Trials and Errors

by Mike Brooke

  The brief was for three lots of smoke to be used so we went round again for another attack. The smoke from the first event was now spreading out and, as the tank ejected its second salvo, this added to the obscuration. This time I looked at the FLIR screen and saw what looked like one of the dive-bombing targets I used to drop bombs on from my Canberra. Selecting white for hot showed a ring of bright objects in a circle on the ground. Although the Chieftain was not visible, even though its engine was running and therefore hot, I knew exactly where it was – in the centre of that ring of white dots. These were the hot smoke canisters. The third run made it even more obvious. I pointed this out to the folk in the back and there was the odd ‘Oh, yes’ and ‘How about that?’ Back to the drawing board, boffins!

  When we got back Jack and I were told to report asap to the group captain’s office over in the control tower. Apparently he was not aware of the trial and its peculiar flight profile so close to the airfield and the wing commander, who had signed it off, was not there. Apparently his PA had come into his office and found ‘Uncle Reggie’ standing on his chair trying to see why our Varsity, one of the priceless trials aircraft under his charge, kept diving below the distant tree line. His enquiries had tracked down the culprits and we were summoned to explain. Once we had explained he was somewhat mollified, but it was interesting that on the second such sortie about a week later, the wing commander accompanied me to experience it for himself!

  Note

  22 The micron or micrometre (symbol: µm) is a unit of length equalling 1×10−6 of a metre; that is, one-millionth of a metre or one-thousandth of a millimetre, 0.001mm, or about 0.000039in.

  20 OTHER HOTSPOTS

  In concert with all the FLIR and electro-optic work there were ongoing attempts at giving pilots a view of what their systems were ‘seeing’ without having to redesign cockpits. The first one of these that I came across was a Honeywell device that effectively put a miniature TV tube onto the pilot’s helmet. It was one of the very early Helmet-Mounted Displays or HMDs. The TV tube was fixed to the right-hand side of the helmet and poked around to place a little, circular screen in front of the pilot’s right eye, so giving him a monocular view of whatever the TV or FLIR was seeing. It was all very odd at first, the helmet was much heavier than usual and felt like it was trying to tilt to the right with the off-centre weight of the tube. Then it got worse when I was told that high voltage electricity was running through the cable up the back of my neck and alongside my right cheek. Goodness knows what the Health and Safety folk of today would make of it.

  We flew with this contraption on our heads in one of the Canberras, but it was difficult to make much use of it in its original state. What was needed was some sort of connection between the pilot’s head movement and the electro-optic seeker. However, all these things were being worked on and I spent many hours in a simulator over in the ‘Factory’ area with a monocular sight, which did not have a picture in it but a miniaturised HUD. The simulator, which had a single seat ‘fighter’ cockpit and a visual display of the outside world on a screen, fed by a model of the terrain on a continuous belt passing under a TV camera. It was actually quite realistic despite its lack of sophistication.

  This research crossed over into the LLTV work that we were doing and the boffins were trying to give us the ability to look away from the conventional displays in front of us and look towards the way we were travelling during those steep low-level turns in the dark. The monocular HMD had a patch of flight information, modelled on a HUD, which meant that we could still see the important parameters like height, speed, heading and the aircraft’s flight path. The idea was to eventually incorporate the LLTV or FLIR image within the display.

  But several problems soon came to light. The first I discovered was that after flying for about twenty minutes in darkened ‘night’ conditions, the monocular display suddenly went out. ‘The display’s failed,’ I called. ‘No it hasn’t,’ came a prompt reply from outside. There followed a short reprise of the pantomime – oh yes it has – oh no it hasn’t – before the lights came on and the run was stopped. ‘Ah, it’s back on,’ I said. ‘Must be a loose connection.’

  Everything was checked and we decided to do another session. After about fifteen minutes it happened again. ‘Close your left eye,’ came the dubious suggestion. I did and the display miraculously reappeared. In the end the medical wizards up at the IAM diagnosed something called Binocular Rivalry. In brief it meant that if the visual input to one open eye was vastly more than into the other, the brain could not compute the result and, after trying very hard, it would shut down the feed from the optic nerve of the highly active eye. Hence my experience that the HMD had failed.

  A second problem arose because the miniature patch of flight symbology was not always pointing where the aircraft was going. Within it there was a tiny, stylised winged circle that represented what was called the aircraft’s velocity vector; that shows where the aeroplane is going at any instant in time. However, if the velocity vector is no longer related directly to the flight path vis-à-vis the outside world it means very little. So we had to play about with different ways of displaying the velocity vector and finally decided that it should be fixed in space along the aircraft’s axis. That meant that when we looked away from the forward view, say up and right while turning, we no longer saw the velocity vector but we could recapture it when we next looked ahead. However, one day I was doing a very demanding exercise at high speed and very low level and was moving my head quite a lot. I had just rolled out of a turn and descended into a valley trying to follow the navigation demand when I crashed. ‘What happened?’ came the disembodied voice from the desk outside.

  ‘I dunno,’ I replied.

  Then I realised that I was sitting there with my helmet right back on the seat’s headrest. I had tried to make the velocity vector go up with my head and not the stick! Sheepishly I owned up. ‘That’s a really useful result,’ came the response. I suppose it was.

