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AIR TOURING FOR A TV HOLIDAY SHOW
 Channel 4 wanted to film people taking unusual holidays for the popular series 'The Real Holiday Show'. I was planning a touring holiday by light aircraft to the Western Isle of Scotland in my group owned C172. This obliously proved interesting to Channel 4 who asked to accompany me on my travels.
I was taking with me, my friend Steve White who is just about to qualify for his PPL at Filton. The idea was I flew and he assisted with the map reading and navigation. We both worked on the princible that if Steve could assist in navigating G-HILS to Scotland, the experience gained should make his NFT in a few weeks time a bit of a doodle.
The islands we planned to visit would take 15 days by the more conventional route of car and ferry. The total travelling time alone for this method would be 43 hours if travelled continuously from London. Also the cost would be about £800 in petrol and ferry fares for the car. An amazing fact, which we managed to convey in the film, was that taking G-HILS to Scotland and touring by light aircraft in this instance was substantially cheaper then by going by car and ferry. Also a lot quicker, we planed to do the whole trip in 4 days. The cost an incredable £186 each between three which covered all the flying, landing fees and fuel.
 We met our cameraman on the first morning of the trip, although we had spoken a number of times previously. I was concerned about the weight of the camera equipment but was pleasantly surprised just how small and compact the actual camera was. We took off from Blackbushe in perfect weather and routed via Daventry, Gamston, Pole Hill to Blackpool to re-fuel. Even at 2000ft the Yorkshire Dales below, still buffeted G-HILS as the wind followed the contour of the undulating ground below. These were minor hills of no more then 800ft, but lessons were quickly learnt in pre-empting the ground features, especially for a south of England flyer like me who has no experience of hill of mountain flying. In Scotland, mountains of 3000ft plus were going to be encountered how would G-HILS and more importantly I take to them.
After re-fuelling which included filing a flight plan and checking with the Military on there low level operations phone number that there was going to be no known fast jets operating in our vacinity around the lake district, we took off. Only to be buzzed about 5 minutes later by a Hawk at 1000ft and 500ft below us. So much for the alerting service! The hills became bigger, 2000ft was now the average height of the ground around the Lake District. The VOR became less effective, I knew this would happen, but is still off putting especially flying over such a rugged landscape. We routed via Turnbury VOR, yet we didn't receive a signal until we were at 25nm to run to the VOR. Steve my low hour's student PPL friend impressed me at this point, by cross checking our route via another VOR and NDB and working out our position which was on track and given me an actual ETA for Turnburry. I could have done this myself, but having a student PPL working on his own initiative and providing such detailed navigational information gives credit to his flying instructors at Filton.
The first island we spotted was Alsa Craig, which incidentally is practically the same name of Steve's mother-in-law, Elsa. It's uninhabited, and practically a perfect circle. We flew around it at 500ft for a spectacular view. Steve commented it looked like his mother-in-law, who was as hard as rocks. A comment he later regretted, once he realised the camera was running and his views were now saved on film for all to see.
We then flew on to Campletown and called ATC, who welcomed us. Fynn was on duty at the Tower that day, who we had spent much time talking to on the telephone previously to this trip and was extremely helpful. Campletown's runway is massive, and I mean massive. It was one of the emergency landing sites for the Space Shuttle. Fynn advised me to land long, to save on taxi-ing time, I agreed to do this - however managed a perfect touchdown on the piano-keys and then had to taxi along the runway for two miles to the apron, much to the amusement of all on board and Fynn. What was however off putting was being chased by a fire tender that was waiting for me on the runway followed me down. Had someone told them about my landings and a full emergency had been given because it was me that was landing. No, actually the runway is so long that the only way the airfield can keep it's licence is to have the fire tender follow every landing aircraft, so that they can keep in the two minute response time for an emergency.
Campletown like all the Highlands and Islands owned airports were very modern, had full fire coverage by two tenders each costing ¼ million pound each and excellent ATC and weather briefing facilities. Average movements while we were there was about 4/5 aircraft a day. A bit of overkill but much welcomed and received. We were met by the airport manager who was also responsible for Tiree and Islay. Our cameraman went off for a ride in a fire tender while I sorted out transport to our accommodation. No problem as our re-fueller who was also the local accountant offered us a lift into town in his LandRover. It appeared everyone in Campletown had to jobs. I kid you not, when we arrived at our accommodation, the doors were shut and no one was around. Apparently there had been a death in Campletown and our hotelier was also the local undertaker!
