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The Shackleton AEW, despite its World War II-era engines and radar was expected to defend the United Kingdom from the air arms of the Warsaw Pact at their most potent. This was not a plastic digital jet, but a noisy living monster as analogue as a hammer. We spoke to former RAF pilot Trevor Williams about flying the immortal ‘Shack’.
Describe the Shackleton in three words...
Noisy, Slow, Heavy
What was its role and was it effective?
Airborne Early Warning – a flying radar station. We would, ideally, detect low flying targets, report their position etc to the Air Defence Ground Environment and control friendly fighters to intercept them. Additionally, we had a secondary role doing the equivalent for enemy ships. We would broadcast their positions (Surpic – Surface Picture) and control friendly attack a/c (eg. Buccaneers) onto them (Vasstac – Vector assisted attack). Our tertiary role was Search and Rescue. The Nimrod force were the experts, and we were never on SAR standby as they were, but I flew 4 SAR flights during my 7 years on 8 Sqn.
As for effectiveness, the Shack was distinctly sub-optimal at AEW, operationally valid at Surpic and Vasstac, and probably the best SAR visual search platform then flying in the world.
What was the best and worst equipment on the aircraft and why?
As an ex-maritime aircraft it is almost obligatory to say that the best equipment on board was the galley. Given that our raison-d’etre was AEW, the radar would have to count as the worst. For our peace-time training we depended on Secondary Radar (IFF) like a blind man depends on his white stick. Probably the most under-rated, and under-used, equipment on board was the Orange Harvest Radar Warning Receiver (ESM)
What was the radar and well did it work?
It was the AN/APS-20, the world’s first AEW radar, developed under the code name of Project Cadillac in the aftermath of the Pearl Harbour attack. Although it was the ‘F’ model – the 6th upgrade – it was profoundly basic (although still in use on USAF Super Constellations until the Americans finally got the E3 AWACS to work in the mid 70s). When it was working well we could do a (very) good job, within certain limits, and any AEW capability is better than none. On a bad day however, there wasn’t much in it. Although the media and politicians billed us as ‘the national asset’ the Squadron’s primary task (as stated in the Statement of Unit Policy) was to provide a ‘pool of trained manpower’ for the new aircraft. When the Squadron formed up with Shackletons in 1971 the ‘new aircraft’ was intended to be the E3, and was due to enter service in 1975/6. The AEW Shack was a stopgap, that served for 20 years…
As for the radar, there were some plusses – It was powerful, as an analogue radar it could be ‘interpreted’ by an experienced operator, and it didn’t suffer from contacts/information falling below a threshold and disappearing as was the case with digital processing. For the ground crew it was very old technology and was very satisfying to work on. For the aircrew it could be very satisfying, and very frustrating. I shudder to think of the hours I spent flying around over the sea while the radar team tried to make the radar work properly – ‘Changing the Low Volts power pack’, ‘tuning the crystals’, ‘by-passing the PA’ and goodness knows what else.
Su-27s and MiG-31s would have eaten Shackletons presumably. Were you scared of them?
No. Because of our antiquity we would have been a very low priority target, and because we operated at low-level it would cost any hostile jet aircraft a significant amount of fuel to come and get us. And I doubt that the Russians had a world-beating look-down, shoot-down capability
What was the best thing about the Shackleton? And why?
Easy. It was a ‘crew’ aircraft. We flew as constituted crews which was brilliant. And to get the system to work well required the whole crew to work well together. All of us treasured both aspects.
You were offered the chance to fly the Lancaster, what is a Shack pilot’s perspective of the Lancaster?
I remember sitting in the cockpit of the Lancaster, looking out at the engines and thinking that they looked more like starter motors than proper engines like the Shack’s Griffons. Side by side it was the differences between the two aircraft that struck one. The Shack was bigger, heavier and sat much closer to the ground than the Lancaster. Compared to the Shack the Lancaster was a hot ship. I believe that it could reach 200 kts, at 20,000 ft. The Shack could do one or the other, but certainly not at the same time, and it took a long time to achieve either.
What was the worst thing about the Shackleton?
The unreliability of the radar system. If the aircraft had been equipped with the radar that was fitted to the Navy Sea Kings in the aftermath of the Falklands War I would have happily stayed flying it for years and years, and would be permanently hard-of-hearing as a result.
Did you always get on with your crew? Who is the happiest and least happy person in a Shackleton?
The crews were always happy, unless the Captain was a difficult character. With 9 in a crew there would inevitably be someone you didn’t gel with but that still left 7 people to like and the crew always sorted themselves out. Shortly after I left one crew I asked the Captain what it was like having so-and-so (a confirmed social hand grenade) on the crew. He replied “he’s embarrassing, but he’s ours”.
As a trade group I think the Flight Engineers were the most happy.
What should I have asked you?
