A fighter jet is in the skies. The pilot is ordered to begin and he uses the jet to attack and destroy a few targets, including a small base and a boat. The jet is extremely fast and it is equipped with powerful missiles. It is watched from a small base next to a cliff.
Inside this base is The Hood and a man known as General Bron. The Hood is completely impressed with this new jet as the General tells him that, with this new weapon, he could be the master of land and sea...if it weren't for the Red Arrow. The General explains that the Red Arrow is a new fighter jet which is even better than the one he has. His army is becoming restless and he wants all opposition removed, so he asks The Hood to sabotage the Red Arrow. He'll be greatly rewarded if he dooms the Red Arrow project and the testing phase is due to start soon.
A few days later, at London airport, Commander Norman has the test area for the Red Arrow cleared and then hands over control to Colonel Tim Casey, who is overseeing the Red Arrow project. Down below, a hanger opens and then rolls back to reveal the first Red Arrow jet.
The Hood has pulled up into a parking space. He is disguised as a laundry cleaner but he has far more sinister plans than that as he cracks a joke to himself. He has a good view of the Red Arrow launch site. Meanwhile, Tim briefs the pilot of the Red Arrow 1 and tells him not to do anything fancy, he just needs to follow the instructions to the letter. The pilot, Race, says he understands as he blasts off in the new jet.
Race reports that everything with the new jet seems fine, but then he says his speed is increasing. Tim tells him to slow down, but he can't and soon he no longer seems to have control of the plan. The Red Arrow turns around by itself whilst going faster and faster and starts to head right back towards the airport. The aircraft goes into a dive and Race blacks out due to the G-Force.
Norman sounds the red alert and fire and ambulance vehicles are scrambled as Tim tells Race to bail out, but it is too late. Red Arrow 1 crashes into a hangar and explodes. The Hood has seen everything and casually drives off.
Tim is wondering what could have gone wrong as the fire services reach the hangar. News of this accident soon reaches the papers, which in turn soon reach Tracy Island. Jeff tells some of his sons about the story and that they plan to continue testing the Red Arrow, but Colonel Tim Casey will no longer have anything to do with the project. Jeff knows Tim as they were both in the space program a long time a go. Jeff thinks that it isn't like Tim to let something like this happen and thinks that maybe it was sabotage. The Red Arrow is a powerful weapon that some people might want to see put out of action for a long time.
At The Hood's temple, the General has been invited over. He's pleased that the first Red Arrow test ended in disaster and shows The Hood a casket full of expensive jewels, but he doesn't let him have them yet. Red Arrow 2 is due to take off soon and he also wants that test to fail so the entire Red Arrow project will be abandoned. When that happens, the casket will be his. The Hood accepts his terms.
Back at Tracy Island, Brains and Alan see something heading their way on radar at great speed. They report it to Jeff, who says they aren't expecting any visitors. The object doesn't appear to be on a commercial flight path either, but Jeff highly doubts this thing is going to attack them or anything like that. He starts operation cover-up just in case, because if someone does end up visiting them they don't want anyone knowing about this being International Rescue's base. Scott, Virgil and Jeff head out to the balcony to see a yellow jet...
...which suddenly dives right at them! Scott thinks it is going to attack so Jeff tells everyone to get down, but as they do this the jet pulls up and released a flag which has a greeting on it. Jeff gets up and sees this and realises that Tim Casey must be in the plane, as it couldn't be anyone else. Meanwhile, back in England...
...The Hood is busy attaching a device to part of a British Telecom television relay tower. After he puts it on, he makes a call to the two guys up in the tower saying he is a maintenance man who has finished checking over the tower structure and they should be fine during tomorrow's predicted storm. Back at Tracy Island, Jeff and Tim discuss the Red Arrow. Tim thinks the first one never should have crashed as every part of it was double checked.
Brains appears as he's been checking blueprints of the Red Arrow, but has found nothing wrong with them. Jeff is sure the crash happened due to an act of sabotage and Brains believes that there must have been some kind of homing device involved. Brains has created a device which will tell the pilot of the second Red Arrow if his aircraft is being pulled off course. Goddard, the man who will pilot Red Arrow 2, is the one who flew Tim out here. Tim sends him back and tells him to make use of the device Brains has given him during the test tomorrow.
Goddard takes off and heads back to England. In England, the two guys inside the relay tower see that the storm is still coming and it is most likely going to shake the tower around a bit -obviously not enough to make the tower fall, but it will be a bit rough in a few hours. The next morning, at London airport, a hangar opens up to reveal Red Arrow 2.
Norman isn't happy because he's been put in charge of overseeing the test, even though he wanted Tim back on the project. He contacts Goddard and tells him to take off. Red Arrow 2 is launched but this time there seem to be no problems with it at all. Meanwhile, in the relay tower, Stan (the one with glasses) tells Jim that there are strange readings on the cyclonic force reader -the storm has just started but Jim doesn't think it would make these kind of readings happen. He thinks an aircraft must be somewhere nearby. Stan thinks that can't be as there isn't an aircraft flight path for miles around here.
Meanwhile, Goddard is having trouble and he reports to Norman that he can no longer control the plane, it seems to be flying itself. Norman says this is the same thing that happened before and he finds out that the Red Arrow 2 is already 80 miles off course. It is, however, over open country, so Norman tells Goddard to aim the plane downwards and then eject. Goddard checks Brains' diversion detector, which is starting to read that something is pulling the plane off course. He then does as he is told...
