Mods. I hope you don’t mind this blatant plug, but tickets are selling out fast and it is a unique chance to hear first-hand from some of those who were in at the start of the jet age……
In recent years the Historic Aircraft Association Annual Symposium has become noted for its spectacular line-up of speakers. Recent years have seen leading lights including John Moffat, the last survivor of the Swordfish pilots to attack Bismarck and former 617 Squadron and Battle of Britain pilot Tony Iveson leading speakers who give a unique insight into flying and restoring vintage aircraft.
This year’s speakers at the Historic Aircraft Association’s Annual Symposium at the RAF Museum, Hendon on Saturday 22nd October will celebrate the birth of the jet age. They are headed by Captain Eric “Winkle” Brown, CBE DSC AFC, perhaps Britain’s greatest living aviator.
Captain Brown, in his career in the Fleet Air Arm, then as a test pilot at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Farnborough holds the record for having flown more different types of aircraft than any other pilot. He will trace the earliest days of jet propelled flight from his experiences of flying the Gloster Whittle E28/39, Britain’s first jet aircraft.
He was one of the first British pilots to break the sound barrier, test flew the high-speed de Havilland Swallow after the death of Geoffrey de Havilland junior, was the first pilot to operate a jet (a de Havilland Sea Vampire) from an aircraft carrier and evaluated Germany’s wartime jet aircraft including the Arado 234 and Messerschmitt 262.
Captain Brown will be joined by Ian Whittle, the son of jet engine pioneer Sir Frank Whittle and by Ray Fowkes, who in the early 1940s became an apprentice to Sir Frank Whittle as he developed the first jet engines. They will add a unique personal perspective on Frank Whittle, the man.
Captain Terence Henderson (who flew both) will celebrate the de Havilland Comet, the world’s first jet airliner to enter service and the supersonic Concorde, perhaps the ultimate. Aviator and writer Nigel Walpole will tell the story of the Hawker Hunter and Supermarine Swift, to explain why one became a 1950s icon and the other became shrouded in obscurity.
For further information and to book tickets for the day-long event, which includes buffet lunch and access to the RAF Museum, log on to the HAA website http://www.haa-uk.aero.
By: pagen01 - 13th October 2011 at 16:29
I think it is all down to what was recorded or not, I can’t double check at the moment but seem to think that DH was reported to have gone supersonic just before the crash that killed him, and that Derry had reported going supersonic before the acknowladged date, but couldn’t substantiate it.
A very difficult and interesting era of flight-testing.
By: low'n'slow - 13th October 2011 at 15:06
I think you are right – copy duly amended. Eric reached mach 0.985 in the DH 108 Swallow in 1946. But he did blow in the windows of the CO’s greenhouse with a boom on his subsequent posting to the US Navy Test Pilots Schools at Pax River!!
By: pagen01 - 13th October 2011 at 13:47
He was probably the first British pilot to break the sound barrier, test flew the high-speed de Havilland Swallow after the death of Geoffrey de Havilland junior…
John Derry is recognised as the first British pilot to break the ‘sound barrier’, doing so in the DH.108, on 6th Sep 1946.
Looks like it will be an interesting talk though.
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October 13, 2011 at 1:40 pm