Plane Tales

After last week’s tale, here are a few more letters of the Alphabet to ponder on!

The Martin Baker Mk7A seat with adjustable rocket pack!

The US Army working under flares

Aircraft registrations

Working on the RR Merlin engine

The aircraft convenience!

Varig Flight 820

The Queen’s Flight

Rolls Royce

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to Martin Baker, US Army, Richard Stone, David, Sapeurs Pompiers de Paris and the MOD.

The language of aviation is treasured by those of us who use it, especially since it separates us from those poor earth bound souls who don’t spend their lives with their eyes cast skyward. In the spirit of fairness, particularly to spouses who stand impatiently, eyes rolling as we converse with our avgeek friends about how pretty that Wedgetail is, here are a few pointers to help you join in the conversation.

The axes of an aircraft

Flight Bag

Drag!

An Empennage

Flaps

A Chinese Follow-Me car

A world record hail stone

Hi is for Hangar

The angle of incidence

The F8 “Last of the Gunfighters’.

The Jetway!

Images under the Creative Commons licence with thanks to M9matr0902, ZeroOne, Comicship, Olivier Cleynen, NiD29, NOAA and Wallsworth.

I apologise to you all but it’s time for my tatty old RAF log book to come out of the cupboard again. It was a sad, sad situation but for the recently promoted Flight Lieutenant Anderson, his departure from flying the Phantom on 43 Squadron was a reality that he had to face up to. Central Flying School is an august establishment that will proudly inform anyone with an interest (or not) that it is the world’s longest existing flying training school. It was to this anachronistic institution that I was bound!

The crest of the Central Flying School of the Royal Air Force

The Staff of the Central Flying School

The Red Arrows

The island of Anglesey

The Britannia Bridge

The BAE Systems Hawk T1

Flying the Hawk

The Great Orme and Llandudno Pier

Llandudno Pier

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to CFS, the RAF, the National Library of Wales, Tim Felce, Defence Imagery, Google Maps, Noel Walley and images within the Public Domain.

The subject of UFOs became a very popular theme in the press, on the television and in film, something that Intelligence services quietly encouraged. There were many, very secret projects that the US Government was investing enormous resources in, and any alternative explanation was preferable than the truth. One such project was the Silver Bug, a US Black version of the Canadian Avrocar. However, the Silver Bug’s true capabilities were about to be discovered!  But beware… not everything may be as it seems!

Sightings given credibility by the Swedish Air Intelligence Service

Everyone was caught up in the new UFO phenomena

Henri Coanda, discoverer of the Coanda effect

Jack Frost of Avro, the designer of the Avrocar

USAF regulations relating to UFOBs

The Canadian Avrocar during tests

Groom lake in Area 51

Technical Report on the Silver Bug

The Silver Bug’s special Jet Stream aerodynamics

The Silver Surfer

The Silver Surfer accelerates

The Silver Surfer crosses the coast

The Silver Surfer completes its secret flight around the planet

The Soviet Aпреля Один (Aprelya Odin)

Images under Creative Commons Licence with thanks to the USAF, Bzuk, National Archives UK, Instituto Geográfico, Invencion propia, Doc Searles, William Bill Zuk, Phylyp and the USGov.

It takes about 12 seconds for the human body to reach terminal velocity.  At that speed they will see the earth’s surface approach them at 177 feet or 54 meters every second.  These are the stories of a few survivors who have fallen from an aircraft, without opening a parachute… and survived!

The remarkable Juliane Koepcke

Nicholas Alkemade

RAF Lancasters

The Ju88 nightfighter

The Il-4

B17 Flying Fortress bombers on a mission over Europe

The B17 ball turret

Vesna Vulović and a JAT DC9

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to the RAF, SDASM, IWM and clipperarctic.  Other images are in the Public Domain or considered Fair Use.

The landing gear, or undercarriage, of a big airliner is a massive and powerful system. In modern times stowaways, have frequently attempted to hide within the undercarriage wheel-wells of airliners. The chances of surviving such an ordeal are remote in the extreme as the hazards are many. If someone attempting such a dangerous journey isn’t crushed by the movement of the gear as it stows or fall to their death when the undercarriage doors open to raise or lower the gear, then the environment will present an almost insurmountable hazard. Some, however, still survive!

