Plane Tales

The third Ian Palmer interview deals with Ian’s attempts to overcome his condition of alcohol dependance and how his life moved on.   Ian rehearsing with his friend and mentor, Steve Gadd.   Images with thanks to Ian Palmer.

In this, the second of the Ian Palmer interviews we continue with Ian’s story and he describes his move from a career in music to one in aviation.  We also find out how his condition of alcohol dependance starts to affect him.   Ian doing aerobatics in an Extra 300.   The unusual Piaggio P-180.   Ian meets the Iron Maiden drummer, Nicko McBrain.   Images with thanks to Ia...

My father was beacon that led me into the world of aviation and steered me unerringly through my flying life more accurately than any gauge or needle on my instrument panel.   He grew up on the white sand beaches of Western Australia, fought in the Second World War  on the Sunderland Flying boats of No 10 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force and continued to fly in peacetime, plying his way around...

Ian Palmer’s life has hardly gone as smoothly as he might have wished.  Born into a family of musicians, particularly drummers including Carl Palmer of the band ELP, he started off as a very successful drummer himself.  What he didn’t know was that he suffered from a condition that carries great stigma and frequently leads to ruin and death… alcoholism. This is the first part of...

Born in Wales to immigrant parents he would grow to a height of 6’ 6” and climbing into the cockpit of a World War II fighter was going to be a problem… but he managed it  and before long had earned the moniker Lofty.  He  would pen books that charmed children for generations and generations for  Lofty, who was an army officer, fighter pilot and spy was better known as the renown author who sold o...

Fifty three years ago a man fell to earth.   He came from space having survived the appallingly hostile conditions that exist there.   Apart from the hard vacuum, the electromagnetic radiation, the intense cold, the cosmic rays and other damaging particles that exist there.  Despite overcoming numerous failures on his Soyuz-1 spacecraft he had achieved the near impossible and piloted a manual reen...

The German name for the Shrike songbird is Würger, which also means Strangler and by coincidence, was also the name given to the Focke-Wulf 190, a World War II fighter which  quickly became one of the most feared Axis fighters of the 2nd World War.  Various dubious plans were made to get hold of one to reveal its secrets but then along came  Oberleutnant Armin Faber.   Armin Faber’s gif...

Dick Andrews was flying over the battle of A  Sầu in Vietnam  and feeling deja view as he saw what was going on beneath him.  It took his mind back to the day in WWII when he landed his P38 Lightning in a field to rescue his leader who had crash landed there.  Now he was watching the same thing happening below except a Skyraider was landing amongst enemy Viet Cong and not German troops.  A remarka...

I was about to enter the Devil’s Triangle, the Limbo of the Lost, the Twilight Zone or the Hoodoo Sea… more commonly referred to as the Bermuda Triangle.  What dangers awaited, would I disappear like the famous loss of the 5 Avengers of Flight 19!  Listen to this terrifying story of myth and mystery!   A fine example of a Pseudoscience.   The Bermuda Triangle.   Images under C...

Boeing was the most successful aircraft manufacturing company on the planet but a European consortium thought they could take on the world’s best selling airliner, the B737, with a design of their own.  So was borne the A320 family of airliners with the most daring and radical of technological advances that the airline industry had seen since the advent of the jet engine.  But the birth of t...

What better day to celebrate the aviators of Ireland than on St Patrick’s Day.  From the crash of Alcock and Brown to a tractor maker and a flying olympic competitor, the Emerald Isles have a fascinating aviation history. Henry Ferguson, perhaps better known as an agricultural machinery maker than a pilot.   Lilian Bland piloting her Mayfly.   Lady Heath featured top centre amongst...

The sequel to Passing Gas recalls what it’s actually like to plug into a tanker and take on a fighter pilot’s life blood… fuel!  Of course not every tanker mission goes as planned and some have ended in tragedy and one, by the smallest of margins, was saved from further disaster on an epic scale. Two MH-53E Super Stallion helicopters perform aerial refueling from a KC-130J Hercul...

The history of Air to Air refuelling and how the systems that we are now familiar with, the boom and the probe & drogue, came into being.   Capt. Lowell H. Smith and Lt. John P. Richter receiving the first mid-air refueling on June 27, 1923.   The Question Mark receives fuel during its record breaking endurance flight.   A KB-50J refuels a F-101A Voodoo, B-66 Destroyer and F-100...