What is the spark plug on top for ? (easily the most asked question at air displays, depressingly followed quite closely by ‘how did you get it here’?). The spark plug was the ESM. We almost never used it because it diverted the radar operator in the ‘C’ position from looking at his radar. However we did really pay attention to it when we ‘rushed’ a Shack out to Cyprus to provide AEW after the Americans bombed Libya. We had to transit from Gibraltar to Akrotiri, at low level, without being able to find out where the US 6th Fleet might be, but we DID know they were likely to be trigger-happy. One Chas Buckingham, a recently arrived ex-maritime AEO, sat in the ‘C’ seat and did nothing but listen to the ESM output. I was very impressed at the volume and quality of the information that he provided. Some years later, the shiny new E3 flew its very first Quick Reaction Alert mission for the RAF. Apparently, the Russian aircraft was first detected by the LORAL ESM some time before the radar picked it up, which didn’t surprise me at all.
What is a long mission like?
Tiring, and inevitably boring for everyone sometime during the flight. My wife quickly appreciated me going for a drink in the bar with the crew after a long flight. If I went straight home after a trade sortie I would be both tense and tired. After unwinding with the boys (some of whom were old enough to be my dad) I would at least be more relaxed.
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Image of the ‘Westland Wildcat’, hand-drawn by Royal Marine PoW Guy Griffiths, 1945. Catalogue reference: WO 208/5440
The writer Luke Turner shared a link with me via X leading to a sketched cutaway from 1945 of a formidably armed fighter-interceptor labelled as the ‘Westland Wildcat’. The twin-boom pusher design, reminiscent of the Saab 21, was plausible, but what was it?
The Westland aircraft company had created the revolutionary Whirlwind fighter design in 1938, was this sketch evidence of another innovative fighter that never made it into production? Sadly, this article is no exception to Betteridge’s law that the answer to a question in a headline is always ‘no’. The Wildcat, which is no relation to today’s helicopter of the same name, was an attempt at disinformation by an incarcerated Marine pilot.
According to the British National Archives“Guy ‘Griff’ Griffiths is a Royal Marine pilot and one of the first naval officers to be captured. He found distraction from captivity in dreaming up a scheme for feeding misleading intelligence to the German authorities whilst imprisoned in Dulag Luft – creating sketches of fake British aircraft which he leaves around the camp for guards to find.”
Guy Beresford Kerr “Griff” Griffiths (6 June 1915 – 12 July 1999) was a Skua pilot at the start of the war. Eleven days into the Second World War, three Skuas were dispatched from HMS Ark Royal to defend a merchant ship against a German submarine attack. This was the first British Naval bombing of the conflict, and one of the pilots was Griffith. Due to incorrect fuse arming, the Skuas bombs damaged the tails of two of the three aeroplanes, which crashed into the sea with the loss of both air observers. Griff, along with fellow pilot Thurstan, survived, becoming the first naval officers captured in the war. Griffiths’ spirit of defiance survived captivity and he used his artistic skills to create fake British warplane designs to confuse and waste the time of Nazi intelligence (he also forged documents to aid escape attempts). He was freed in 1945 and become the first Royal Marines officer to fly a helicopter. During the Korean War he visually identified the first downed MiG-15.
The Westland Wildcat
So would the Wildcat have worked in real-life? Jim Smith had significant technical roles in the development of the UK’s leading military aviation programmes from ASRAAM and Nimrod, to the JSF and Eurofighter Typhoon. He was also Britain’s technical liaison to the British Embassy in Washington, covering several projects including the Advanced Tactical Fighter contest. We asked him his opinion of this intriguing design:
“The Wildcat concept is a compact, single-engine, twin boom-design that shows its Westland pedigree in the compact central fuselage nacelle, pusher engine and heavy armament, with nose- mounted cannon supplemented by additional weapons in the front of the tail-booms. The nacelle- form fuselage not only looks like the front end of the Whirlwind, it also resembles in layout the fuselage of the 1931 Pterodactyl IV, and the projected Mk VI fighter. To me, it looks to be reflecting an answer to the question “How can we deliver the punch of the Whirlwind in a design using a single Merlin engine?”.
This would be desirable for two reasons. Firstly, the Peregrine engine powering the Whirlwind had found itself at a development dead end, given the far greater urgency of continuously keeping the Merlin competitive, because of its criticality to the performance of key fighter, strike, and bomber aircraft. Secondly, moving to a single-engine design would have a greater chance of Air Ministry approval than simply replacing the two Peregrines on the Whirlwind with two Merlin engines, given the pressing demand for those engines.
Unsurprisingly, the proposed pod and boom layout offers both benefits and disadvantages – like any other aircraft, there are trade-offs to be made between desirable characteristics like range, manoeuvre performance, speed and handling. The most obvious attraction of the design is the realisation of a small, yet heavily armed fighter, combining aerodynamic and structural efficiency into what should be a fast, manoeuvrable and effective platform.
Where then, do the disadvantages or questionable aspect arise? Apart from the question mark about whether Merlin engines would have been available, that is. Two aspects strike me as requiring some thought – and possible revision.
The undercarriage arrangement is a particular problem as the ‘conventional’ tailwheel layout will lead to low ground clearance for the propeller – or longer and heavier undercarriage legs will be required to give adequate clearance. This problem is compounded by the positioning of the fin, rudder and tailwheel in the centre of the tailplane. This results in fin, rudder and landing loads all having to be sustained by the tailplane, inevitably adding weight to the structure. A second related issue is the complexity of the control runs for the empennage. Positioning the fin and rudder at mid-tailplane has the advantage of these surfaces being in the propeller slipstream, but with the disadvantage of complexity of the control system, which has to pass from the cockpit through the wing to the tail-booms, down the booms, and then across through the tailplane to the fin.