Once we had got into our chosen hotel, 'The Rosemount' we were pleasantly surprised £18 each per night gave us a massive recently decorated room, with large 4-piece bathroom suite and a view over the bay to die for. (Excuse the pun). Excellent full Scottish breakfast the next morning too! Campletown was an eye opener, Palm tress in abundance helped by the mild weather of the Gulf Stream, excellent golf courses, hill walking and fishing country in crystal clear waters.
At the airport is an abandoned American base, with an entire small town of accommodation blocks, shops, pubs and such like, most of it built in the last few years and many of the buildings looking from the outside like Travelodges. Surly some developer could turn this into a luxury holiday resort as it is next to the sea, airport with a daily scheduled flight from Glasgow and 18 hole golf course.
Day two we planned to do 'The Black Bottle Challenge' a challenge where you had to land at Campletown, Tiree and Islay with a set number of hours.
We took off from Cambletown again on perfect sunshine, and routed to Tiree in a non direct route to take in Gigna, Colonsey and other islands. Two other aircraft were doing the challenge that day and were flying similar routes and about the same time. Tiree loomed up at us. This really is the perfect find and can only really be apprieated from the air. If you didn't know and looked out of the window at the white sand and blue lagoons and palm trees below, you would assume you were coming into land in Barbados. Tiree each year usually holds the national sunshine record for the UK. Again the airport was overkill - two brand new fire tenders, a fire boat and what looked like a dune buggy painted bright yellow which reminded Steve of the car the 'Banana Splits' drove in the early 70's kids TV programme. Having an aircraft land at this airfield again seemed a major event and everyone was out to meet us followed by a guided tour of the tower and fire station.
Next stop was the Island of Islay. We were meet by the manager of one of the local distilleries who presented us with our prize a bottle of whiskey each for completing the challenge. He then offered to show us the island and take us to one of the distilleries for a tour. Islay has seven distilleries and we went to the remotest in the North of the Island. After a full tour and another free bottle of whiskey each, he offered to drive us to our hotel in Port Charlotte.
Our hotel is in a small fishing village about 7 miles from the capital. The Port Charotte hotel specialises in fresh seafood and a gourmet meal was enjoyed by all.
Day three arrived with some bad weather forecast. We arrived early at the airport in heavy rain. However the weather was reported to be clearing from the North. As we were flying to Oban today, we should be flying into some good weather. At our request a British Airways Shorts 360 Captain who took off a few minutes before us gave a cloud base and vis report to us. 2000ft base and vis in excess of 8k. It obviously looked better up there then from the ground. We took off only to be met with an 800ft base and vis of about 2k. I had recently revalidated my IMC plus done 3 hours instrument practice only the week before so was confident to continue the flight. We tracked the coastline at 600ft to remain visual with the ground. Our VOR's were useless in this terrain.
 Steve checked the map and confirmed that we were following the coast with the island of Java to our left and at that time up to 3000ft above us. Something didn't seem right, yes there was an outcrop of land to our left but it had peeks at the same height as we were flying. That was not Java but the north part of Islay and we were now flying up an estuary. I immediately gave Steve our exact position and checked the map and route. We could continue on this heading and come out over the sea a few miles up. It would mean entering IMC to clear some ground of 1000ft and this is the course of action I chose. As soon as we were over the sea at 2000ft, the weather cleared and we were in perfect vis again.
Oban was soon spotted and we landed and met by the airport manager, who again couldn't do enough for us. A biz jet was also in owned and flown by one of the Schouder family who own Schrouders Bank. Oban is a perfect GA airfield, run by GA pilots. Oban the town however was something else! Although inviting from the air, the town is just one big tourist theme park aimed at coach holidaymakers. We ate in 'McTavishies' a seafront themed restaurant which came with pipers, haggis and kilts -try tried to hard to bring a image of Scotland which was nothing like what we had seen over the last few days.
Day four and the weather had closed in. Today we planned to leave and head back south. After waiting for three hours for the weather to clear, Paul the airport manager lent us his jeep so that we could go off exploring the countryside. At around 4pm, the weather looked better, we planed for the Isle of Man, then Blackpool. We were lined up on the runway when an aircraft that had taken off a few minutes earlier reported they were returning as a front had set in about 10miles south. We were stuck in Oban
for another night!