With the prospect of a new movie following the classic Top Gun in the offing, we take a largely ‘tongue in cheek’ look at the F14 and how Maverick got into a ‘flat spin heading out to sea!”   F-14A Tomcats of Fighter Squadrons VF-51 “Screaming Eagles”, the VF-111 “Sundowners” and F-5E/F Tiger IIs of the Navy Fighter Weapons School.   An F-1...

During the Vietnam war, the A6 Intruder was known for making daring, low level attacks in foul conditions and often alone.  As such it had more than its fair share of losses. One such loss was due to a lone .303 bullet which gravely injured the pilot and would have killed him if not for the brave actions of his Bombardier Navigator… actions that would result in the award of a Navy Cross. An...

If you’ve ever looked out onto a wing and wondered what the strange looking blades and plates attached to it are? Then wonder no longer!  An explanation of Vortex Generators and Wing Fences and why we need them. A fine set of wing fences on the Mig 17. This one can be seen on the deck of USS Intrepid in NY.   A line of vortex generators on the wing of an A4 in the hangar of USS Intrepid...

Visit the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Stonehenge and you will pass another stone monument.  It’s the Airman’s Cross, placed by his comrades to commemorate the death of an early airman, Captain Eustace Broke Loraine and his Sergeant, who died when he crashed his Nieuport Monoplane near Stonehenge. This pioneer aviator deserves to be recognised not just because of his own place in hist...

Fun in the Sun continues with part 2 of my first Air to Air Gunnery camp in Cyprus.  The work has started and now it’s time to become ACE (Allied Command Europe) qualified with the mighty M61 Vulcan cannon. Before long, though it’s time to return to reality and, as my first year on the squadron comes to a close, time for my first annual assessment.   An unmounted M61 Vulcan 20mm c...

Delving back into my RAF Pilot’s Logbook, Form 414, it’s time for the annual instrument rating and prepare for our first deployment to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus.  Whilst the ‘High Ups’ sorted everything out for a major detachment, I’m left doing QRA but at last we are heading south for the Mediterranean. My journey, however, is in the opposite of a supersonic fighter jet...

This story harks back to the 300th APG show and was rewritten for the Plane Talking UK live show near Heathrow Airport.  It is the story of a crippled Airbus A300 that barely survives a missile attack and the excellent work by a phenomenal Flight Deck crew. The DHL A300 that was struck.   The landing.   The damage done to the A300’s left wing.   Images under Creative Commons l...

The Convair 990 was a financial disaster that cost General Dynamics one of the largest corporate losses in history but thanks to some fascinating aerodynamics it was also the world’s fastest subsonic airliner.  This is the story of a little known airliner and the transonic design that allowed it to cruise at Mach 0.97!   Convair CV 990 displaying anti-shock bodies on the top surface of...

Growing up in poverty, life in Germany following WWII was hard, but for one young man, dreams of starting a new life as a pilot in America seemed beyond imagination.  However, through strength of character and determination, Dieter Dengler would achieve his goal only to have his short career brought to an abrupt end when he was downed flying a secret mission over Laos at the start of the Vietnam w...

From one of the lesser known Bee Gee’s records comes a bizarre title for a seasonal song that brings to mind the story of  Captain William Wincapaw, a native of Friendship in Maine.  In his early days of flying float planes around Rockland Harbour he often used the many lighthouses of New England to help him navigate in poor weather.  His fondness for the families who tended these lighthouse...

After WWII many American pilots were employed by the growing Chinese airline industry flying from poorly equipped airfields in China.  The weather was often difficult and the terrain dangerous but on Christmas day 1946, struggling to get back to their base at  Lunghwa airfield tragedy would strike… not once but three times.  This is the awful story of that night in Shanghai.   A CNAC Cu...

The very next installment of my flying logbook stories has me attempting my first arrester wire engagement, paying tribute to the Bell Rock Lighthouse and meeting the USAF’s  527th Aggressor Squadron for combat training.   Armed Phantoms of No 43 (F) Squadron, RAF Leuchars.   Three F-5E Tiger II aircraft from the 527th Tactical Fighter Training Aggressor Squadron, RAF Alconbury. &#...