I suggest that the use of a nosewheel undercarriage would result in better ground handling, and be a lighter solution to providing adequate ground clearance. Similarly, moving to a fin and rudder carried on each boom would not only simplify the control system, but also provide a more structurally efficient transfer of fin loads into the structure. Of course, the resulting configuration would perhaps then look like a piston-engined precursor to the Vampire, and, perhaps less like a quirky Westland product.
Pilot escape might be another problem area, and the Wildcat might, perhaps, have been an early ejection seat adopter should the design have gone into production. Another issue, often encountered with pusher engine installations, is difficulty in cooling the engine. Arrangements for engine cooling are not entirely clear, the drawing hinting at an under-fuselage radiator, rather like that of the Hurricane. This is certainly an area which would need to be considered in development.
With a small design, as this appears to be, one does wonder what the combat range would be, particularly as the available volume in the fuselage and wing appears limited. Timing is everything here – as a shorter-range interceptor fighter the concept has some promise. But in the latter stages of the war, larger, longer-range escort fighters were perhaps a greater priority.”
The National Archives bew exhibition, ‘Great Escapes: Remarkable Second World War Captives’ draws on The National Archives’ vast collections of wartime era documents and photographs – featuring not only the iconic stories that you may have heard of, but many stories of survival that have rarely been told.
Former RAF pilot Matt Doncaster talks us through some of his incredible flying experiences
The aircraft that is closest to my heart…
..has to be the Harrier, simply because it was an absolute honour to get selected to fly and operate such an iconic aircraft. And she just looks right as well! It’s also the only aircraft I ever had my name on the side of (ZG509/80) and that jet is now privately owned and I’ve just been invited to visit her at her owner’s house. That will be a great day out for sure. To graduate from Tac Weapons training in the Hawk, all map and stopwatch stuff with a basic weapons system, to a jet that accelerated like a scolded cat, even at heavy weights, climbed better than a Hawk, and was essentially a flying weapons system for both day and night operations, was like the jump to light-speed, to say the least. As a single-seat fast jet pilot in the ‘90s you could want for nothing more. And whilst the rest of the world’s aviators used to complain about the noise of the Pegasus engine at idle, it was music to my ears (and that of every Harrier pilot on the planet!)
What did taking off in the Harrier feel like?
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
When you strapped into a Harrier, you knew she meant business – the cockpit was like no other in RAF service at the time because of the McDonnell Douglas influence, all HOTAS, big multifunction displays, a large HUD and a very useful ‘Up Front Controller’ just below the HUD primarily for comms management and data entry. Also, you sat very high up compared to most other aircraft, so lookout was amazing – I could also look down much further that in any previous aircraft I’d flown because of the bulbous shape of the canopy, and this was very useful as you didn’t need to drop a wing as much to see targets or features on the ground from high altitude. All in all, the cockpit was very user friendly having been designed with proper ergonomics in mind, so couple that with what I can only describe as ‘spirited’ performance, it was a joy to fly and operate, operational pressure and stresses notwithstanding. And I think in hindsight, that’s one of my most enduring memories of her – it was an intense working environment because of the tasks we were trained and training for, so there wasn’t much spare time when you were airborne to simply sit back and take in your surroundings and say ‘Wow, this is incredible!’ Which is a bit of a shame really, but when you could, say in the cruise at high level coming back from a low level sortie, or when performing a VSTOL manoeuvre that you knew looked awesome and you were comfortable with, so there was slightly less pressure than normal (hovering never had that feel if I’m honest because you had to be on top of that scenario from start to finish and the slightest error could lead to disaster very quickly – any VSTOL manoeuvre could do the same to be fair, but some were slightly more forgiving than others), it was like nothing else I’d done or have done since.
What was a typical mission?
There wasn’t a standard mission as such as the aircraft was so capable in so many areas of operation. Primarily the ground-to-air, or air-to-air threat dictated how we could fly in a given environment, plus the weather factor of course. Also, the weapon arsenal we could carry was very varied, and constantly evolving, and that drove what kind of delivery profile we would employ, which in turn dictated whether we could fly low level to the target (the preferred option to try and deny fighter interception), or had to deliver weapons such as PGMs from higher levels, or from a high angle dive because the surface to air threat dictated, and so on. So never the same day twice. And then we had the ability to do all of that off the aircraft carrier as well.
What stands out?
