Chapter 1

Flying Training

we all start somewhere

Free flying, weekends in the sun.  Join the ATC.  Canvas gliders, years old, like most of the instructors.  Sedberg barge. Kirby Cadet brick. String from the pitot tube for slip and skid.  Tap the altimeter to keep it accurate, but not the glass - it might break.  The hole at the front for the lead weight - a rare solo.  Gosport tube for a feeble voice.  Hours driving winches.  Retrieving lousy landings.  Who gets the 'fly-in'?

Never seen so many aircraft.  The line went on and on, like ground school.  Flying kit.  Leg restraints that clicked at every pace.  Morning prayers, stand up when the Chief Instructor walks in.  Met men briefed fine weather with snow in their hair, slides dripping rain.

The Jet Provost Mk3.  Out performed by old spitfire gate guards.  RR Viper, more noise than thrust.  Circuits and more circuits.  Flapless, low level, high level, glide.  Finals three greens.  Church Fenton, Elvington, Leeming, Linton-on-Ouse.  Up and down the A1.  Apologize to Air Traffic, didn't call in time.  Join, four in, 1 downwind, 2 on finals, one on the dead side.  First solo.

Instrument flying, under the hood.  One peek is worth a thousand scans.  Cloud Penetration Certificate, DF homing, Amber Rating.  Practice Diversion, ILS.  PFLs, high key, low key.  Aerobatics, stall turn to left, to right, to incipient spin.  Prog Check, going on review.  Thinly Disguised Chop Ride.  Some quietly leave.

Instructors to the fore, students in their place.

Scribble on the course photo.  A bowler for the unfortunate, some were more unlucky.

Friendships forged......

Crowd round a real aircraft, stories from places beyond imagination.  One day aim for Lightnings, then Harriers or Jaguars ~ as fickle as girl friends.  They beat up the airfield.  Someone rotates a bomb bay at 500 kts, luggage spills out ~ don't want Buccaneers!

The JP Mk5.  Pointed, pressurized and much more important, an electric canopy!  Thrust outdoes brakes.  Going up in the world, above 25,000 ft!  Wonderful.

Close formation, a nervous instructor wedged between two solo students.  Eyes glued to the mirrors.  Break and rejoins ~ the litany, left turn, 10 thousand feet, 300 knots, clear join.  Ready to dodge.

Round and round the Vale of York.  Sins forgiven until the last.   Rejoin through initials, break downwind, eyes cast upwards.  What was that shambles, spacing, all over the shop, up and down like..................

On to better things, bright wings on the chest...... but first.  Pre-oxygenation, decompression, pressure breathing - coming on in, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, now.  Inflation, human balloons.  Old flight safety movies in government green painted rooms.  Keen fitters clamp old comfortable helmets onto the skull.  Pliers pulling to ridge the skin.  Doctors chat, stay off the beer and spicy food.

25 to 45 thousand feet in 3 seconds.  Doctors and technicians stare in.  Breath out, dull clang.  Air mists, temperature drops, mask toggles down, ears pop, arse cheeks lift.  Number one, are you OK? - thumbs up.  Altitude creeps down and masks come off.  Ruddles and curry fumes fill the air.

A line of little sports cars.  The Q gear and cam K, stuprec and cubstun, offset TACAN, dive arcs, zero readers, Welsh.

A new language.

Pilots notes on Hunter beach, jets whistle overhead, the end of a summer.

In big cabins new simulated torture.  A story is told.  The size was never checked; too big for the only bridge.  Floated across on barges.  By whatever means, they are cursed.

A Folland Gnat T Mk1, not to be climbed into, more to be strapped on.  The jet of the Red Arrows.  A fabled roll rate of 540 deg per second, fuse pulled.  Fast and nimble in the air but in the sure hands of a student they waddle like ducks on the runway.

The pocket fighter.

Hands crossed over sword hilts, pilots guard the body of a fellow student.  

No one expected to die.

At low level, the only way home, the A5 pass.  Crease the lake, canopy to the rock, down and out in a rush of g and sweat.  The ONLY way home.

The fastest hunter in the West.  Nicknamed the GT6, the Hunter F Mk6.  Without gun ports or armament, the quickest thing around.  Completely different from the T Mk7 two seat iron maiden, it was an adrenalin rush with wings.  The next one would have camouflage. 

Campfire songs, the end of another course.........

Dingy drill and winch training - cold, wet and rum ration.  No one liked to fly with their head in another mans crutch, except the winch men.

Life could be a bit of a drag at times............

Bombs, guns, rockets, sun, sand and it still didn't cost a penny.

Hunter T Mk7, FGA Mk9 and F Mk6A litter the line.  Each cockpit different.  Little hand painted labels on the switches.  The worry were the ones that weren't painted.  Use the shiny ones.

Four Aden 30 mm cannons mounted in the nose.  The cordite smoke went through the engine compressors and into the air conditioning.  Smelt good.  Sneb rocket pods on wing pylons, along with practice bombs.  Above the nose cone a camera but film for assessment was taken on a tiny gun sight camera.  The film canisters only lasted a few passes.  Take lots.  A bandoleer round the leg.  Filming sighter shots en route.  An Ealing farce, clattering on the cockpit floor.

Heady days in the summer.  Postings to the front line confirmed.  Eager to be off.

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