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[w3526602]

Hi,

"Last Flight of the Vulcan" is showing at 9PM tonight on Channel 18.

For any new readers, who did not know Brad (aka Romany Rose), he was a well respected contributor to this forum, but died fairly recently. His father was an Air Engineer on Vulcan bombers.

OT, My sergeant at RAAF Butterworth, had done a tour at Christmas Island. He recounted how, one day, a Vulcan just came wafting out of the sky, and trickled over over to it's parking bay. Scarcely anybody noticed.

The following morning, it trickled over to the runway ... and took of like a "bat out of hell". This was a V-bomber remember. A Yank asked "Was that a fighter?"

I've tried Googling for "Vulcan bomber doing fast take-off. Video", but with no luck.

OT, I understand that an English Electric Lightning, a fighter, could take off at "zero revs", stand on it's tail, and go straight up ... for 12 miles.

While I was at Butterworth, the Ozzies were flying ex-Korean War Sabres F86s (which we referred to as ...
"Wheet Meece". ) nobody was allowed to show off. But just before I left, they changed to Desault Mysteres (sp?), after which, showing off was allowed ... after an Oz pilot showed how to travel the length of the runway  in "sideways skid", etc,  at just above ground level ... and the rest.  Probably good for morale.

602

[gvo416j R.I.P.]

OT, I understand that an English Electric Lightning, a fighter, could take off at "zero revs", stand on it's tail, and go straight up ... for 12 miles.

Back when we actually made world beating things. *&%^$ range, so didn't sell worldwide, but did exactly the job it was designed for - intercept from the ground before an enemy could reach the coast

After permission was granted by the US to try [although they categorically stated it could not be done] one of them intercepted the U2 spy plane as it flew over the UK on its return flight - in fact the lightning flew up, passed within sight and communication of the U2 while still climbing and before it reached our coast. It eventually topped out above it by over 6000 feet at over 80000 feet [well above its "official" ceiling]. The official US reaction is not recorded.

It is also the only ever nato fighter to actually catch and pass concorde in a tail chase after BA offered a concorde flight for RAF intercept training. The French claim a mirage also caught concorde but that was an intercept at an angle not a stern chase.

[w3526602]

Hi,

In 1960, I was (I'd volunteered) posted to RAF Sharjah (two hoots and a holler from Dubai), flying from RAF Lynham (Wiltshire?). I duly presented myself, met two other 'ercs, signed the book, and then they pointed us to our aircraft .... ******  RAF VIP COMET. I'm guessing we were "make weight".

What an aeroplane!!! Despite two civilian Comets exploding at high altitude (some of our readers will remember ... metal fatigue due to pressurising/depressurising, I think, combined with having windows with square corners), the RAF still flew them, but did not pressurise the cabins to the same degree.  Whatever, 41,000ft, at 550knots, in 1960, was enough to keep me happy. The sky was almost navy blue. And smoooooth!

Stop-over ar RAF Akrotiri (sp?) Cyprus, where I met up with an old school mate, got invited to somebody's birthday party, and got plied with oozo. (at somebody else's expense ... I had left UK with less than four shillings ... £0.20 ... in my pocket). Ever onward ... I can't remember what plane took me from Aden to Sharjah, (probably a Viking) But twelve months later, I departed Sharjah in a Beverley, and changed to a Brittania, at Bahrein (sp?)

There was a story about the first Comet to fly the Atlantic. The pilot (or whoever) radioed the US ATC, to say he was approaching at 550knots and 41,000ft

ATC corrected him ... "Don't you mean 250 knots and 21,000ft?"  "NO!"

My best mate's brother-in-law, was a reporter with  the Daily Mirror. He contrived to be invited on a publicity trip in a Comet. They landed at Amsterdam, without incident. But taking off was a different matter ... the jet engines started to cut out, one after the other. They eventually took off with just one engine.

All the journalists were elevated to First Class, and told not to discuss the matter.

That Comet was the first jet airliner to visit Amsterdam. As it was accelerating down the runway, it was sucking stones into its engines. This would not have happened with propellers.

My first flight was in a Tiger Moth, wearing goggles, and sitting on a parachute. My second flight was in a Puss Moth. Both were couple of circuits of Croydon Aerodrome. Croydon Aerodrome was closed down during WW2, as it would have made Croydon (town), a target for enemy bombing.  RAF Kenley stayed open, and I've flown out of there too, but only Ansons and Oxfords, mainly circuits and a bump, although one Sunday morning, an AVM took me on his "G&T jolly" ... RAF Marham, Scampton, and Waddington, plus one other who's name I can't remember. I left home before anybody else was out of bed, returned at tea time. My mother asked where I had been. I told her. (She had already learned that it was best not to enquire too deeply into my unbelievable answers to such questions, so end of discussion..

On another occasion, "Middlesborough!" stopped her dead. I'd hitch-hiked from Croydon, to see if my uncle, (Billy Dixon, who owned a garage) would give me a job until I was "drafted". I arrived just after midnight, only to find that the "garage" was a bicycle shop, with a petrol pump in the window.  (Does anybody here remember it?) I turned round, and started hitching back. About 240 miles each way. Blazer and flannels, NO money. But this was during the London bus strike, so hitching through London was easy.

602