Without a shadow of doubt, carrier operations. My last two months on the squadron were spent at sea in 2000 on board HMS Illustrious on Operation Palliser, flying in Sierra Leone, and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. We’d deployed to the ship via Malta in anticipation of a two week workup in the Mediterranean prior to a co-operative two week exercise with the French Navy in the Bay of Biscay. However, after about two or three days achieving nothing in Biscay because of the weather, we found ourselves steaming south, fast, replenishing the ship’s stores off Gibraltar before arriving in Freetown harbour some time afterwards to announce our presence. The task was to support British troops on the ground who were primarily manning the airport perimeter and the High Commission, and that support came in the form of us at very low level, literally tree top height, putting down noise in order to upset the opposing forces at the time and make them think twice about any planned actions. Normally we’d plan to avoid villages and towns in the UK for reasons of noise pollution and general military PR, but in Sierra Leone we ‘joined the dots’ and flew from one settlement to another, deliberately flying overhead to invoke communications over their radio and mobile phone network, and it worked. Very quickly the Royal Navy, sat in Freetown harbour with a Signal Intelligence Frigate listening to those communications, built up a picture of who was where in country, and we continued to operate in that way for the five weeks of operations. But flying off the carrier, for me, was the most satisfying and exciting aspect of my time with the Harrier. Luckily, flying off and back onto the ship clicked quickly for me, and I don’t want to blow my own trumpet here, but whilst it was always a challenge, knowing that I could hover alongside and land and be relatively comfortable doing so took a lot of pressure off. I found the carrier easier to land on than a pad back home because I could see it – I was never comfortable landing vertically on a pad that I couldn’t see below me. My last flight in a Harrier was an operational sortie in West Africa, landing on a carrier. Personally it didn’t get any better than that.
The thing you need to know about flying the Harrier is..
If she does something you didn’t ask her to do, undo what you last did! This was our VSTOL mantra, and one that got me, and most of my friends, out of trouble in the VSTOL environment at some point in our time of the jet. Obviously because I could move the nozzles by design to vector thrust from aft to downwards, and anywhere in between, depending on which manoeuvre I was attempting to fly, there were a myriad of aerodynamic forces at play as well as engine performance parameters to monitor and manage, and flaps moving in conjunction with nozzle angle (or not if the case dictated). So in essence, a lot going on, and with the best will in the world it was easy to move something inadvertently – the nozzle lever being the biggest potential for disaster – not select something such as the engine water injection system (absolutely vital to increase maximum engine thrust in certain scenarios) or not select the required flap schedule (there were three settings, CRUISE – fixed at 5 degrees, AUTO – anywhere between UP and 25 degrees depending on nozzle angle, and STOL – anywhere between UP and 62 degrees again dependent on nozzle angle). Hence, ‘if she does something you didn’t ask her to do, undo what you last did!’, have a think and try again.
The service or airline I feel closest to is, of course
The RAF. Twenty seven and a half years of service will do that to a person! Never a day goes by without me marvelling at what I achieved and the variety of aircraft I flew and flying roles that I undertook. I never did the same job twice, and whilst I did three instructional tours they were at Basic, Advanced Fast Jet, and the Empire Test Pilot School, so very varied. When I joined the RAF in 1991, I expected to have a ‘standard’ career path of training, probably two tours flying a frontline aircraft, maybe promotion and staff college and a staff tour, then leave after maybe one more flying job. I should have bet a day’s pay on going from training to being an Instructor on Tucanos, then the Harrier, then a Tactics and Weapons Instructor on the Hawk, then a crossover to the C17 because of a neck injury, then ETPS instructing on Hawk, Alpha Jet, Tucano, King Air and Andover, as well as flying pretty much all the types Boscombe Down had to offer including helicopters, with three ground tours woven in for good measure, as I’d be a very rich man now.
Virgin Atlantic is in there as well. I joined them in 2017 after I’d left the RAF, flying the Boeing 747. Another privilege. And despite being made redundant during the pandemic because the airline scrapped the 747, I’m back there now flying the Boeing 787 Dreamliner.
My least favourite aircraft of all that I’ve flown is the Grob Tutor. It replaced the Scottish Aviation Bulldog (a quite lovely aircraft, simple to operate and full of character) at University Air Squadrons, and, quite frankly, the Tutor is too sedate and heavy in roll, over complicated in the checks department, and really quite a bit of an underwhelming experience. Would I fly it again – yes, in the Air Experience role as I’d be giving something back to the young people who aspire to join the RAF and become pilots. Would I buy one? Not if it was the last aircraft on earth – I’ll build something from scratch, thanks!
The C-17 is…..
a truly amazing transport aircraft. Again, I was blessed in being able to operate her through a twist of fate that temporarily stopped me from flying fast jets. I sustained a very bad neck injury whilst instructing in the back seat of a Hawk in the summer of 2003 that meant I couldn’t pull high g for the immediate future, so my fast jet flying was over. I was posted to Boscombe Down on a ground tour to look after, edit and publish the Harrier Aircrew Document Set (basically, Flight Reference Cards, Aircrew Manual, and the Aircraft Operating Data Manual) whilst waiting for the RAF to decide what to do with me. Luckily it wasn’t long before my multi-engine crossover took place, and whilst I wanted to go and fly the BAe 146 and HS125 on 32 Sqn at Northolt, there weren’t any slots available that fitted the service’s timescales for me, so they offered me the C17. Having never seen one before, I asked if I could visit 99 Sqn at Brize Norton on a fact finding mission, and this ultimately turned into a trip away to North America on a training flight as an observer, and that was it – I was hooked! The aircraft’s ability to do all that it is asked to do, and more, is already legendary, but to be able to operate an aircraft that had a flight deck designed by pilots and a cargo area designed by loadmasters is simply a recipe for success, and we all loved flying her. I started on the squadron in January 2006 by flying out to Altus AFB, Oklahoma, as the USAF carried out all UK initial training under contract at that time, so that was fun. And on my return I set to with the major task that the squadron had at the time, which was manning the airbridge from the UK to Iraq and Afghanistan. Over 95% of my flying was the airbridge, carrying everything from 9mm rounds to Apache helicopters, the odd Chinook or Harrier (I’m the only Harrier pilot to fly both types and once was the Captain of a C17 bringing home a broken Harrier that was also in my logbook), and of course the critically wounded being recovered to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. There were the odd trips going West and not East, but they were always related to the conflicts in the Middle East, and usually we were picking up something special from the Americans. We all loved the C17 because of her reliability – we didn’t want to get stuck in theatre, nor did we want to be part of the bad PR that other RAF aircraft seemed to feed on a regular basis through either not getting out of Brize Norton, or not getting in on time. We felt safe flying in her as well, and I suppose when flying a large, very obvious and valuable asset like that, that’s important. Lights off, at night, armour on, looking at the world through NVGs and operating with a HUD to increase situational awareness is definitely the way forward.
