World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War

The next interview is with Gavin Blaire, who now pilots a D-17 combat dirigible for America’s Civil Air Patrol. Formerly, he flew a Fujifilm blimp. Blaire recalls the mass exodus along a stretch of I-80, as he first saw people sitting on top of every different type of vehicle, including a cement mixer. The vehicles sat bumper to bumper, barely moving. There were furniture, boxes, and abandoned cars lining the road, and dozens of people traveling on foot. Blaire understood their panicked state when, further back down the road, he saw the zombies making their way through the vehicles. They were reaching into cars and pulling people out. Some people were shooting at them through their windshields, destroying their last barrier of protection between themselves and the undead. Blaire wondered if the exodus was something that had been organized or if people just saw cars and started lining up. The situation reminded him of a story he once heard about an American journalist in Moscow who stood in line in front of a building as an experiment. Soon, there was a line behind him around the block without anyone asking what the line was for.