Day five, we were at the airport early. Weather better today. I opted to fly south at 6000ft on top of a layer of cumulus. After reaching the Campletown VOR the weather cleared and I was in bright sunshine all the way back via Isle of Man and Blackpool for refueling then Filton and Blackbushe.
What have I learnt from the trip. Well firstly any areas of high ground should be respected. Mountain flying does produce odd up and down drafts on an aircraft. The uselessness of VOR in this terrain and the ability to navigate by eyeball and map.
I would recommend this trip to everyone, Scotland as a destination for a short break is much more varied and challenging then most of the northern European sorties most pilots elect to do.
A free 55 minute video is availible, filmed by Channel 4. Simply email: harry@denford.flyer.co.uk
THE DAY I NEARLY KILLED A ROYAL
 Back in 1987, I had just recently received my pilots licence and had flown about 3 hours since passing my test; all local flights just around the Southend area. It was time, I thought to try a flight, which took me away from my local field. A very good friend was learning to fly at Leavesden at the soon to be bankrupt Donahue Aviation. She was about to go solo, so I agreed that I would fly one of my flying clubs, Cessna 152's from Southend to Leavesden and bring to bring her a present (a box of milk tray) as a reward for going solo.
I planned the flight, I would use ground features such as the A12 and M25 as route markers - Radio Navigation was all a mystery then, as it was not part of the PPL syllabus. Leavesden looked easy to spot from the air, after following the M25, then track north along the M25 and it is on the left.
My steed for the day was G-BKAC the oldest C152 in the Seawing Flying Club fleet. After a full pre-flight check and taxi I was soon climbing away from Southend in gorgeous sunshine on route for my first timed marker, which was over Chelmsford. I soon reached Chelmsford at 2000ft and everything was fine, my timings and headings were correct, it was a nice day, I could see the M25 up ahead and I had pre set the radio to give a courtesy call to Stapleford in about 5 minutes time. Over Stapleford at 2300ft I gave a courtesy call and was told of no known traffic to effect and continued the flight. After about 10 minutes I called Leavesden to get my joining instructions. No answer. I assumed I was out of range, then thought more about it and decided I could not be out of range at that height and tried again. Again, no response, so I checked the frequency, that was OK. The aircraft only had the one radio; it was that basic, so I changed frequency to London Information just in case Leavesden was not manned. A call was made and again no response.
It dawned on me that I had a radio failure, suddenly I had my first real flying emergency - or so I thought at the time! I decided I needed time to think on what the procedure I should follow was, so elected to use what I thought was the M25/M1 junction which was just ahead of me as a reference point. I put the aircraft into a slow orbit, while I decided my course of action.
I did a FREDA check, all seemed ok, obviously a radio failure is not life threating and I was not in any immediate danger. I had a choice now, should I carry on the short distance to Leavesden and land blind or return to Southend. Again where although I would land without a radio, I had as part of my training practised Southends loss of radio procedure - arrive over head Rochford Chimney at 1000ft and circle until the tower sends you a green light signal. Although it meant flying all the way back, I had loads of fuel so opted for returning to Southend. I thought my lack of experience would heed any attempt to land at an unfamiliar airfield such as Leavesden.
I continued to Orbit over the M25/M1 junction and set the aircraft up for the return flight. I put the radio failure code of 7600 in the transponder and as I was at 2300ft knew that I should remain at my last reported height for the return journey, especially as I would be over flying Stapleford once again. I decided that has I had not flight planned the return flight, I would be better for me to fly all the way along the M25 to Dartford Tunnel then up the A13 to Canvey Island and I would spot Southend from there. I also elected to enter the zone at Canvey, as I knew most flight cleared the zone to the north, so there would be less traffic.
I changed the frequency on the radio to 121.5, which is the emergency frequency to alert the Diversion and Distress Controller at Drayton. Even though I had no contact with the ground, at least they were aware of me and could move other aircraft out of my way. They would also alert an airfield along the route of a radio failure aircraft is in their facility.
Another quick FREDA check - to my horror of horrors, the fuel tanks where reading empty. Two things had happened in the last minute - I had lost all fuel via a leak - which I hadn't or the engine would have stopped or the gauges where not working. A look across at my low voltage warning light, which was now starting to flash, confirmed I have experiencing an electrical power failure.