Your worst day at work?
Probably when I was part of a large formation of around 40 aircraft, all fast jets apart from the E-3D AWACS we had in support, running around the North East of England in a ground attack vs air defence with fighter escort scenario, when we all heard ‘Wez, Pull Up, Pull Up, EJECT, EJECT’ followed by ‘Mayday Mayday Mayday’. That was horrible. I thought, as we all did, including Mike who’d put the call out, that Wez (we all had three letter abbreviations of our names and I’ll stick with his) had flown into the ground. In reality he’d glanced forward to see another aircraft coming the other way right in his face, so had instinctively pulled back on the stick, applied full rudder as a survival instinct brace position thinking a mid-air collision was imminent, but that probably saved his life as the jet pulled up and promptly departed controlled flight, such were the nature of his inputs and the speed at which he was flying at the time. He recalled all of this, but also thought it best to eject as the jet was unrecoverable at such a low height, but Mike didn’t see him go out as it was all over in a few seconds. Wez landed in trees just short of where the jet impacted the ground and exploded, so again Mike couldn’t see him, nor did Wez’s location beacon transmit such that we could hear it because of the dense foliage he was hanging in in his parachute. Only after Wez had got himself down from the tree and walked out of the wood onto open ground did we hear his signal on the safety Guard frequency. I can’t recall how long that was, but it seemed like a fortnight – I guess it was probably a few minutes but enough for us to reform the formation in preparation for recovery back to base (there were seven of us initially, Wez was out of the picture, and Mike stayed on scene to manage the search and rescue), but when we did hear his signal, boy was there relief. But those initial minutes were rock bottom, never want to go through that again, horrible minutes. Getting shot at in Afghanistan in a C-17 whilst parked on the tarmac at Kandahar Airport is a risk you accept as part of the job, but being that close to losing a mate during peacetime sucks.
Your best day at work?
Same day. Being met after landing in person by the Station Commander, Group Captain David Walker who alas passed away too young last year, to be asked if there was anything we needed in way of support, as well as being given an initial update on Wez’s condition, was leadership and a half. Apparently we all looked like we’d seen a ghost, which I guess was the aftermath of the stress of thinking a mate had just died, but that soon fell away once we were released from the immediate post-crash management processes and we drove to Nottingham to visit Wez in hospital. To see his smiling face was priceless.
How do you feel about the Andover – and what’s your claim to fame?
The Andover was an aircraft I never in a million years thought I’d ever fly. As a Combined Cadet Force cadet in the ‘80s I’d had a Summer Camp at Boscombe Down and seen XS606 during a hangar visit, but then in 2009 I joined the Empire Test Pilot School as the Fixed Wing Qualified Flying Instructor and Standards Pilot to be told that in due course I’d convert onto the Andover in order to support the delivery of test pilot course sorties that utilised her. So I do have a soft spot for her – yes she was old, but of an era when aviation was still very much the evolving science it was after the Second World War and into the ‘50s and ‘60s. Plus, big propellors and water-meth injection are a combination rarely seen or used these days, so that was something new. She had a museum quality about her because of her age, but all of us who flew her enjoyed the experience. I flew her as far as Toulouse on a visit to Airbus which was interesting since her navigation equipment was ‘60s vintage as well, so standalone GPSs were suckered to various windows on the flight deck to give us a fighting chance. On the return leg we had to fly in t-shirts, flying suits tied off at the waist, from Toulouse to overhead the Channel Islands on the return leg because the air conditioning was asthmatic – how Andover crews operated in the likes of Yemen and its heat back in the day is a miracle. My claim to fame – I was the very last RAF pilot to convert to the Andover before she was retired, and I’m very proud of that fact
Tell me something I don’t know about 747s..
Oh that’s tricky – the 747 is such a venerable old girl, and so much has been written about her over the years. I guess one lesser known fact is that under certain conditions of weight and performance, not only could she continue to destination on three engines instead of diverting in the event of having to shut one engine down due to a mechanical issue, but she could often maintain altitude as well, and in most cases climb higher later on in the cruise on a long haul sector. Now that’s performance worth having when flying over the Himalayas or the Rockies, instead of having to worry about the height of the mountains in today’s large twin-engined airliners where you’re only ever going to descend on one engine.
