advanced instrument flying, and formation flight. Students graduating from 2 FTS were considered suitable to transition to fighters, bombers, transports and helicopters. The instructors were still ‘Sir’ in the air, on the ground and in the bar, but there was some inkling that they would deal with us on more equal terms, and that there seemed a reasonable chance that many of us here would make the grade. Most instructors were content to be at Pearce: it was a stable posting with little time away that enabled them to bring up young families in generally good accommodation in a clean, warm city. Many enjoyed hurtling around in jet trainers with students who had survived the weeding out process at 1 FTS. Night flying was only one or two nights a week, and nearly every weekend was free.
The Macchi’s pilots sat in tandem on ejection seats under a long, boat-shaped canopy. The canopy was hinged at one side like a coffin lid. Except for instrument training flights the instructor sat in the rear, and his words over the intercom were the prime method of instruction; there could be no thumping the student on the arm or helmet here! The cockpit was air-conditioned, however the Macchi was of an Italian design, built for European conditions, and we would find that at low altitudes, the system was next to useless in the hot Western Australian skies.
Behind the cockpits was a fuel tank and behind that, the Rolls Royce Viper jet engine. The Viper sucked air through a small intake in the root of each wing, and compressed it into combustion chambers where it was mixed with fuel and ignited. The hot expanding gas then blasted out through a turbine and out a long jet pipe that comprised the interior of the rear fuselage. The turbine drove a shaft, which in turn powered the compressor, electrical generator and fuel, hydraulic and oil pumps.
An orange ‘spine’ on top of the white upper fuselage gracefully faired-in the canopy and ran down the fuselage’s length before curving up to join with the vertical tail fin. Raked tailplanes with square rear corners and sharp trailing edges sat at the base of the fin, with the jet’s exhaust below.
The Macchi’s wings were slab-like, their leading edges very slightly swept back, but the ‘trailing edges’ were straight, at right angles to the fuselage. The Macchi was not supersonic, but in a high-speed dive it could approach eighty percent of the speed of sound, where some ‘local’ airflows over parts of the aircraft would become supersonic, causing changes in handling and some vibration. Special flights in the training syllabus would be dedicated to exploring this regime. Those large wing-tip tanks, like elongated teardrops, provided extra fuel for the ravenous little jet engine. For us, the landing gear on the Macchi was special, because it was retractable; the consequences of forgetting this fact before landing was never far from most students’ thoughts.
There would be comprehensive ground training before we would be allowed to fly a Macchi, but the classrooms were modern and airy, reflecting the fresh feel of the base. The syllabus included the expected aircraft operation, jet engine theory, aerodynamics, air traffic control procedures, but there were extra dimensions: high-speed flight, the effects of high altitude on the human body and importantly, the understanding and use of the Macchi’s ejection seat.
We had worn parachutes in the CT-4. They were lugged out to the aircraft and strapped onto our backs prior to clambering into the cockpit. The aircraft’s canopy could be jettisoned should the machine become out of control or unable to be force-landed, and then a pilot would heave himself out of the cockpit and dive over the trailing edge of the wing, to manually pull the parachute’s ripcord and float to earth. However, in a jet, which could be conceivably doing 360 knots – or 660 km/hr – at over ten kilometres above the earth, bailing out in the air blast in a similar fashion would be a risky proposition. Force-landing even a small jet like the Macchi into a field would be almost suicidal, its approach speed and momentum would rip it apart on impact. A Macchi’s crew needed a safe and rapid means of escape from an aircraft that was, unless near an airfield, not capable of being force-landed safely. Especially at low altitudes, a fire or sudden control problem could be catastrophic and, likewise, a manual bail out would not be an option. At high altitude windblast, cold and the sudden lack of oxygen could render a pilot unconscious before he got to pull any ripcord. At any case, the high-speed airflow could tear his opening parachute to shreds. Therefore, the Macchi was fitted with the Martin Baker Mark 4 ejection seat.
The ejection seat can be likened to both an aircraft in its own right, and a loaded gun. Today most seats are rocket-propelled, however, this relic from the sixties used explosive charges to blast the seat up ‘rails’ and out into the airstream. A metal pan formed the base of the seat, which contained an inflatable dinghy and small survival pack beneath a thin, hard cushion, and this was what the pilot sat on. It had to be hard, because under the vertical acceleration of an ejection, any soft cushion could increase the potential for spinal injuries. A ‘gun’ attached to the seat structure fired it and its occupant upwards to clear the aircraft’s tail surfaces, which at high speed, could slice a pilot in half if he hit them.
The pilot’s back rested against another hard cushion behind which, level with his upper torso and head, was an inverted horseshoe-shaped brown canvas package crossed with a vee of white straps. This contained the main parachute. Two separate shoulder harnesses, straps of brown and blue, emerged from the centre of the horseshoe: one set for the seat, and the other to hold the parachute to his back. Another set of double harnesses formed the ‘lap straps’, of the seat and leg straps which looped around his upper thighs to support him under an opened parachute. A heavy round knob was the central point to which the complicated harness assembly was attached. Turning and giving it a sharp slap with the palm of the hand enabled the pilot to detach himself from aircraft harness and parachute.
Ejections, we found in the lectures, were basically of two kinds: the ‘pre-meditated’ ejection occurred in relatively slow time, perhaps after an engine failure at high altitude, the aircraft gliding, plenty of time to gather ones thoughts, adopt the correct posture (back erect against the rear cushion, head and legs back, elbows in) and to operate the ‘face blind’ handles. These handles, actually two yellow and black striped rubber loops, protruded forward from the top of the seat over the pilot’s helmet. After pulling a prominent T-shaped handle on the instrument panel to jettison the canopy, a vigorous tug downwards with both hands on the loops pulled an attached canvas ‘face blind’ over the pilot’s helmet and face, forcing his head back into the correct posture and providing a modicum of protection from the windblast to come. The last part of the movement would fire the explosives in the gun, propelling the seat up the rails and out of the aircraft.
However, loss of control, fire or engine failure at low altitude was another matter. With only a second or two to react in an ‘un-premeditated’ ejection, the pilot needed a quicker means to fire the seat: this was done with the ‘seat pan’ handle that could be pulled in a split second. This was a metal stirrup, again black- and yellow-striped, accessible in a hollow between the pilot’s thigh supports, not far from his hand that would still be gripping the Macchi’s control column. When used, there would be no protective face blind or optimum posture, but he would be almost instantly clear of an out-of-control aircraft, probably injured but at least alive. And the canopy? Two ‘canopy breakers’ protruded up like ears at the top of the seat. These would splinter the canopy and save valuable seconds in not having to blow it off beforehand; the pilot would just blast up through shattered Plexiglas, his helmet, its lowered face visor and his oxygen mask protecting him.
As the activated seat moved up the rails, straps called ‘bowyangs’, that were clipped around the pilot’s calves when strapping in to the Macchi, tightened and pulled his lower legs back against the base of the seat. These kept his kneecaps clear of the metal rim of the windscreen. They also stopped the pilot’s legs flailing in the blast of air.
Now the pilot, still strapped to his ejection seat, was out of the aircraft. What now? We learned that as the seat was fired up the rails,