I shut off all equipment, which I thought unnessarary at that time including the radio, nav lights and rotating beacon. I knew I wanted to save as much electrical power as possible to operate my main safety feature, my transponder that alerted the ground controller of my movements. I remembered that most light aircraft batteries must have a least 30 minutes of power after losing the alternator, which I assumed, was the reason for my power loss.
Then I noticed a smell, it was a slight burning smell, God no, please don't say I've got an electrical cabin fire, my lack of experience was now really going to get tested. I admit I swore then again gathered my thoughts and addressed the situation, immediately I dialled 7700 on the transponder, this was now a full MAY DAY emergency. I quickly glanced at the map, Elstree according to the map was just south of the M25 /M1 junction and so I decided to head down the M1. I pulled back the power and bought the aircraft down to 700ft. I really wanted to make an airfield, but knew if it did get worse, and by now the burning smell was getting worse, at least I only had to lose 700ft to put it down in a field. I flew down the M1, looking out of the left-hand window for Elstree as according to the map it was on the left. Nothing! Just lots of houses, I checked the map, yes Elstree should be there, it wasn't then I spotted the North Circular, I had obviously flown to far south, then realised I had made a big error.
The M25/M1 junction, I thought I had Orbited earlier was in fact the M25/A1M junction and I had just flown down the A1, so I had been looking out of the wrong window for the airfield. I needed to get out of this built up area fast - I could see the twin towers of Hendon Police training college ahead of me, I knew they had a massive open space as I was a police cadet there. This was the only large open space I knew, so thought that is where I am going to do an
emergency landing, especially as they had a windsock on site. Four minutes later I was over Hendon Training College at 700ft, the burning smell was still there but it had not got worse. In the distance I could see jets taking off from Heathrow and out of the corner of my eye, there was the runway at Northholt. I could make it; yes I really thought I could make Northholt. The pull of a runway was to great, so with some trepridation, left my emergency landing site and headed at full power towards Northholt.
I was shocked at the speed I arrived. I circled over head at 700ft, hoping that the tower would send me a green light signal to land. To my horror a red light was flashed at me, telling me to go away, do not land.
I was going to land, and they are properly not aware of the situation I am in.Then to my horror I saw a 146 aircraft had entered the runway and was positioned for take off.
Then the smoke started, shit I was on fire, only a small trickle of white smoke, which looked like a ciggerette trail, but it was enough to convince me I was getting this bird down now. I was down wind at this point and I could see fire engines and loads of green army trucks now on the runway. They were heading for the 146.
I opened my side window and the wind rush and noise was something quite unexpected. I could see the 146 starting to roll forward, I was going to take off, then it taxied left and stopped pointing at 45 degrees to the runway centre line.
They had stopped the 146 and I could now attempt a landing, I set myself up on finals, I had no choice I had to land long as the 146 was at the start of the runway. I applied flaps, nothing! Shit I forgot they were electrically operated. This was going to be a flapless landing while on fire with another aircraft on the runway. They didn't cover this on my trial lesson!
I approached the runway at about 90 knotts; I flew over the 146, then relaxed a bit, one problem sorted. I was still very fast, so pulled the power and shut down the engine. The propeller stopped almost instantly and I was still about 100ft above the runway. The only sound was the wind, which suddenly eased off, as there was now no prop wash. I raised the noise, speed dropped to 80kts, and the ground came up fast. I landed a perfect greaser. Applied brakes hard and pulled the aircraft off to one side of the runway, half on the grass and jumped out. The smoke was really starting to bellow out now after landing.
I could see loads of lights coming towards me, a Landrover was the first to reach me, I started running towards it but was told to stop and lay down on the floor. What was going on! Then another Landrover pulled up and two soldiers trained their guns on me. 'Lay Down' gain came the order.
'My plane is on fire' I shouted back, sort of half-standing, half knelling.I then got down on the floor as another solider came close and stood over me.
Check my back left pocket I shouted, I've got a warrant card, I'm a part time police officer, my plane was on fire'
An officer stood over me, and asked me to stand up slowly. A soldier checked my pocket and pulled out my warrant card, which he handed to the officer.
'Welcome to Northholt, Mr Denford, you gave us quite a fright and the boys at Heathrow'
I turned and saw a fire crew had completely formed the inside of my Cessna.
'Looks like you've had quite a flight - You are no doubt aware whom you just flew over on the runway. Princess Diana - that was her 146 who had to do an emergency abort on the runway.