Alpha Jet versus Hawk?
Everyone in the last 50 years who has passed through RAF fast jet training has flown the Hawk. It’s a lovely, sports car of an aircraft, simple to start, operate and fly, with very few handling vices. I flew it as a student, as an instructor, at low level learning and teaching ground attack, at high level learning and teaching air combat and basic air defence techniques, as a bounce aircraft trying to attack formations as they tried to get to a ground target, I dropped my first weapons from a Hawk at Pembrey Range, and it was the one and only aircraft I’ve fired a cannon from, the 30mm Aden. It will always have a place in my heart as an aircraft that was honest, fun and sometimes challenging to operate – some of the best flying I ever did was as an instructor at RAF Valley.
Not many people in the RAF have flown the Alpha Jet. In fact, the number is probably less than one hundred over the time the jets were based at Boscombe Down, and that includes the ETPS students whose convertion to it for their test pilot courses I was in charge of, about 25 in total during my time there. It was a very tidy jet, compact, low to the ground, with sharper aerodynamics compared to the Hawk, and a much more purposeful look to her. Of course she was twin-engined, so in terms of power to weight she was much better placed than the Hawk – initial climb rate was akin to a clean Harrier if I’m honest as we flew the Alpha Jet at Boscombe Down with no external stores or even pylons, even though the wing could carry four. So in essence she was over powered in the role fit we flew, but that’s not a bad thing. We did fly Alpha Jet vs Hawk air combat, and on paper you’d think the Alpha Jet would win hands down due to her extra performance, but so long as you didn’t get slow in the Hawk, say less that about 300 knots, you had a fighting chance because the Hawk could pull more g (we had a training maximum limit of 7g) versus the Alpha Jet which had a limit of 6g. So you could out (turn) rate the Alpha Jet in a Hawk but you had to be careful and patient – the Hawk bleeds energy very quickly if you’re a bit over zealous and aggressive towards your opponent, and then the Alpha Jet’s ability to regain energy, but more importantly sustain a turn at slower speeds without slowing down, would be the downfall of the Hawk. I always tried to merge into combat fast in a Hawk, at least 400-450knots, and go vertical to try and get lost in the sun and then come back down on the Alpha Jet from above, assuming he hadn’t come up with me. Turning flat at the merge, even with a speed advantage was tricky because of the Hawk’s speed bleeding issue, unless the base height for the combat was lowered to 5000ft above the ground where the Hawk’s Adour engine produced more thrust, but that was a rare occasion – our normal base height was 10,000ft and that made a huge difference to the Hawk, less so to the Alpha Jet with its two engines.
Overall, it was never a ‘I’m in the Alpha Jet, I’m bound to win’ scenario – air combat should always be flown to maximise your own advantages, never those of your opponent, and that’s what we did regardless of what we were flying or what the outcome might have looked like on paper.
The most overarted and underrated aircraft I can think of – please explain
Overrated – Oh what a difficult question. I think I need your help there! Maybe we should get together and discuss this one question and see where it takes us? Good idea, let’s do that
Underrated – The Hurribomber I think. The long forgotten stalwart of The Battle of Britain that went on to become a very successful air-to-ground aircraft in North Africa prior to the arrival later in the war of aircraft such as the Typhoon and Tempest, and the family of American air-to-grounders. Overshadowed but wrongly so in my opinion. Or maybe the Tucano – I loved flying the Tucano, others didn’t, but I think it did excellent service as a basic trainer for the 30-odd years it did so. Such a shame they all got sold and shipped abroad – I’d have loved to have had the chance to put a syndicate together and buy one.
What should I have asked you?
What are your future aviation plans? I’ve got a plan to finally get a civilian flying instructor’s rating this year, which will allow me to fly with Ultimate High at Goodwood, and Aero Legends out of Compton Abbas which is only 20 minutes from my house. I need to have some more dynamic flying back in my life, and formation flying and air combat with Ultimate High will be the conduit for that. Aero Legends have recently re-established the training base at Compton Abbas following the sale of the airfield to Guy Ritchie at the end of 2022, and they also operate one of their Spitfires and Harvards there over a number of weekends in the summer months. Obviously I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t interested in flying warbirds at some point in the future, and I think I’ve got a suitable CV to allow me to do that, but the warbird scene is definitely a right place right time scenario, but I’m hopeful that by starting with Aero Legends as a PPL level instructor on their fleet of PA-28s an opportunity might present itself in the future. Fingers crossed!
Matthew Willis has written an excellent book on the most beautiful German aircraft ever flown, the Focke-Wulf Fw 200. We met him at an undisclosed location and plied him with Jägerbombs until he revealed the juiciest secrets of this classic design.
What was the Fw 200 and why was it significant to aviation and world history?
The Fw 200 was a late-1930s airliner that early in WW2 was hurriedly converted to a maritime patrol bomber. It was initially significant for being ridiculously modern at a time when aircraft like the Ju 52 were commonplace, and setting some much-publicised distance records. The war curtailed what would probably have been an illustrious civil career. Germany lacked a good long-range maritime patrol bomber at the outset of war and the Fw 200 was the only suitable type available. The straightforward military conversion was astonishingly successful in 1940-41 in attacks on Allied supply convoys, both in sinking ships in its own right and directing U-boats. For a single type with only a small number of airframes, it required an enormous effort by Allied forces to counter. It’s probably also worth mentioning that it was a popular VIP transport for high-ranking Nazis, and Hitler had his own personal version with a special escape system.