...and ejects, as Red Arrow 2 continues to head down. Jim and Stan are trying to get to the bottom of the strange readings when Norman contacts them and warns that there is an unmanned aircraft in their vicinity. He advises them to evacuate the tower just in case. Jim thinks he must be crazy and there must be a million to one chance of them being hit, but Stan thinks they'd better take it seriously as they wouldn't have been told to evacuate otherwise. Jim calls the elevator to head up to them.
Red Arrow 2 continues down, and the diversion detector is going crazy inside it. Norman thinks whatever dragged the aircraft off course must have incredible power and he then finds out Goddard has landed safely. Meanwhile, the lift hasn't arrived when Stan and Jim hear engine noise outside. They brace themselves as Red Arrow 2 crashes straight into the relay tower.
Jim and Stan are OK and the tower hasn't collapsed, but it is clear it could go over any minute. There is no way they can use the elevator now either and the storm is only making things worse. Meanwhile Goddard is taken back to London airport and he tells Norman the diversion detector was reading that something was interfering with the plane. Norman finds out that the plane has hit the relay tower but they can't get through to the people inside it. He isn't sure what they can do as due to the bad storm they can't send a helicopter out to take a look at it. Stan has had a good enough idea though, as he tries to contact International Rescue.
Tim thinks this Island Jeff is great but he wants to know one thing: what does Jeff do with himself all day? He thinks he and his sons ought to have something to keep them occupied. Jeff thinks he is right but then excuses himself after he sees a signal telling him he is needed in the lounge. He heads up there and finds out from Scott that John has just called - the Red Arrow 2 has crashed and there are two men in danger. Jeff tells Tin-Tin to go and distract Tim whilst Scott heads out in Thunderbird 1. He tells Alan to go and find Virgil and bring him up here.
Jeff explains to Virgil what is going on and tells him and Alan to head out in Thunderbird 2. They are all ready to take off, but they need to wait for Tin-Tin to put her plan into motion. She has taken Tim out to the waters, telling him that she has found out a water mamba has been seen here recently. She explains that the creature is a rare mammal and he may never get a chance to see one. Tim doesn't seem to care as he says he's an air man, not a frog man. However she then says she saw it and dives under the water, so Tim follows her.
She contacts Jeff and tells him she is taking Tim to the underwater caves. This means Thunderbirds 1 and 2 can take off, so they do. Scott contacts Virgil and tells him that the local area around the tower has been cleared, but the weather conditions are meant to be very bad now.
The tower is still shaking badly when Thunderbird 1 arrives on the scene. Thunderbird 2 is still just under 5 minutes away, so Scott deploys Thunderbird 1's remote camera to go and take a look at the tower. As expected, part of it is in quite a mess.
The camera is flown up to one of the windows at the top of the tower, where Jim and Stan see it. It makes them glad as clearly someone outside is here. The image the remote camera is recording are displayed on one of Thunderbird 2's monitors just as Virgil lands his machine. Thunderbird 2 rises up as pod 3's door opens up, revealing a small vehicle Alan is driving known as the Booster Mortar.
Alan drives up next to the tower and he and Virgil figure out the correct co-ordinates to fire a shot through one of the tower's windows. After doing that, Alan fires and a projectile smashes through the window. Jim and Stan see a canister has been sent up to them and they open it to find two low-altitude escape harnesses. They put them on.
The tower structure is getting worse and worse. Stan and Jim have the equipment on and head out of a window and onto a balcony so they can take off. Virgil is wondering what is taking so long when the tower topples over and crashes to the ground.
Scott heads over and says those two guys never stood a chance, they were just seconds too late. However Alan points out that they haven't failed in saving them as they are both seen floating down to the ground safely a short distance away from the tower. Alls well that ends well, bit Virgil then sees something in the wreckage -a strange device.
Virgil reports to his father and Brains that they've saved the two guys but they've also found something. He displays an image of the device and Brains takes a look at it. He says it is some kind of homing device and that it may well have caused the Red Arrow to lose control. Jeff tells Virgil to warn the police, as the one responsible is probably still nearby. Indeed, The Hood is getting out of there and thinks the gold will soon be his, but he speeds past a police car that starts to chase him. He accelerates.
The Hood sees what he thinks is a blockade, but he just drives right through it. He contacts General Bron and says that International Rescue must have discovered some evidence at the tower and have sent the police after him. The General calls him a fool and says that he can never escape from International Rescue! The Hood says he has already shaken off the police and keeps driving. The blockade The Hood drove through was actually a diversion -the car chasing after The Hood has stopped there. The officer who set up the diversion tells the two cops in the car that he tried to warn the man that the bridge ahead is down, but he deliberately drove through.
Thanks to the poor visibility, The Hood drives right of the bridge and into a river below. He has survived and surprisingly his radio still works, but General Bron has heard the loud noise caused by the crash. He tells The Hood that not only have his plans been ruined, but he now knows that he cannot even drive a car, so he can fend for himself now.
Tin-Tin has shown Tim over 20 caves and he's getting bored as they still haven't seen any water mambas. However, Tin-Tin gets a signal, so she now knows the Thunderbirds have returned and she can go back. She and the Colonel start to swim back up to the surface. Jeff makes sure everything was the way it was before Tim left and then greets Tim as he walks back into the lounge. He tells him that the Red Arrow tests had been sabotaged but it has been cracked wide open and Tim is now wanted back on the project. A short time later, Tim leaves the Island and has another message for Jeff.
NOTES