Once More Into The Wide Blue Yonder

by Brian Carroll

1982 was the end of an era for me - after many years of flying the Lightning, every hour of which was exhilarating, the time had

Brian Carroll en route to XS 458 Cranfield July 2002

come to hang up my helmet; a sad but inevitable day.

Little did I think, not even in my wildest dreams that 21 years later I would once again experience the thrill of lifting a Lightning free of the tarmac; on countless occasions at Bruntingthorpe and at Cranfield having reached nose wheel off speed have I had to throttle back, stream the chute and taxi back to dispersal. The word frustration falls far short of my feelings, so close and yet so far.

Mike Beachy Head who owns and runs Thunder City and I have corresponded for some time, discussing the Lightning and various aspects in respect of operating it safely. Some months back, June 2003 an e-mail from Mike invited me to visit as a guest, adding "and who knows there may be a seat a begging". Well I thought it would be rude to refuse, so having given it considerable thought for a few microseconds, I accepted and booked a flight to Cape Town.

The plan was to attend two airshows, the first Ysterplaat (Cape Town) on 07 November, the second show on 14/15 November at Overberg (Bredasdorp), a Test Flight Development Centre some 100 plus miles (as the crow flies) south of Cape Town used by the SAAF.

I'll now short cut to Friday November 14 when I met Dave Stock who was going to share the T.5 (ZU-BEX (ex 451) with me. A brief exchange of pleasantries in the company of Barry Pover, one of Mike's engineers at which stage I elected to go and find a coffee. During my brief absence, Dave asked Barry if I had done any flying! No one had briefed him on my background - did I need a detailed brief on the aircraft? How to strap in? How to use the ejection seat and so on. I gather that Barry, after a brief pause informed him that I had close on 3,000hrs on type. This contrasted with his 40hrs on the Lightning and brought forth the comment from Dave, "well in that case he can fly the whole trip". I should add here that Dave is a test pilot and also flies regularly for a South African Airline and is a really nice guy. It is also true that he uttered a brief but telling expletive on hearing the news, Barry reckoned the news ruined his day.

And so to the trip, the briefing for the flight was fairly standard, Mike Beachy Head was to fly a F.6 as my number 2; that was a surprise. Weather conditions as we briefed were not good, low cloud base and poor visibility, and as the Lightning's are not cleared for IMC we had to wait for an improvement. This came about an hour later, the proverbial 'Window of Opportunity'.

Cloud was still hovering around 1,000 to 1,200feet, but we had already decided to go low level, following the coast all the way to Bredasdorp on the Southern Cape. The Cape in question is not the Cape of Good Hope, which many folk think is the southern point of Africa, but Cape Agulhas some 100 miles further south. As we were going to follow the coastline, our approximate distance would work out closer to 238miles just fine by me, the more time in the air the better. The additional distance included several holding orbits some ten miles short of Bredasdorp while a C.130 practised for the afternoon's display.

Walking out to the aircraft felt just like another routine flight, but knowing that this time I would not be quitting at 150kts - a walk round confirmed the aircraft was in good order, and we were soon strapped in and ready to start engines. Internal checks completed, at this stage Dave commented how nice it was to have someone who knew where all the switches were.

A confirming wave from the groundcrew and number one engine fired up, temperatures looked good, warning lights went out at the correct percentage RPM and after further checks I started number two. All looked good and clearance was obtained from ATC to taxi for the active runway at Cape Town International.

Lining up, Mike on my port, engines run up to 85% and we were ready to roll - Mike followed at 10 seconds as I was only using cold power to save fuel as we had a fairly long route to cover. Nose wheel off at 150 - a slight pause and lift off, we were airborne, wheel brakes applied, U/C selected up, lights all out as I entered a 60º climbing turn to starboard, levelling at 500feet and settling the speed at 450kts, Mike was flying loose battle as we cleared the coast line and headed south.

After 21 years, handling felt as though I had never stopped, it was sheer delight to fly the Lightning again. I followed all the many bays and inlets, swinging the aircraft into easy turns left and right as we progressed rapidly towards our destination, passing places I had never heard of - Hout Bay; Chapman's Peak; Noordhoak; Kommetjie, and on to Bredasdorp.

I varied the speed between 450 and 500kts and we were soon approaching our destination when, as mentioned above we were required to hold for the C.130.

Clearance was finally given to join the circuit, 600kts and 200feet seemed like a good idea as I streaked (fully clothed in case anyone was wondering!) across the field, a hard break to the downwind throwing in a twinkle roll as I climbed. Speed back to below 250kts, gear selected, three greens, flaps down as I turned onto finals at 175kts. What wind there was, was virtually down the runway, over the threshold at 165kts for a firm but smooth touchdown at 160kts, nose wheel lowered, chute streamed, Dave pulled the chute handle, well he was getting bored with nothing to do. Rolling to a stop some 400 metres from the end of the runway we cleared the active and taxied to dispersal. It was all over much too soon but I will always be grateful to Dave for letting me fly the whole sortie from take off to landing, not forgetting Mike Beachy Head's invitation without which it would never have happened.

Did I enjoy it? Oh yes and it wasn't even my birthday.

**************End**************

(Brian was one of the resident LPG pilots who carry out the Lightning High Speed Runs at the Bruntingthorpe and QRA Open Days until his death on 2nd December 2004)

Brian Carroll - a potted history