a leaf in the wind

So cold and numb, the hailstrikes scarcely hurt;
their relative velocity's quite small.
Ten thousand meters off the Aussie dirt,
Wisnierska wasn't piloting at all.
Unconscious baggage in convection's blast
her glider--packed with snow--persists to fly.
Her life-force on the wane, and fading fast
the mystery is that she didn't die.
Where Gadd and Castle opt to sit one out,
she takes the meethead's word the day looks good.
Subordinating any private doubt,
'though now, she might repent that, if she could.
Mere gossamer within the stormhead's suck
she lives to fly again, through dumbest luck.