The landing gear of a B747

The forces that the undercarriage assembly is subjected to are considerable

The landing gear assembly and doors of a B747

FAA guidance on times of useful consciousness

Stranded near Newfoundland in the ice

A Douglas DC8

The DC10

Japanese troops in Timor

A 1950’s airport similar to Kupang

A Netherlands Air Force C47

Darwin Hospital

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to Adrian Pingstone, Faisal Akram, Alf van Beem, Australian War Memorial, Fotoafdrukken Koninklijke Luchtmacht and kenhodge13.

The Hovercraft is something of a rare beast. This story examines the many engineers and scientists who contributed to the development of a vehicle that is lifted on a cushion of air and is capable of travelling over land, water, mud, ice, tarmac, sand and many other flattish surfaces.

The Swedish scientist Emanuel Swedenborg is known to have sketched the first hovercraft design in 1714.

Dagobert Müller von Thomamühl’s Luftkissengleitboot, a surface effect boat.

How a hovercraft functions.

Ford’s efforts at hovering cars.

The L1 hovering tank.

Charles Fletcher’s Glidemobile.

Cockerell’s hovercraft patent.

Sir Christopher Sydney Cockerell.

SRN1.

SRN4.

The US Navy LCAC.

The Soviet Zubr class ACV, the biggest in the world weighing in at 555 tons.

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to those in the Public Domain, Technical Museum Vienna, Messer Woland, the Ford Motor Company, Ad Meskens, GB Patent Office, The National Archives UK, USN, Andrew Berridge and Mil.Ru (LightZone).

Out of the gloom of thick cloud, through their windscreens, the pilots suddenly saw the tops of pine trees but it was too late to pull up. They ploughed through them as the branches smashed into the left wing shattering the navigation light. One of the passengers onboard was the President of the airline, Captain Eddie Rickenbacker… this is his story.

An Eastern Airlines DC3

Atlanta had poor weather and it was close to midnight when the aircraft crashed

Eddie Rickenbacker

The findings of the inquiry

Racing in San Francisco

Rickenbacker becomes CO of the 94th, the Hat in the Ring gang

After receiving many decorations, Rickenbacker returns to the US a hero

The Rickenbacker motor company

Rickenbacker survives a second crash, this time in a Boeing B-17

Capt. E.V. “Eddie” Rickenbacker wearing the Congressional Medal of Honor

Images published under Creative Commons Licence with thanks to Jack Delano, the Library of Congress, CAB, SF Public Library, NARA, Rickenbacker Motors, the USAFand the USAAF.

This is the final part of the Red Flag tales which carries on directly from Part II where we heard some exploits from participants of Exercise Red Flag. If you haven’t listened to the previous taleson this subject, it would be worth going back them.  My thanks to Jaguar Pilot Nij, Tornado pilot Gasher, Tomcat RIO Scott and RAAF F111 Nav Abs.

The E-3 Sentry AWACS.

Break Right Chuck, there’s one in your 6 o’clock!

A Smokey SAM.

Live weapons being dropped during Red Flag.

A Tornado drops flares.

An RAAF F111 puts its wings back and goes!

The Jaguar pilot’s favourite dance.

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to the USAF, Photo-Concepte.de, the RAF, the USN,

In the first part of the Red Flag tales we talked about the reasons for the formation of the USAF Fighter Weapons School and the subsequent creation of Exercise Red Flag. Now we get a chance to hear from some of the participants.  Firstly there is Nij who took time off from his Nuclear QRA duties to fly his RAF Jaguar in Flag exercises.  Then we have a Tornado GR1 pilot, Gasher, who also participated on behalf of the RAF.  Jack was an F15 pilot who took part as a wingman, formation leader and also as a Fighter Weapons School graduate.  Scott was a Tomcat RIO who was part of Red Air during Flag exercises and Abs, a navigator from the Royal Australian Air Force flew with the F111 force and was even a Blue Force Commander during the exercise.

An RAF Jaguar

An RAF Tornado at Nellis

The mighty F15 Eagle

The USN F14 Tomcat

The RAAF F111

The Nellis ranges with Area 51 marked in red

The Nellis Air Force Base

A Red Flag briefing

The symbol of Exercise Red Flag

The EF-111A Raven

Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to Steve Lynes, Finlay McWalter, the USAF, USN, Ken Lund, the National Museum of the Air Force and the MOD.