  Away from all this esoteric stuff came a requirement for us to fly a Buccaneer to Eglin AFB in Florida for trials with a new piece of Electronic Counter Measures (ECM) kit called Skyshadow. This was built by GEC-Marconi and was a wing-mounted pod. At the time none of our Buccaneers had an in-flight refuelling facility. However, there was one in the MOD(PE) fleet and that was Buccaneer S2 XN 975. It was due to come to Farnborough for HF radio trials in May 1978 and following those it would be earmarked for the fitment of the ECM pod and flown to Florida for about one month’s work. I was to be the pilot.

  This was all well and good and I was a very happy bunny. Somewhat hesitantly, in fear of losing a month’s flying in Florida, I did point out that, unlike the rest of the fighter pilots on EFS, I had actually never done any flight refuelling; well, not of the sort in question. Although I had consumed many a cardboard sandwich from a cardboard rations box in my time! ‘Well, it’s about time you learnt,’ came the rejoinder from the boss. ‘Get onto the FR School at RAF Marham and fix yourself a course.’

  So I did and went there to learn all the technicalities of the way that kerosene can be passed safely from one large flying petrol station to an aeroplane in need. After the two-day course I felt well up to having a go at inserting my probe into a basket. It had been agreed that before we set off westwards I would get a couple of sorties on the tanker over the North Sea in 975 with one of the more experienced guys in the back to tell me what I was doing wrong! The aircraft arrived in late May and I flew three of the HF trials sorties myself. Then the aircraft was due to detach to RAF Laarbruch to continue the trials at low altitude in Germany. Flt Lts Terry Adcock and Mo Hammond had drawn the long straw for this particularly arduous detachment. On 14 June, while Rich Rhodes was away and I was standing in as flight commander, I received a call from the Ops Room to tell me that the radio folks had lost the signal from 975. I told them not to worry too much, but that we would call Laarbruch operations to see if anything was amiss.

  Within about hal
f an hour we were told that the aircraft had crashed. Not long after that we received the good news that Terry and Mo had ejected and landed safely with only minor injuries. It transpired that they were flying at about 500ft and suddenly Terry spotted a helicopter right in front of him. It was slightly, but not a lot, higher so he pushed the nose down to fly under it. But then the ground came up fast so he pulled the stick back – a bit too hard. The Buccaneer didn’t like that at all and it departed rapidly from controlled flight, so our boys did the only thing that they could – eject. Ironically the helicopter saw the whole thing and landed near the downed aviators and took them to hospital! There must be some sort of moral there!

  So that was the end of Buccaneer SMk2 XN 975 and my detachment to Florida. By the time a new way of doing the trial had been found I was long gone! I never did do flight refuelling – although I nearly did many years later.

  21 OVER THE POND

  By April 1976 I had never visited the United States. So it was a very pleasant surprise when Rich Rhodes informed me, with one of his usual beaming smiles, that we were going to spend a couple of weeks together working in the USA. We would be based at the plant of the US aerospace company Martin Marietta, where the main business activity was the production of Minuteman missiles; however, we would be using a co-located flight simulation facility. But first we had to get there. In those days the RAF ran its own transatlantic airline. It was called No. 10 Squadron and it operated a fleet of Vickers VC10s in the grey, blue and white livery of RAF Transport Command. The squadron was based at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire and its graceful but noisy airliners flew to destinations worldwide, as well as to the USA. Now Rich and I were going to put our lives in the hands of a gallant VC10 crew who were going to fly us from Brize Norton to Washington Dulles Airport. One of the anomalies of being forced to use the RAF airline instead of searching out a good deal via a travel agent was that, despite not starting our trial until the following Monday, we had to travel out on the Friday as the VC10 schedule to Washington was only twice per week. This meant that we would be spending two nights in a Washington hotel before travelling to Florida on the Sunday. The economics of this were beyond me.

  When we arrived at Brize and found our way to the very utilitarian ‘departure lounge’ I noticed that our aircraft was having quite a lot of freight loaded. I soon learnt that we ‘talking ballast’ would be sharing the cabin space with a pile of boxes, aircraft spares and other oddments all secured to the cabin floor by straps, turnbuckles and nets. Speedbird service it was not. The other anomaly that we discovered on locating our seats was that they faced the back of the aeroplane. This, apparently, was deemed to give better survivability in the case of a crash. Once we had settled in the captain gave his usual introductory chat during which he announced that the biggest of the wooden crates under the aforementioned netting was an original copy of the Magna Carta which was going to the USA on loan as part of their bicentennial celebrations – 200 years after they had escaped from the rigours of the British monarchy.

  The seven-hour flight passed tediously, although my first views of the Greenland icecap and the wastelands of north-east Canada were interesting and awe inspiring. Over New York City I was even able to see Manhattan through the haze and pick out the green postage stamp of Central Park among the skyscrapers.

  We finally landed at Washington Dulles Airport and, as we taxied to our allocated slot, a long procession of black and white police cars fell into echelon port formation. We were then told that we were to remain seated until the Magna Carta had been unloaded. Being a bunch of service personnel the only upshot was a low murmuring; I suspect that if we had been the usual mix of today’s airline passengers there would have been uproar and mutiny!

