The English Electric Lightning jet

[Music] [Music] in the 1960s at the height of the Cold War one aircraft became a potent symbol of British airpower this hugely powerful machine had one purpose and one purpose alone to intercept any aircraft that posed a threat to the United Kingdom's airspace the aircraft was the English Electric lightning the prototype of the Lightning first flew in 1954 but even then its future was uncertain because there was a school of thought that said you could defend the skies of the United Kingdom with surface-to-air missiles and not manned aircraft luckily the aircraft supporters won the day and the Lightning entered service in 1960 where it remained as the RAF frontline fighter for over 20 years despite the tireless work of lightning enthusiasts the UK aviation authorities do not currently allow lightnings to fly believing their maintenance demands are too high for civilian operators but there are no such problems in South Africa so I've come to Cape Town to meet a man who's devoted a lot of time and money to keeping lightnings in the air Mike beachy head Mike you're the founder and the chief executive of Thunder City here in South Africa you've got an amazing collection of aircraft here what's your interest in aviation how did this all get started Pelham Anson here the Sotheby's auction catalog on which the Midd we're laying off some older hunters and various other things you know it's like you get a bit of a rush of blood to the head and I said why not I mean you know every self-respecting family's ever been up to jet we amaze them some people have lightnings in their front yards you know and but they're not flying like this that's the difference isn't it very much so so if you're gonna do this do it property did go go big or go home and you know we ended up acquiring quite an amazing collection of airplanes all of them serviceable all of the Flyers hello people and realize it's not just acquiring an airplane I mean he actually can interplay for next to nothing but to integrate a system and skills and people and spares inventories and all that sort of thing behind it is the real challenge very lot of people say this could never be done but I think we put one over on him and looking at it where you say this could never be done looking at it you've got an amazing selection of aircraft here what's your personal favorite aircraft the diplomatic answer would be these are all such different aircraft and you find you aeroplanes of this genre or time with purpose built for specific tasks sky lightning is a supersonic high-level interceptor Buccaneer is a low-level nuclear strike attack airplane hunter as a fighter you know I particularly like the way that the Lightning looks I mean you've done a beautiful job on getting it back into this sort of condition well this is a particularly special airplane because it was the first lightning that we actually rebuilt it was it via ground up restoration and we'd started the restoration in England when the UK see air he poured a cold water on the ability to fly it out of there and a lot of great British engineers South African engineers who worked on this thing shipped it half around the world and rebuild reassembled and fluids hence you see it's called BBD big bad dog as its nickname what do you see at Thunder City as we've got to see the only three flying lightnings in the world in fact sometimes heartache but overall man it's been a good ride in many ways this is the iconic image of the Lightning - rolls-royce Avon engines stacked one on top of the other together they develop about thirty six and a half thousand pounds of thrust when they're in full afterburner lightning pilots often talked about the sheer power of the machine and looking at these two brutes you can see exactly what they meant the Lightning was a quantum leap in performance the climb rate the climb speed the climb angle what was stupendous almost as if somebody grabbed the world and pulled it away from you I will remember that my first ride in the Lightning my pilot was a chap called Jim jewel who was still flying today and as we climbed out this enormous oblique powerful airplane going up at a angle which I couldn't believe he's looked at me and he said young man you'll notice the only reason we have wings on the lightning is to keep the nav lights apart [Music] to protect NATO's airspace the Lightning's were ready to get airborne 24 hours a day 365 days a year at a moment's notice it was called quick reaction alert and from my experience in the Falklands and in the UK sitting on QRA most of the time it was just boring but every now and then the siren would go and you didn't know is this an exercise or is this the one for real you simply got up run to the aircraft and got airborne cliffs pinged found himself on battle alert in his lightning during the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974 I was battle won the primary battle airplane [Applause] alert horn went I went and Matt got into the aeroplane and much to my surprise the controller said alert one lightning we have six tracks coming down from Adana I rather glad to look over my shoulder and see my flight commander Henry pleasure jumping into the other lightnings and I thought well the odds are going to be slightly better we launched off proceeded to intercept some RF 84 from the Turkish air air force and they look pretty nervous as well I have to say because I'm sure they didn't know what our reaction was going to be in the end there was a criss crossing the skies of Cyprus were these quite small recce aeroplanes from Turkey with one of these latched onto it Quick Reaction scrambles in the UK led to some interesting encounters with Russian aircraft marauding into UK airspace as Peter Collins remembers if it was a cure a scramble the intention would be to get yourself into position where they knew you were there so that they were aware that they had been intercepted and they would know that this would happen and they were quite often relatively friendly dialogues if I can use that word between the two crews I mean you'd get the the tail gunner in a you know in a bison holding up a copy of Playboy or something of that kind or he'd be having a cup of tea and he give you two fingers [Music] these guys clearly had the time of their lives flying the lightning in the RAF now it was my turn for the full lightning experience first I met my pilot now you've stopped just give that tip Panhandle a tug for me this is you get a good idea you get the chance to do this see me beer I've done it I know I won't be needing to do that don't worry that won't be needing to do that [Music] [Music] though many people get a chance not only to fly a military aircraft but deploy fly something as unique as the lightning so this is what I'm looking forward to [Music] [Music] okay we got to go [Music] just waiting for it to stabilize they're bringing in one afterburner the afterburners in a speed is alive there you can see and you can feel that trust ok that's second off the burners in [Music] decide that prepare in Cape Town this is the English Electric lightning you have to see I'm gonna start already - 37,000 feet okay so we got a hundred percent power I'm being you one off the venturi let my shirt kick at this table okay I mean we have full afternoon you can feel the vibration we now supersonic just about you didn't believe that that's us traveling