Table of contents for Spring 2023 in Pilot

One benefit of the freeze that followed January’s rains was that the usual winter mud bath that is my home strip became more akin to a giant waffle, with a frozen crust that was sufficient to support the fat-tyred Cub. Even so, I was slightly reluctant to take it on its latest outing because I had driven out through the winter sun-soaked Chilterns to find the Thames Valley half-obscured by banks of fog. Fog is a hazard of a strip located close to the Chiltern Ridge. The rule of thumb has long been ‘don’t fly unless you can see the ridge’ but today the ridge was half visible and – where there was bank of fog – half not, making it something of a judgement call. Was the fog moving…

It was supposed to be a day off, but in the RAF of the early 1990s, with little consideration as to flight time or duty limits, a day off really meant ‘off until the system needed you’. Consequently it was no surprise when I was asked to “Just swap an aircraft with Chivenor tomorrow morning”. Living only a couple of miles from Coltishall I cycled in early, to see two yellow SAR Wessex outside the hangar. One on standby and mine. It was pre GPS so I put a line on a map, created a sandwich from the rations, got authorised for the flight and went to see the engineers. “The Chivenor aircraft won’t be ready until mid afternoon”, so I went home. On opening the door the phone was…

“Where are the condoms, please,” I asked the bespectacled and rather rotund young helper at Sainsbury’s, “I am in a hurry and I need a couple of dozen”. The poor chap froze for a moment, but with commendable helpfulness simply said “Follow me”, and led the way at pace. We reached the right aisle and he pointed at a wall of prophylactics. “Blimey,” I said, faced with a huge choice, “these are very expensive. Which are the cheapest?” His expression changed from helpfulness to slight alarm, nevertheless he scanned the aisle and pointed. “Those ones,” he said. I took a look, “But that’s £13.50 for twenty of the thin ones, and they’re no bloody good at all, I’ll need the heavy duty ones, but look,” I exclaimed, genuinely surprised, “£16.50…

We meet up by the aircraft on a glorious January day, and as Phil starts to tell me about his stressful week I simply say, “c’mon mate – forget all about work, kids, money etc – let’s just go flying”. Phil grins gratefully and starts strapping in without another word. We both know that the SF-25 Motor Falke is nowhere near as exciting as his old Sea Harrier, but right now he just needs to get off the ground! I first met Phil several years ago, initially as neighbours and then when he joined the Buckminster Gliding Club. After three tours in Iraq and another three in Afghanistan he needed some more peaceable flying and started learning to glide, but work, family, Covid and – well, just life – all…

I first experienced the sensation of full spins as a passenger with my father – who was a keen aerobatic pilot – in a Cessna Aerobat, over Liverpool Bay. I cannot honestly say that I enjoyed the experience, but it certainly gave me a good appreciation of how violently an aircraft can behave if mishandled at the stall. I then took up flying myself and commenced with learning to glide on K13s at Lasham, often under instruction by the late Derek Piggott. At some point during training I sensed that a solo flight was becoming close, and an instructor briefed me that, before going solo, it was standard practice to have your logbook endorsed to show that you had satisfactorily demonstrated full spins and correct recovery. Training for this was…

This is not how it is done. Generally, during an editorial meeting at an establishment around the corner from the Editor’s house, we will natter about interesting aeroplanes and the fascinating people who fly them. We’ll get talking about characters like Tiger Moth legend Henry Labouchere and ex-Lightning display pilot Tony Doyle and then we’ll go and interview them. This time however, it has been different. An email was received from a publicity man promoting a forthcoming solo album by Dave Rowntree who is best known as the drummer in the band Blur. Rowntree we are told, has a pilot’s licence. Would Pilot like to interview him? At Pilot we can rock with the best of them. We’ve interviewed Richard Jones, bassist with The Feeling, who flies out of Elstree…

No waste on North Weald Social media buzzed with speculation last month, after it was reported by ‘Everything Epping Forest’ that Epping Forest District Council had announced a £4.1m plan for a ‘waste depot’ on North Weald airfield. However, the council moved quickly to quash the rumours, and within 24 hours a council spokesperson said, “contrary to social media speculation, there are no plans, studies or suggestions that we would locate any form of recycling centre, waste transfer station or indeed, incinerator at North Weald Airfield.” The spokesperson added “we are simply looking at feasibility options for parking and maintaining of our empty refuse trucks when they are not on the road, plus washing and parking facilities for the crews. Having our own depot puts the council in a better…

STAR LETTER CAP 403: would airfields really require daily permission to operate? We operate Stoke Golding Airfield, a private rural airfield on the Leicestershire Warwickshire borders and we have a variety of visiting aircraft throughout the year and especially during the summer months. We also have a small on-site cafe providing refreshments for visitors which helps to support the airfield facilities we provide. These facilities are available to members of the public and pilots alike, we don’t discriminate. A typical summer weekend will see non-flying visitors, sitting at our benches, enjoying the countryside and watching the aircraft arrive and depart, chatting to the pilots and everybody generally having a nice time. You may remember this sort of thing, it goes on at hundreds of airfields around the country every week.…

Having converted onto British Airways’s fan-engined Boeing 707-336s, I began to learn some of their foibles that were only alluded to in the manuals. These later airframes had much the same tankage as the earlier ones, but went fifty per cent further on the same mass of fuel simply because their Pratt & Whitney fan engines were so much more efficient than the previous straight turbojets. Reliable powerplants for their day, they were also howlingly noisy – quite unlike the Trent-powered B787s and A350s that whisper overhead nowadays. But the JT3D-3B’s main operational problem was that they spooled up much more sluggishly than the plain jets. Acceleration time from idle to full thrust was supposed to be less than eight seconds, but with ageing engines it was often longer. And…

EDITOR’S PICK Reaching a new level of realism Devotion, directed by J G Dillard and produced by Black Label/Media Stage 6 Films. Available on streaming platforms. 138 minutes Popping up on Amazon Prime seemingly without touching the sides with any cinema presentation in Britain (maybe the distributors thought the US Navy and Korean War were of interest only to Americans), Devotion is a flying and war movie that really deserves your attention – and not just for its superb flying scenes, which make extensive use of real aircraft. ‘Real’ is the watchword here: it is immediately apparent that period-correct aircraft were used in the production. According to US publication Flight Journal, they came from six sources: ‘The Erickson Aircraft Collection of Madras, Oregon provided their F4U-7 and AD-4W Skyraider. Planes…

Beech in a bind Aircraft Type: Beechcraft King Air 200 Date & Time: 3 January 2022 at 1118 Commander’s Flying Experience: ATPL 16,300 hours (of which 2,000 were on type) Last 90 days: 50 hours Last 28 days: 18 hours The pilot was positioning the aircraft from Lydd to Alderney. As he approached Alderney he selected the undercarriage down and heard it lowering as normal, but once the cycle had completed the left main undercarriage green light, which indicates that the undercarriage is down and locked, did not illuminate. The pilot confirmed that the bulb worked before re-cycling the undercarriage. Again, the left main wheel green light did not illuminate. A go-around was undertaken and the pilot decided to divert to Exeter, where the aircraft was maintained, and alerted air…