'Shit!' I replied, I thought of the amount of trouble I was now in.
The officer then handed me his phone and stated that ATC wanted to talk to me urgently - boy was I in for a bollocking - or so I thought. I was instructed to go with the officer to ATC. I arrived and was met at the door of the tower by a controller, who surprised me by first shaking my hand and asking if I was alright - where was my bollocking for nearly killing a Royal.
Heathrow have been tracking you, and were getting worried about you entering their airspace and ours, we knew you had a radio failure but did not know where you where going or your intentions. I told him I had transmitted 7700 for MAYDAY, but that was never received by Drayton. The power must have been gone by that stage.
I told him what had happened and asked what sort of trouble am I now going to be in. I was relieved when he told me that obviously a full report must be logged, your actions as the captain would be commended, especially for such an inexperience pilot as me at the time.
He informed me that he was happy with my explanation and the misjudging of the M25/A1 junction was simply unfortunate.
I was then the guest of the station commander for the rest of the afternoon and had a first class lunch and tour, while the RAF checked over the Cessna. It turned out to be a short circuit, which was simply disconnected.
The flying club were informed and the CFI who was Instrument Rated drove down with a mechanic. The CFI would have to take it out of Northholt, as it was Class A controlled airspace.
A bit of fun at the gates, as the mechanic was refused entry to the base -he was Iranian! The CFI therefore had to accept the RAF authority that the aircraft was now airworthy and flew it back; I went back in the car with a very put out mechanic.
What did I learn from it - well I learnt I still hold the record for the only single engined civilian pilot to have landed at Northholt in it's history! I also learnt that I was always good airmanship to find out the radio failure procedure for any airfield you are visiting - by the way I also according to 'Flyer' Magazine hold the current record for radio failures in flight at seven. I found that calling certain airfields to ask what their procedure is has been met with some very blank responses, or they did not know their procedure! Yes, I now always carry a handheld!
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FLYING HIGHER THEN CONCORDE
The lady pilot who I had originally set out to see doing her first solo at Leavesden, in the last report was now a qualified pilot and wanted to take me on a flight from Biggin to Lydd and back. We landed the Cessna 150 at Lydd, had some lunch then as I flew it there, she was going to fly it back.
We lined up and Karen took off and climbed out passing 3000ft for 3500ft. She called Lydd and told them she was leaving their zone to the south.
'Golf - Lima Mike, be on the lookout for a Concorde, passing you left to right just below you', the controller replied
Karen turned to me and said, 'Did he just say Concorde'
'No don't be silly, he must of said Condor' and I convinced myself there was such a aircraft called a Condor'.
'Golf - Lima Mike, please acknowledge my last transmission' the Lydd controller repeated.
I took over the radio, while Karen continued the climb and acknowledged with 'Lima Mike will be on the look out for a Condor passing below. We can not see traffic at present.
'Negative, Lima Mike - you are looking for a Concorde passing below you - break Speedbird Concorde be advised my traffic is a Cessna 150 climbing above you to 3500ft'
Karen and I looked at each other in disbelief - What the hell was a Concorde doing in our airspace? Then Karen pointed out of the window and we saw the white shape of a Concorde flying in formation with a Spitfire, below us - It was a chance in a million position to be in as a pilot and Karen and I were the lucky ones that day. If only I had my camera! What a breathtaking sight!
I came back on the radio - 'Golf-Lima Mike - we have Concorde traffic passing below us now and what a suburb view it is from up here' Sorry we thought you said, look out for a Condor. It's a bit of a shock to realise it was a Concorde flying around at our level or in this airspace'
Then as quick as a flash, the Concorde Captain radioed, 'Lydd Approach could you inform the Captain of the little Cessna above us now, that not as shocked as we would be if we discovered him flying in our airspace one day at 50,000ft'
The Concorde was doing a photo shot with a Spitfire over the White Cliffs of Dover for a commemorative Stamp for 50 years since the Battle of Britain.
There are two great things I have had the once in a lifetime chance to experience as a pilot - this was one of them, a birds eye view of a flying Concorde and Spitfire. The other experience was landing on the Shuttle runway at Cape Canaveral and being able to accept radio calls like 'This is NASA, you are cleared to land' How good did I feel when I replied, 'NASA, this is November 179, cleared to land on Shuttle Runway'.
