Dartley could see it from where he sat. The pilots were looking for a needle in a haystack—an oil rig somewhere in the continuous thick bank of fog beneath them. Some of the passengers were grumbling, expecting that the flight would have to return to Sumburgh. One disagreed, claiming that their two pilots never allowed the fog to beat them and would get them in somehow. After a while the helicopter circled slowly and lost altitude. One moment they were in the bright sunshine above the soft layer of mist, and the next they were lost in a swirling fog so thick it blocked out much of the daylight. The pilots sat erect and tense, talking rapidly into their headsets. Even the most bored and hardened oilmen on board stared out through the fog uneasily. Dartley knew that there were four giant rigs on the Brent field—Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta. They were looking for Delta. These enormous steel structures were somewhere nearby, hidden in the fog. The pilots continued to set the chopper down slowly through the grey swirls of mist, peering to make sure the rig did not suddenly materialize immediately beneath or in front of them.