  Eventually we were allowed out, but then came another novelty. On leaving the VC10 we stepped directly into what seemed to be a large, airy and sunlit room with rows of seats arranged down the side and up the middle. Once this room was full, a man in a uniform walked from the end closest to the aeroplane through the assembled crowd to the other. There he got into a small cabin and proceeded to drive the whole shebang across the tarmac towards the main terminal. As we rolled along between the serried rows of commercial airliners the driver adjusted the height of our mobile lounge so that when we reached the door of the terminal we could walk straight off into the lower reaches of the building. NATO Travel Orders in hand we followed the more knowledgeable towards the entry point of ‘The Land of the Free’. As we rounded a corner I saw on my left a huge African American figure, dressed in a black uniform and prominently supplied with a gun, handcuffs, truncheon, radios and badges – a real American cop.

  ‘Now I know I’m in the USA,’ I said to Rich.

  After completing all the arrival formalities and collecting our baggage we had to find out how we got from the airport to the hotel. Then came an announcement in a rich American baritone, worthy of a trailer for the latest Hollywood blockbuster:

  ‘Ground transportation is now leaving for downtown Washington. All aboard!’

  We soon learned that this was repeated at monotonously regular intervals. However, it had given us the clue as to what signs to look for. Sure enough there was a large arrow with those unambiguous words Ground Transportation written upon it. Following that we came across the next verification of our transatlantic location – a large silver Greyhound bus, being driven today by an undoubtedly close relative of the policeman we had seen earlier.

  Fares paid, destination announced and we were on our way. The journey into DC was an interesting replay of a multiplicity of background scenery to many of the movies that I had watched. Everything was so different from the UK: the styles of houses, water towers, farmsteads and the slat-sided tobacco barns. As we reached the more urban areas of the capital and the houses crowded closer together the differences with the Old Country got smaller.

  Soon we were driving down the side of the Potomac River and had pulled into the environs of the Twin Bridges Marriott Hotel – our home until Sunday. It was then that I realised that it was still mid afternoon and I was going to face another new experience: jet lag. So when I had settled into my room, I took a shower and lay on the very large and very comfortable bed and, quite quickly, fell asleep.

  Rich roused me in time for us to institute our own Friday evening ‘Happy Hour’. After all it was now 5 p.m. local time, although my body knew it was just coming up to bedtime. After sampling my first ever Budweiser beer, with a dish of ‘chips’ to hand, I made my mind up to push on through the rebellious biological clock signals and enjoy my evening. There was a nice restaurant, a well-stocked bar and the Queen was paying. What was there not to like?

  I eventually gave in to the aforementioned insubordinate body clock at about 10.30 p.m. and wandered off to my room. I would sleep the sleep of the righteous until breakfast time now. Not a bit of it. At 4 a.m. I awoke with a box of birds in my head. What is going on? I asked myself. Body-clock-wise I didn’t get to bed until about 4.30 in the morning – I surely should have slept until at least 10.30? So what time is it now in the UK? A short pause while my addled brain calculated. Rats! It’s the equivalent of 10 a.m.! So now I had to lie there for another three hours before I could legitimately get up and move around the place. I could now see why folk got so worked up over jet lag. It is a real nuisance and, as such, has generated quite a lot of work to overcome its effects on those most affected, namely the air transport pilots and aircrew.

  Our weekend in Washington was spent as tourists. We ascended the needle of the Washington Memorial, the views through the letterbox windows at the top were awe-inspiring and as I looked out towards Washington’s National airport,23 across the Potomac, I was sure that I could feel a very slight sway under my feet. The Lincoln Memorial, the Reflecting Pool, and the Jefferson Memorial were all on the schedule. We discovered the hop-on-hop-off tourist buses to move us around as well as the 4.6-mile stretch of the newly opened Washington Metro. The latter was impressive with huge canop
ied stations and large bore tunnels. Being so new (it had opened only two months earlier) the rolling stock was sparkling clean and comparisons with the London Tube were inevitable. ‘Yes, but how do you think this will all look in 100 years time?’ was a fair rhetorical question. There were still many more miles to be constructed and put into service, but what there was was certainly impressive.

  At one point we needed to find a gent’s convenience and we discovered one not far from the Washington Memorial. As we entered someone pushed at a cubicle door to reveal a gent sitting in mid evacuation. When he reached out to shove the door shut a small revolver clattered onto the tiled floor.

  ‘Yes, we are certainly in the United States,’ said Rich.

  After a good day taking in all the sights and actually remaining safe we returned to our hotel to pass another evening fending off the jet lag with food and drink. The agenda for the following day, Sunday 30 May, would be breakfast, checkout, cab to National Airport and our flight to Orlando, Florida.

  All went to plan and we arrived to a steamy sunset in Orange County, Florida. Our hotel was on the Orange Blossom Trail and was more than adequate for our needs. The jet lag was receding a little by now and having met up with the two BAe boffins joining us for the trial we helped things along with king-sized steaks and Californian Merlot. And so to bed.