Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?

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boing
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Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?

#1 Post by boing » Mon Jun 06, 2016 6:45 am

The scene is the Central Flying School of the Royal Air Force, at this time based at Royal Air Force Little Rissington as it had been since 1946, otherwise known as "Hell on the Hill" because it was, quite literally, built on top of a hill with a marked hump in the centre of the runway. The "Hell" part was standard pilot witticism because it worked well with "Hill", it was actually a very pleasant place..

The CFS course produced flight instructors for the RAF, it was the most useful and interesting training course that no pilot ever seemed to want to volunteer for. You see, as a pilot when you finished one tour of duty you could request your next tour (not that anyone seems to have often considered that request). But, being pilots, everyone wanted to volunteer to fly the newest, fastest aircraft available or go somewhere interesting like Cyprus or Singapore or Hong Kong or even Germany. Few pilots would volunteer to become a flight instructor because it was seen as a potentially boring and routine job but I think most would say after the experience that they learned more about flying and about themselves by instructing than by any other possible activity.

Specifically, the scene is the flight operations room of one of the squadrons during the "night flying" part of the course. It is a strange idea but Flying Training Command considered that there was something special about flying around in the dark. This concept was roundly challenged by the course students who mostly had at least one operational tour of duty under their belt but their Airships insisted that "night flying" should be a special subject and so potential instructors must learn the correct instructional techniques.

There was not much activity in the operations room but the planners had a problem because they had run out of serviceable Jet Provost Mk.4 aircraft. They had plenty of Jet Provost Mk.5 aeroplanes but the students did not convert to the Mk.5 until AFTER the night flying part of the course so, even though the planners had plenty of aircraft available, they had no one qualified to fly them solo. Why this state of affairs arose I have no idea. This was a greater problem than it may seem because there were only a few nights assigned to night flying (the station did not normally operate at night) and having the training schedule slip so that another night could be added to the training would cause all sorts of complications.

Boing was waiting to go fly a night solo trip.

Then one of schedulers came up with a "cunning plan", note the very appropriate use of inverted commas, we all know about "cunning plans".

"Boing, you've flown a Mk.5 haven't you. I remember that your instructor used one on a flight with you a few weeks ago."
"Well yes but I would not really call that a conversion, we did not do any type training we just used it on a regular flight".
"Well, that's OK then, you are qualified on the MK.5. After all, it is really simple, not that much different to the Mk.4."
Apart from the pressurisation system, the different engine, the different checklists that I had not been issued with yet let alone have with me, the different take-off and approach speeds and the fact that the previous trip I had flown by day with an instructor not at night solo - no, not much difference I thought, nothing I can't hack. I actually thought this would be great fun, I liked the idea.
"So, off we go".

The MK.5 was parked near the far end of a long line of aircraft on the darkened ramp. Nice night for a walk and not many aircraft in the area. I remember thinking as a walked past a bunch of Mk.4s - how could they all not be available. About three quarters of the way down the ramp there was a lone aircraftsman working on another aircraft. Apart from me he was the only other person on the flight line.

I arrived at the assigned aircraft and that is when the cold feeling ran down my spine that the "cunning plan" was unravelling - the aircraft canopy was closed. When I had flown the aircraft previously the canopy had been open when we arrived as is usual much of the time. Now, I was pretty confident that I could handle things after I was strapped in the aircraft but I had no idea how to get in. One of the big changes to the MK.5 is that it was pressurised so the canopy system was completely different to the Mk.4. I had a flashlight, of course, so I searched all over the front of the aircraft looking for a lever, switch or button that would let me open the canopy but no joy. It had to be there somewhere but I could not find it and opening the canopy FROM THE OUTSIDE had not been covered on the other flight.

OK, I had two choices.
I can walk all the way back to operations, admit to the schedulers that I am a doofus, get pulled off the flight because they could hardly let me fly if I did not even know how to get into the aircraft. Additionally the word would surely get around among the pilots and the rest of the course would be a misery of jokes about helping me get into my aircraft which would likely follow me into my next tour.
OR, I could ask the mechanic down the line to let me into the aircraft.
Working on the basis that one way I would get continuous hell from the other pilots versus being discussed for a day or so among the Corporals the choice was a no brainer.

