I don't understand. Finally, one of the younger men steps forward and speaks in fairly good English.
After a few pleasantries, I ask directions to the Lady Be Good. Everyone points south and chatters away in Arabic. But before I can get in my Land Rover, a lunch invitation comes from the young man. I look across from the water well where there's a tent and a steaming pot over a low fire. That's an invitation I can't refuse. It will be an insult to the tribe if I turn them down.
"Na'am, shukran," I say, which means, "Yes, thank you," and follow the men over to a steaming bowl of couscous that has been spiced with chopped lamb, camel, and parsley. We all sit on the ground cross-legged around the bowl. Everyone takes flat bread, then we reach into the steaming bowl, dip, and eat. Finally, after we finish, everyone accompanies me to my Land Rover, and I head south, following some obvious tracks.
In a little over an hour I top a rise and there, sitting in front of a low sand dune, is one of the strangest sights I have ever seen. The Lady Be Good is sitting there. The plane, which looks intact from the outside, is completely stripped inside of anything that can be unbolted or prised off.
After a few minutes of walking around the plane, I climb into the cockpit, then look into the interior, and I've seen all there is to see. I think about what the men faced when they scrambled out of the plane. In 1959, they found the remains of the crew. They had tried to walk to Kufra.
I set my compass northwest, and after an hour of driving, I know the rig should be 20 miles ahead. But the wind is picking up, and soon it is blowing some 30 mph. It is a ghibli, as the Libyans call these sandstorms, and the dust drops the visibility to zero.
Hours later it's dark, and I still haven't found the rig. I begin to worry about running out of gas. That's when I drive up a big sand dune and climb on the top of the car. I've been standing there for about 15 minutes, trying to see a glow in the night sky, which would be the gas flares at Zelten, the Esso Camp.
What am I going to do?
This is one of those moments when you wonder how someone from Norphlet, a small oil-field town in south Arkansas, winds up lost in the Libyan Desert. The fate of the Lady Be Good crew flashes in my mind again as I lean back in the seat to wait out the ghibli. The wind is rocking the Land Rover and in a few minutes I'm asleep.
It seems as if I've been sleeping for several hours when something happens, and I sit up startled. No wind! I jump out of the Land Rover, and the first thing I see are the Zelten flares. I'm less than a mile from the Esso Camp, and the burning gas is so bright it's like daylight. I can't believe I was so close and couldn't see the flares. In a few minutes I'm at the camp to spend the rest of the night in the crew quarters.
Morning comes quickly, and soon I'm driving across the desert again, back to Rig 2 for my morning report.
"Mason here, Gerhard; Rig 2 report, 9875 T. D. made 365' Heira Shale, black shale, no shows. Over."
"Mason, where the hell have you been? George was about to send out search parties. Over."
"Went over to Zelten to pick up some supplies and got caught in a ghibli. Over."
"OK, but keep in touch better. Over."
I don't think Esso needs to know the details.
Richard Mason is a registered professional geologist, downtown developer, former chairman of the Department of Environmental Quality Board of Commissioners, past president of the Arkansas Wildlife Federation, and syndicated columnist. Email richard@gibraltarenergy.com.
Editorial on 03/25/2018