HOW TO SCARE A CAA EXAMINER
It was in the very late stages of my revalidation test at Manston. I had with me a CAA examiner, who like any flying examiner should be referred to as God!
It had been for me a very stressful test, not helped by the fact that I was not a happy man, as the PA28 I chose to take the test in had developed some weird flying angles in flight. I had been shouted at by the examiner for not holding course during the instrument flying section of the flight, and accused of flying one wing down. This I denied and confirmed that I had maintained course and flown straight and level. The discussion got to the stage, where I asked for the instrument flying section of the test to be postponed, as I could not see what I was doing wrong. As far as I was concerned, I was flying perfect on instruments. It transpired that their was a problem with the aircraft and after some discussion, the examiner finally agreed that with the aircraft lined up on the artificial horizon, the plane flew on wing low and to the left. He agreed to pass me on the instrument section and we both decided that the final part which was approach and landings, should be tested on a different aircraft as this one was obviously not well.
The examiner who was also the CFI elected to fly the plane back from the right hand seat, so that he could assess the strange wing down flying characteristics. The yoke was hard to hold in line with the horizon.
I was still not that happy and of course the examiner was not best pleased with the aircraft and our earlier mid air row.
He lined up downwind and was cleared as number one for landing. A shorts 360 had earlier reported long finals and was told he was number two to us on short final. We lined up on final called final.
The controller with some urgency in his voice suddenly told us to cancel approach and do one orbit to the right. The examiner, increased power, levelled off and started a right rate one turn. I looked around and shouted 'No!' and grabbed the controls from the examiner and put the aircraft in to a steep left turn' The examiner could then see what I saw, the controller had put us on a collision course with the 360 which passed by us at about 50ft.
 The controller immediately called the Shorts and told him that he had not been given permission to land and that he was number two to us. My anti-collision movement had now meant that we had no choice but to enter a live gliding site by pulling left. I passed control back to the examiner who now wanted blood! There then followed a very heated argument between the controller, the shorts captain and the examiner. The bottom line was the controller and the Shorts were blaming each other and although not funny at the time, the examiner was cutting in every now and then calling them both names and wanting to report everyone from the Shorts Captain's granny upwards! Referring to the Shorts Captain as that 'Van Driver' helped fuel the debate (Shorts 360's when treated with contempt are called flying vans).
By the way, I got a full pass as it was decided it would be unfair to test me on a possible landing emergency, when I dealt with a real landing
incident so well.
What have I learnt - well I studied the Trident crash at Staines when I was at Guildhall University which may have been avoided if the first officer questioned the captains, odd handling manoeuvre. We in the cockpit had the same scenario, two pilots not talking much, but this time I over ruled the commander, despite his experience and status, as I spotted the danger. I admit before studying the Trident Crash, I would have accepted that the commander, i.e. in this case an experienced CAA examiner would never allow himself to be in such a dangerous position. I think if I was a low hour student PPL I would have never have questioned the actions of any instructor, and therefore would not be here now!
YET ANOTHER CRASH
 Steve White who featured in my earlier report on Scotland, was going to accompany me on a flight to Calais from Elstree. At the time I had a 1/3rd share in a Grumman AA1, which any AA1 pilot will verify has unusual flying characteristics - I called it the 'Flying Egg Shell' It could be quite unstable in flight and required your full attention, a very lively little piece of kit!
She had just had her C of A, the bill was just over £3000, so was now in first class condition. She had three hours on the clock since that expensive and major overhaul and it was a perfect day for a flight to France. Steve who has since qualified as a pilot, was at that stage two hours into the PPL course so only knew some of the basics of flying.
All was fine; it was going to be a standard routing of Lambourne, Midhurst and Dover. About 15 minutes into the flight and at 2300ft, we were approaching our first turning point, which was the Lambourne VOR, which is next to Stapleford airfield. We were on track, and I was calculating in my head the estimate for Dover.
BANG! BANG! What the....! Two large explosions had happened up front and suddenly I was siting behind a large piece of cowling, in a state of mind shock! Steve turned to me, he said calmly, 'Are you OK?'
I just stared a head for a few more seconds, then snapped out of whatever trance I was in and I think due to addrelinin kicking in, pulled back the power to help with the vibrations, scanned the instruments, confirmed we still had power and were flying straight and level. I concentrated on getting the aircraft down as quickly as possible. Before the explosion, I could see we were very close to overflying Stapleford, so that is now where I was going to bring it down. I looked out of the window ahead; the cowling was blocking forward visibility.