Why is it so much better looking than the Ju 52?
It’s tempting to say that this was purely a function of being a later generation of aeroplane, benefitting from better structural and aerodynamic knowledge, and better materials, not to mention wind-tunnel testing, which was still fairly rare at the time. But even for the late 1930s, it was among the best proportioned and most pleasingly lined airliners. Perhaps just luck, or perhaps the designers had an eye for art as well as function.
Not many were built were they?
Fewer than 300, in all variants.
What was its relationship with U-boats?
It was meant to be the U-boats’ ‘eye in the sky,’ reconnoitring for merchant ships and directing the submarines to their targets. And it did do this, and very effectively, but due to the power struggle between the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine, there was often too much focus on the Fw 200s attacking shipping directly, which was pleasing for Goering, but actually less effective overall than concentrating on reconnaissance.
Was it effective in World War 2?
Yes, in terms of sinking supply shipping, directing U-boats, and soaking up a huge expenditure of resources by the Allies to respond to it. It was also successful as a transport aircraft, making Rommel’s spring 1942 advance possible through petrol deliveries across the Mediterranean, and airlifting critical supplies to Axis troops in the Kuban pocket in 1944.
Was a long-range bomber version proposed?
It did actually act as a long range bomber early in the war, with some raids on a hydro-electric plant in Scotland, but it wasn’t particularly successful. The airframe wasn’t really suitable for development as a pure bomber as it had a very low strength factor. Focke-Wulf did start to develop a bigger aircraft with more powerful engines, the Fw 300, but even this was for essentially the same roles as the Fw 200.
Weirdest thing about the Fw 200 story?
British intelligence was contacted in 1941 by a man claiming to be the father in law of Hitler’s personal pilot, Hans Baur, who it was claimed wanted to use Hitler’s personal Fw 200 to kidnap the Fuehrer and deliver him to the Allies. The RAF made plans to receive the aircraft at Manston on the appointed date, but needless to say, Hitler never arrived. The alleged kidnapping was probably part of a convoluted plot to damage Baur’s influence with King Boris of Bulgaria.
Best and worst things about the 200?
Best – superb efficient design that gave it great range and made it the only available aircraft capable of carrying out a number of important roles.
Worst – its airframe was too lightly built for military use so it had to be manoeuvred with care.
Could it fly safely on two engines?
According to Focke-Wulf publicity when the aircraft was new, it could, though this capability was probably reduced somewhat by the significantly increased weight of military variants.
Wait – there was a BOAC 200?! What was the story?
One of the pre-war customers for the first airliner Fw 200s was the Danish airline DDL. One of its Fw 200s happened to be on a flight to the UK during the surprise invasion and occupation of Denmark in April 1940, and the aircraft was impounded and transferred to BOAC. It was stored for a while then refurbished by Cunliffe Owen from Spring 1941, but in July that year crashed on take-off and was written off. No Condor in ‘speedbird’ markings, sadly.
What was it comparable with?
As an airliner, it doesn’t seem to have an exact analogue – the French Bloch MB.160 is probably closest but I doubt many people even know what that is. I’d say it fits somewhere between the DH91 Albatross and the DC-4. As a maritime raider it isn’t like much else either – it had the same sort of role as the RAF’s Sunderland flying boats, and later on things like the Consolidated Liberator in Coastal Command service. All-in-all it was pretty unique.
What should I have asked you?
Where did the expression ‘Scourge of the Atlantic’ come from?
It is attributed to Churchill – a lot. The trouble is, despite a great deal of searching, I have not been able to find an actual source for it, just literally hundreds of ‘”the scourge of the Atlantic,” as Churchill called it’-type quotes. The closest I can get is this, from Churchill’s The Second World War: “To the U-boat scourge was added air attack far out on the ocean by long-range aircraft. Of these, the Focke-Wulf 200, known as the Condor, was most formidable though happily at the beginning there were few of them.” I suspect that the usual version is a misquote of the above, but it’s hard to confirm because the popular version is so very prevalent.
Where should people buy your book from?
It’s available from the publisher, Morton’s as well as Amazon. You might also find it at WHSmith, and it can be ordered from any regular bookshop.
“Willis’s Fw 200 book is meticulously researched, utterly readable and with extremely beautiful photography – an essential book for every aviation historian.” – Joe Coles, Hush-Kit Aviation Blog
If you like your aircraft small and characterful, then head to India. For your pleasure, we plucked the ten most beautiful, handsome or aesthetically arresting Indian flying machinesand presented them below.
10. HAL HJT-16 Kiran
Not many military aircraft inspire protective instincts in the casual observer, but one cannot help it with the Kiran. Though totally bereft in badassery it wins points for cuteness, scraping it in at number 10.
9. HAL Ajeet
An Indian derivative or the British Gnat, the Ajeet was an appealing design but loses points for looking too much like the Gnat/Midge.
