aspects of control of the aircraft: taxiing, take-off, climbing, levelling off, turning, cruising, following a heading, plotting the approach to land, descending and landing. If it sounds busy, it was: indeed, there seemed to be such an absurd amount to think about that I was always neglecting something. ‘Glance at the instruments,’ Sean would say. ‘Don’t gaze at them,’ as I became transfixed by, say, the needle of the altimeter, or the rev counter, or the air speed indicator, trying to get it to stay in exactly the right position. A helicopter pilot once told me that the kind of person who made a good flyer was someone who, while driving, could wash/wipe the windscreen, re-tune the radio and overtake simultaneously, without letting this in any way interrupt his conversation. I now saw what he meant. In simple ‘straight and level’ flight I had, simultaneously, to:
Keep the nose level so I wasn’t losing or gaining height.
Stick to within 4-5° of a given compass heading.
Maintain a gentle but continuous pressure on the left rudder pedal to counter the torque of the propeller and the effect of the slipstream it put over the right wing on to the fin, so that the ball remained central in the slip indicator.
Keep a roving eye on the engine temperature, rev counter, altimeter, and air speed gauges—not to mention regular checks of the fuel level.
Look out, continuously, for birds and other aircraft, and—most importantly—a suitable field for landing in case of engine failure.
This before I contemplated a manoeuvre. Fortunately, we did not have a radio, so I was spared having to keep the ‘tower’ informed of my actions in the dense and impenetrable jargon of radio-telephony.
The result was that it was never until the end of each lesson that I seemed to get the hang of it, only to find that the hour had pinged by and time was up.
Around the Tuesday a change came over Richard. It was just after he had taken his Air Law exam. Richard, like Lester, had a considerable head start on Dan and me. Having only recently acquired his Private Pilot’s Licence in Africa, the Civil Aviation Authority had declared that to be fully ‘legal’ he need only complete a cross-country flight in a Cessna to validate this licence, and then be ‘checked out’ in the Thruster. The one thing he had to do first, however, was sit and pass his UK Air Law exam, something I, too, had to do before I could go solo.
Accordingly, we had both been desultorily cramming the air law statutes detailed in CAP 85: A Guide to Aviation Law, Flight Rules and Procedures for Applicants for the Private Pilot’s Licence. CAP 85 was not a racy read. In fact, in both its tone and content it reminded me unpleasantly of my short and lacklustre legal career. It was full of sentences like ‘Pilots flying beneath TCA or SRA should use the QNH of an aerodrome situated beneath that area when flying below transition altitude.’ However, if we were to get our licences, then learn CAP 85 we must. So, at spare moments, we had taken to quizzing each other on such essential questions for the single-engined, non-radio daylight pilot as:
What sign does an aircraft marshaller make to indicate to you to open up your starboard engine?
What Secondary Surveillance Radar code on mode ‘C’ should be used by an aircraft in the event of two-way radio failure?
In level cruise, at the same altitude, at night, what does an anti-collision light together with a green and a white navigation light closing on you on a steady relative bearing of 330° indicate?
Committing the statutes to memory temporarily levelled our relative flying experience, though inevitably Richard was well ahead. The rules of aviation in the UK were not dissimilar to those in Africa and by Monday evening he had felt ready to sit the paper in Sean’s office. Naturally, when I saw him afterwards, I asked how it had gone.
‘How did what go?’
‘You know—the exam. Air Law.’
‘Oh that? Messed up a couple of questions.’
‘Bad luck. Do you have to do it again?’
‘No. You only have to get 70 per cent to pass.’
‘You got more than 70 per cent? What did you get?’
‘98 per cent. Stupid mistakes too.’
Gone was the shared ‘novices-at-this-absurd-activity-together’ attitude of before. Nor, over the rest of the evening and the following day, did it return. Outwardly, he was the same as ever, good-humoured, friendly, affable. Only when it came to matters of aviation was his tone altered. It had acquired a didactic note. Where previously he had responded to a casually inane remark about the Thruster being like a tennis ball to land with a sympathetic nod, a murmur of agreement and, perhaps, a close shave that he had had that morning, now he responded seriously, taking the opportunity to dispense some advice that might help me deal with my difficulty. It wasn’t that I minded, or that I didn’t think it was justified—I was happy to receive all the help I could. But we were no longer equals and, for the first time, I felt the chilly draught of my inexperience and the catching up that had to be done.
Having passed the exam, Tuesday afternoon was scheduled for Richard’s qualifying cross-country flight in one of the club Cessnas. He had been checked out in the morning by one of the club instructors, and by the time we went to lunch his superiority had reached a peak. The Thruster and microlighting generally now sounded a very poor relation indeed alongside the ‘necessarily more rigorous’ disciplines of ‘general aviation’. As, after lunch, he prepared his route, drawing lines, measuring angles, confidently turning the dial of his flight calculator as he filled out his flight plan, his involved and excluding air of competence made me feel my inferiority keenly.
‘Good luck,’ I said, as I went off for my lesson.
‘See you later, Antony.’
It was about five o’clock, after an extended lesson with Sean, that I next saw Richard. As I entered the clubhouse, there was the sound of raised voices. ‘What the fuck did you think you were doing?’ one shouted angrily. ‘Think how this makes the club look. “Leave it,’ said another. ‘This is for the CAA.’ Three figures with epaulettes on their shoulders were taking it in turns to berate an unhappy-looking fourth person—Richard.
Piecing together what happened afterwards, it seemed that Richard had filed his flight plan and checked out for departure in accordance with standard procedures. Taking off, he struck north-west. Unfortunately, it seemed that he had omitted to check the club notice-board for information about local events, or, once airborne, to change his radio from the Barsham local frequency to the area frequency, Norwich Control or RAF Marham. Oblivious, he had entered the Marham Military Air Traffic Zone panhandle, crossing the approach to the main runway as a pair of Tornadoes were on final approach to land. The RAF, anxious to know who was trespassing in their air space without contacting them at such a time, put out calls on both their own frequency and the Norwich frequency. They were unable to raise Richard, who was by this time circling overhead at Sandringham, an opportunity, he told me, that seemed too good to miss—but unaware that, with the flag indicating royalty in residence, this was prohibited, purple air space. Tiring of this, and still oblivious to the now considerable ground-efforts to contact him, Richard continued round the coast towards Great Yarmouth.
Further trauma was to follow as he crossed the approach