'What's happened' Steve shouted across
'We've had an explosion of some kind, I don't know what but at least we are still flying' I replied. 'I am going to try and land at Stapleford, can you see ahead?'
'Yes' Steve replied, he remained calm, which was a Godsend, I would need his help if we were going to get out of this safely.
'OK, this is the situation, as much as I can access, I have full control of all flying controls and there appears to be no external damage to the flying controls. I cannot see ahead, so you will have to talk me down on to the runway, are you OK to do this'
'Yes' again came the reply.
'OK I'm going to Orbit, look out for the airfield, I'll do a May Day'
'MAYDAY MAYDAY MAYDAY Golf Alfa Yankee Hotel Alfa is a AA1 about two miles from your field, we are at 2000ft and have had a mid air explosion, request immediate landing, be advised that we still have power but limited forward visibility'.
Golf Hotel Alfa this is Stapleford, runway in use is 22, you have permission to land on any runway, wind 240 at 10. Confirm souls on board'
'SOB is two and we are full fuel' I replied.
Then the most unbelievable call over the radio, 'Golf Hotel Alfa this is Golf Charlie Delta, could you give a weather report from your height'
Steve and I both laughed, somewhat nervously, I could not believe the call and had to answer 'Sorry, we are a bit busy at the moment'
Then the controller reminded the outer aircraft to clear the airwaves, as there was a May Day.
I positioned myself over the runway at 500ft and called downwind. I could see the runway perfectly from the side window. Even on downwind, I had a perfect view of the runway, Steve started reading my heights and position from when I was downwind. Again his voice was relaxed.
On downwind I told Steve I was now fully flying on instruments and he was to shout out when I was lined up with the runway to turn finals.
I asked Steve if he would be prepared to try and land it, remember he had no real experience of landing an aircraft and no experience on landing a AA1.
 He elected to instead shout out directions and height and he will guide me down. I remember at one stage, I'm asking is there anything else he should do and I replied, 'Yes pray!'
It was a very odd and frightening experience, landing a plane with no concept of forward visibility. Steve did a sterling job, shouting left a little, on course, right a little, we got down to a bout 50ft before I could see the runway markers on my left. I pulled back power and raised the nose' when Steve said Flare now! He gave the command slightly too early and we floated down the runway, the wheels touched down and we bounced once before coming to a rest half way along the runway. We were down safely.
The fire crew arrived and on opening the canopy I was met with 'Harry, you old Tos*%er, how are you doing'
One of the firemen was someone who I used to take the pee out of while at college doing my commercial ground exams - he was now an instructor at Stapleford, and also in emergencies manned the fire tender.
The reason for the explosion, a rivet had not been replaced correctly during the Cof A.
I ADMIT TO THE FOLLOWING FLYING BALLS UPS
1. That I passed my Commercial Pilots Licence ground examination which covered VP propellers and still to this day - can never remember when the propeller should be positioned fine or course.
2. In the early stages of my flying training - I did not fully understand the concept of doing a fuel drain. My instructor showed me once, and so when I did it myself, I filled the fuel drainer up thinking it was all excess water - after about 6/7 drains - I reported the fault to my instructor who told me it was not excess water but fuel I was draining.
3. That while flying a large passenger C207 I may have slightly came of the runway and across a open field
4. That I may have once left a plane in France stating that there was no power and had a club machanic fly out the next day to find nothing wrong - I suddenley remembered that I may have forgot to switch the master switch on, the previous day.
5. That during the Scottish trip which was filmed for Channel 4, you see me do a perfect approach and landing at Blackpool - well done the film editor as what actually happened was I lined up and tried to land on the wrong runway.
6. That while doing my CPL ground exams, I sent most of the class to a quiet little pub near the university, called 'The Nags Head' knowing full well it was a strip joint.
SPECIAL MENTION FOR STEVE WHITE
My mate Steve White, who you read about earlier has recently joined the ranks of us proper pilots by completly making a pigs ear of a landing at Staverton in PA28 and heading off across the grass. Well Done Steve, Welcome to the Club!
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DID YOU KNOW Although comedian Harry Denford is now a qualified pilot he was actually chucked out of the police for having vertigo!
Harry always states if you can walk away unaided - then it was a good landing