8. NAL Saras
Despite being the least attractive aircraft in the light transport pusher class (lacking the sleekness of the Avanti or Vector) the Saras is still a pretty machine. It loses points for an overly broad chord to the vertical stabiliser and too small wings protruding from a flabby underbody, but gains some for the t-tail, friendly windows and pusher PT6s.
7. HAL HF-73
Credit: artstation
An early 1970s Indian Aircraft requirement for a Deep Penetration Strike Aircraft (DPSA) required collaboration with the West German Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm company. The resultant concept, with its wedge inlets and twin-tails looked like a tiny MiG-25 or perhaps a butch F-5E. Unsurprisingly considering MBB’s concurrent work on the MRCA, its forward fuselage and intakes were extremely Tornado-esque. Power would have come from the same engine type as the Torndao, though the smaller lighter Indo-German design would have enjoyed a far superior power-to-weight ratio. Studies featuring both single and double tails were produced but a lower risk option, the procurement of the Anglo-French Jaguar, replaced this extremely promising design. The HF-73, had it been actually built, may well have topped our list, but loses points for failing to happen. The extremely low canopy bow would have afforded an excellent downward view, a feature seen on the contemporary HAL HLFT-42 concept.
Credit: ArtStation
6. HAL Prachand
There is nothing wrong with a convex belly and thicker torso, with many people finding the ‘Dad bod‘ extremely attractive. Having said that, the Prachand looks best when concealing its stocky underside from the camera. Nose down and flying towards you, the Prachand (meaning ‘intense’ or ‘giant’ in Hindi) has a hungry predatorial look utterly appropriate for a light attack aircraft.
China’s Z-10 is sleeker and more futuristic, and the larger Apache and Ka-52 may cornered the market for the hideous-satanic-harvester-of-souls look, but the Prachand has a tall lumbering purposefulness all of its own as if British firm Avro still existed and decided to make a helo. The rather comical ‘grand piano’ style tail wheel adds a touch of humour so often sadly lacking in the world of military helicopters.
5. HAL HTT-40
Neither as freaky as an Orlik nor as exciting as a PC-21, the HTT40 is still undoubtably an attractive machine.
4. HAL HF-24 Marut
German Kurt Tank designed the exceptionally elegant Fw 200 airliner, the muscularly piscine Fw 190 fighter and the salaciously elongated Ta 152. Clearly Tank knew how to sculpt a beautiful aeroplane and his Marut was no exception. The first successful Asian jet aircraft did not, like the Spitfire for example, enjoy ‘all aspect’ beauty – and there are angles of looking at the design, where it seems incoherent or awkwardly proportioned. It would be rude to look at the Marut directly from above, where it becomes clear that the fuselage is far too thick and the wing too small. But the Marut, with its sleek sweeping fin and mass of exquisite natural metal design features is somewhat like a 1950s US Cadillac, it is kind of ridiculous – yet wonderful. These design features included a ravishingly space-age intake comprising a half-body and splitter plate, and the 1950s style split exhaust trough. Viewed directly from the front it looked uncannily like the later Mirage 2000 and 4000. Though not pretty from every angle, the Marut was the most charismatic of Indian aircraft.
Rival Willy Messerschmitt’s minute HA-300, a far more coherent-looking machine was more akin to a Fiat 850 Sport Spider.
3. HAL HT-2
Vishnu Madav Ghatage obtained his doctorate in Aeronautical Engineering at Gottingen in Germany under the famous Dr Ludwig Prandtl. A few years later he led the design of the the HT-2, a brilliantly pragmatic design with a rather lovely tailfin.
2. HAL HJT-36 Sitara
The curvaceously sexy canopy of the Sitara intermediate jet trainer is arguably the most appealing in production anywhere in the world, the simple tiny ‘ear’ intakes are rather cheeky and the petite dynamism of the Sitara is as refreshing an Italian ice cream next to Lake Como.
HAL Tejas‘The Bangalore Matador’
“The moment had come, I swallowed my gum, We knew there’d be blood on the sand pretty soon. The crowd held its breath, Hoping that death Would brighten an otherwise dull afternoon.”
– Tom Lehrer, In Old Mexico
Put aside the history, put aside a technical assessment and enjoy the Tejas from a purely aesthetic perspective. It’s not hard, as what could be more thrilling than a pocket-size Mirage 2000? Which is in many many ways what this tiny Indian fighter jet resembles. But as much as a Mirage 2000, the Tejas resembles the Spanish bullfighter, the matador. By ‘matador’ I do not mean the Spanish Harrier, but actual matadors, upholders of the Spanish tradition of the bullfight that rather too viscerally combines slaughter and spectacle. The epitome of the dainty deft killer, the Tejas is every inch the matador. Let’s start with the extremely pleasing taper of the fuselage from its widest point back to its neat little nozzle, reminiscent of the way the tight-fitting tights, or taleguilla, of a matador lead down to the zapatilla flat slippers. The extremely unusual LEVCONS are very much like the broad proud shoulders of the matador’s jacket (chaquetilla) and the stylish Viggen-like wing is like the matador’s cape, the capote de brega. Imagine an unfairly disadvantaged Su-30 (perhaps the pilot has been gored and denied missile usage) ‘fighting’ a Tejas in dissimilar air combat training gives you the closest aerial equivalent to the bullfight.