Together we returned to the aircraft, found the two rubber covered switches that opened and closed the canopy and the problem was solved. I cursed the individual who had painted the aircraft and who had sprayed over the two flush rubber switch pads with the same white paint that was used on the rest of the fuselage effectively camouflaging them.

I was, of course, suitably grateful to the mechanic whose departing question was "Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?'
He shrugged his shoulders as he walked away.
the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.

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Re: Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?

#2 Post by Alisoncc » Mon Jun 06, 2016 7:40 am

boing wrote:versus being discussed for a day or so among the Corporals the choice was a no brainer.

Enjoyed your story Boing. I could have been one of those Corporals. Not that I was ever at Little Rissington, but could often be found out on the line at some ungodly hour. On the Vulcan OCU would occasionally get newbies come out to have a look and I would have to let them in. I'd hook up a Houchin and fire it up so they had some light, and keep my fingers crossed they didn't do something stupid.

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Re: Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?

#3 Post by Ex-Ascot » Mon Jun 06, 2016 12:25 pm

Thanks boing. Along the same 'lines' I was PNF so hung back in ops sending the rest of my crew to do their thing. I wandered out to the line of aircraft and started the external pre-flight checks. I only got as far as the starboard main wheels when they started push back much to the amusment of my F/O on the flight deck of the adjacent aircraft. All the pax were at the window in the terminal facing the line. I waved to the other captain and gave him a thumbs up as if I had been doing a last minute check for him and then started on my jet. Think I got away with it with the pax but not my crew. Fortunately I was in a position to roster any piddle taker to a month of night flights.
'Yes, Madam, I am drunk, but in the morning I shall be sober and you will still be ugly.' Sir Winston Churchill.

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Re: Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?

#4 Post by Chuks » Mon Jan 23, 2017 10:47 am

We had a Cessna T303 Crusader passing through Lagos on its way from Nairobi to Miami that needed a test hop because of a rough-running engine. It was on the American register and I had an FAA license so that I was voluntold to test fly it.

I asked the engineers to leave the handbook in the aircraft, promising to do the hop when I returned from a scheduled trip on the weekend.

Back from the trip, there was the T303, but there was no book in the aircraft, a type I had never flown before, with everything locked and all the groundlings having gone home. Oh well, it sure looked like a typical Cessna light twin, so that I did a walk-around, climbed in, fired it up, and off I went. Sure enough, the engines ran smooth at idle and on take-off, but one went very rough at cruise power, no idea why. That was that, so that I got cleared back to Lagos.

In the pattern, on the downwind, I put the gear down, but got two, not three greens. Bugger. I went back out over the bundu to try and sort that one out. No book, but there must be some sort of emergency extension thingy in here somewhere, thought I. No blow-down bottle as in a 402 or 404, so how about a pump handle, as in a C177RG? I looked and looked and found nothing at all, so that I finally cycled the gear again and then came in for a very, very soft landing on one main, lowering the other like taking the lid off a box full of butterflies, when the other green light lit. Just a dirty micro-switch instead of expensive graunching noises and the end of my glorious career in West Africa.

The next day those same engineers who had not bothered to put the book in the aircraft mocked me heavily, and justifiably, for going flying without it. It turned out that there was some sort of emergency gear extension thingy in there, but behind the pilot's seat, where the upholsterers in Nairobi had carpeted over it, hiding it from my sight completely. WAWA.

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Re: Are you really going to fly this aircraft Sir?

#5 Post by Boac » Mon Jan 23, 2017 11:29 am

On a detachment to Wattisham (29F Lightnings) I was assigned a Mk 3 to 'put on state'. They were all parked in the 'Embry follies' and it was February 2300 and 'kin dark.

I wandered out to the jet, checked it out, set it up and returned to sign the F700 (eventually found the line hut =)) and thence to the crewroom 'on alert'. At around 0300 the scramble order was given, I rushed to the jet in the chaos, climbed in, fired it up and off I went. 50 mins later I shut down 'somewhere' at Wattisham and 'found' the line hut to discover I had checked out 'E', signed for 'M' and flown the sortie in 'B'. =))

Sharp as a tennis ball!

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