The information which Mel Bakersfeld had been given about a meeting in Meadowood was quite correct.

The meeting had started half an hour earlier in a church hall. It had started late because the 600 people who had come had to fight their way to it through thick snow. But they had come.

They were the sort of people you would find in any small town. An equal number of men and women were present. As it was Friday night, most of them were dressed informally. Several newspaper reporters were also there.

The room was uncomfortably crowded and full of smoke. All the chairs were taken, and at least a hundred people were standing.

Only an extremely serious matter could have brought them out from their warm homes on such a terrible night. They were all, at the moment, extremely angry.

They were angry for two reasons. First, because of the noise which could be heard night and day in their homes, and second, because even during this meeting the noise of planes taking off was making it impossible for them to hear one another. In fact, it was unusually noisy tonight. Of course, they did not know that this was because runway three zero was blocked by the Aereo-Mexican plane, so that runway two five was being used. This was the runway nearest to Meadowood.

During a short silence, the red-faced chairman announced loudly that it was impossible to live in such terrible conditions.

'We have tried to reason with the airport management,' he shouted, 'but they take no notice of our suffering.'

The chairman was Floyd Zanetta, the sixty-year-old manager of a printing company. Near him sat a younger man, a lawyer called Elliott Freemantle.

'What do the airport and airlines do?' Zanetta shouted. 'I'll tell you! They pretend to listen to us. They make empty promises to us. They are nothing but cheats and liars!'

The word 'liars' was lost in a sudden, almost unbelievable burst of sound. The room shook, and a glass of water on a table near Zanetta almost fell to the floor. The noise ended as suddenly as it had begun. This had been happening since the beginning of the meeting.

Zanetta continued. 'As I said, they are cheats and liars. I think what is happening now proves it, and-'

'Mr Chairman,' a woman's voice interrupted, 'we've heard all this before. What I and all the others here want to know is what we can do about it!'