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RedditIn the early 1970s I was copilot on a 4th Military Airlift Squadron Air Force C-141 jet transport at Yokota Air Base, near Tokyo. One winter we spent two weeks shuttling people and cargo all over Japan, South Korea, and southeast Asia, and when the work was done, we really wanted to get home for Christmas. But unless we could be assigned to an aircraft heading east to Seattle, that was not going to happen.
Then, good news: The day before Christmas, a mission was going east, to Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino, California. It was leaving at 10 p.m., so we’d miss Christmas Eve, but by crossing the international dateline, we would be home on Christmas Day to deliver the goodies we had bought in Japan—if we could hitch a ride from Norton to Seattle.
As we headed for the airplane, we passed through an empty terminal, where we spotted a seven-foot, fully decorated, live Christmas tree. “Wouldn’t that look great in the cargo bay,” I thought. “We could linger at the tree with our coffee and look forward to playing Santa Claus.” While the loadmaster made final checks of cargo placement, I found a spot for the tree, with its garlands of fake holly and strands of gold and silver balls.
While refueling at Elmendorf Air Force Base at Anchorage, Alaska, we went through U.S. Customs and Immigration, where officials checked our passports and sent us on our way. The cargo got a permit to proceed—it could legally be flown to another point, where it would be inspected by a Customs agent.
We passed over a snoozing Seattle around 6 a.m. Somewhere over northern California came the first hint of a problem. “Uh, Pilot, this is Load. Do you have the cargo manifest and the Customs papers?”
“Load, Pilot. No, why would I have them?”
“Copilot, Load. Do you have them?”
“Load, Copilot. You have them somewhere back there.”