along happily at Mach 1 yeah I think people would expect that you'd stick to something more than ever that you'd hear a sonic boom yeah only on the girl [Music] going supersonic in the Lightning is really easy but slowing to subsonic speed without stalling the engine can be slightly trickier it's about a twenty liters a minute right and full dry the higher you go the this is just fantastic the lightning in your spare tire it's great the lighting is a wonderful piece of kit it's just starting to really the office coming on now you can see that there those are way up and you haven't gotten a yeah you can feel it [Music] [Music] so let me first this rate-of-climb outstrips many modern jets like mild aircraft the tornado it's hard to believe the lightning is over 50 years old no wonder it was the stuff of little boys dreams when it first appeared in the skies it's pretty much like the brush 3 you learn learns about tricky not slower yes makes it easier the trick with this airplane is a very subtiles which make it very difficult my gun had me run air brakes huh we've got three wheels we've got stone okay things different there's the shooter [Music] well what can you say about that that's marvelous really really fantastic I thought it would be YUM I don't know an older aircraft noisier cockpits a bit small but I think what stands out is the is there just the acceleration this it's just a brute it's a monster with two engines stuck on it to be honest awesome cause there anything else the Lightning is an important aircraft in the history of British aviation it was conceived in 1947 as the country's first supersonic fighter but just seven years earlier the RAF had been fighting a war with gladiator biplanes with a top speed of just 250 miles an hour it was an amazing leap forward and it was masterminded by Teddy Petter English electrics chief designer with engines mounted above each other had as design was radically different from other aircraft it also included some innovative engineering the whole idea in Teddy Peter design this machine was to have a minimal frontal cross-section everyone thinks because of two engines stacked like that's actually not actually stack one behind the other so if you like that one and a half engines incredibly clever and acting if you think this airplane can where's along at Mac two and it'd still be feeding in a slower air or subsonic air into the engines they don't get a compressor stored as amazing so flying an aircraft that's a 40 or a 50 year old military fighter it must be quite difficult to actually fly yeah well you know Sydney I don't find the handling characters deserve a plan at all actually read those so you know there's a bit of a myth about it's being called the frightening but he's also understand that we operate these things in Bey visual conditions hi different stories and poor guy in the 60s and shockingly bad weather out of Bend Brook with no fuel and no visibility and he's looking into a radar as an operational thing that becomes really really difficult it was an aeroplane that we could easily run away with you you had to be ahead of it and you not only had to be ahead of it in performance terms but it was a gas guzzler fuel management was absolutely critical you planned your sortie you had to know where you were in relation to your either your landing field or your diversion at all times you had to have one one eye on the fuel gauges I thought it was a great builder of captaincy in young men you had to manage that aeroplane from the time you started taxing so air-to-air refueling became the norm for young lightning pilots air-to-air refuelling was almost a daily occurrence for us the probe was fixed which did actually just slightly reduced the indicated airspeed limit by about 25 knots but the airplane was so controllable that when you sat behind you you really felt that the airplane was part of you and it it you felt it and even the smallest control movements the airplane would respond to and in a tanking which is essentially formation it was great although you couldn't see the end of the probe that was down to your left-hand side and when you first started you had to know that as you close down up to the wing and using the references on the wing and the pod but that would actually go in if you started to look you were lost it was a technique which sometimes was hard one but once you got it there was not a problem later versions of the lightning had enlarged fuel tanks in an attempt to extend the aircraft's range mark 6 with a much bigger ventral tank and this is one which is all fuel tank in some and certainly the ones we flew in Cyprus we had 230 millimeter cannons in the front of this assembly I remember speaking to American once and he said in a sort of a Texan draw he said only a Brit would put guns in a fuel tank toward the end of its career the lightning fulfilled a different role as it was adapted to a changing tactical threat Peter Collins was the station commander of a lightning squadron based close to the East German border our role became much more low-level we knew very well that just over the border were many of these Soviet forces in Germany air bases which were capable of mounting a low-level very fast attack against any targets within NATO lighting wasn't only very fast it was extremely maneuverable and a very good aircraft in air combat and we reckoned that we could cope with any threat that we perceived and we regularly practice these tactics against NATO aircraft of performance we knew very well that we could spammable from good as that unlike the ones from QA in the UK you knew very well that you were being scanned by enemy ground radars only a matter of miles away it kept the adrenaline level high we did regard ourselves to use the warm phase of as Cold War warriors it's great seeing these old aircraft again when I first joined the Air Force this was still flying and when I left in 1996 11 squadron which is this aircraft was my my last squadron is it's just great to see them it's a shame that we have got to be flying in the UK my time in Cape Town was coming to an end but there was just enough time for one last flight with Mike in the lightning [Music] [Applause] [Music] just raw sex appeal raw power she's such an touch you saying touch of the earth and there's no fly-by-wire to isolate you yeah you and everyone who's seen China in particular must be an ideal place to operate the sort of flying operation that you do well I mean apart from the fact we've got a great bunch of guys in the tower normally look at the airspace around you here free uncluttered sadda Haq density area and the south the tapes and of course next up Antarctica sir if Linda Powell as the yeah but Karen's mad at each other life [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Sutton's just setting of a takes out absolutely fantastic interview at 6000 feet it is wonderful oh they're top [Music] the English Electric lightning is an iconic part of British aviation heritage and it's absolutely fantastic to see flying examples preserved here in Cape Town South Africa so that future generations can enjoy its legendary speed and its power and its noise as I have here in the aptly named Thunder City

Channel: George Pollen

Views: 867,738

Rating: 4.8243046 out of 5

Keywords: The Lightning jet

Id: b-4wuvw_5GM

Length: 22min 22sec (1342 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 06 2017