Life of a Concorde Pilot E-Book

John Tye

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 629

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

John Tye's job at British Airways was supposed to be only temporary, a way for him to pass the summer before starting university. Instead, it would kickstart a forty-six-year career in aviation and take him all over the world. Told in an irrepressible and infectious style, Life of a Concorde Pilot is the story of how, despite a somewhat turbulent start to life in a Middlesex orphanage, John would go on to fly the world's only supersonic airliner. A true insight to the life of an airline pilot, with many amusing anecdotes along the way, it follows his ups and downs from his career on the ground at BA to flying with Dan Air and then back to BA, through to Covid and his reluctant retirement at the end of 2022. Full of the fascinating details only a pilot can give, this is a memorable journey to the edge of space and beyond.

Leseprobe

I dedicate this work to Mum and Dad, who have both departed this world for the next, but gave me the most wonderful upbringing since they adopted me at an early age.

I was born as a result of a secret, illicit affair in 1957 into an unknown future – a life that, without Ron and Erica, would have taken a completely different path. I’ve been blessed. I have a wonderful family and have had a glamorous, exciting and privileged career.

I hope that future generations of my family, and you, dear reader, will find this story inspiring, moving and, at times, amusing.

Cover illustration: Front: Concorde in Chatham livery in 1998. (Courtesy Adrian Meredith) Back: John Tye (Courtesy Rosie Maggs)

First published 2023

This second edition paperback first published 2025

The History Press

97 St George’s Place, Cheltenham,

Gloucestershire, GL50 3QB

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

© John Tye, 2023, 2025

The right of John Tye to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the Publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 1 80399 464 2

Typesetting and origination by The History Press

Printed and bound in Great Britain by TJ Books, Padstow, Cornwall

eBook converted by Geethik Technologies

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CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION

FOREWORD

1 THE EARLY YEARS (1957 TO 1976)

2 OUT INTO THE BIG WIDE WORLD (1976 TO 1987)

3 DAN-AIR (1987 TO 1989)

4 BRITISH AIRWAYS (SUBSONIC) (1989 TO 1998)

5 TO THE EDGE OF SPACE (1998 TO 2000)

6 BACK TO SUBSONIC FLYING (2000 TO 2022)

7 THAT WENT WELL

8 THE OTHER DELTA

9 WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

10 FROM THE ORPHANAGE (1957 TO 1959)

11 BEFORE THE ORPHANAGE

EPILOGUE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

PROLOGUE

‘3-2-1, now.’ Full power is produced instantly from four Rolls-Royce Olympus engines with 12ft flames leaping out of the back as the reheat ignites. The acceleration is phenomenal. A wisp of kerosene comes briefly through the air conditioning. The flight deck bounces up and down. I’m pushed aggressively into the back of my seat. Seconds later, ‘100 knots … V1 … Rotate.’

I’m airborne for the first time at the controls of Concorde, the world’s only successful supersonic airliner. It’s 18 February 1999. It’s sunny. It’s Seville, Spain. Thousands of people are clinging to the airport fence watching our every move. Three TV crews are covering us live on Spanish TV. It is, quite simply, fantastic.

How on earth did I find myself doing this?

A WORD FROM THE AUTHOR

I’m starting work on this in March of the year 2020. It feels as if the world is coming to an end. The sun is shining, but we have become used to expressions never heard before. ‘Self-isolating’ and ‘social distancing’ are not just common phrases, but courses of action being enforced upon society to prevent the loss of many lives. Coronavirus is sweeping across the globe killing thousands of people along its way. If you are reading this now, it will seem a distant memory and the human race will have survived.

INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION

Well, the human race did survive. Much else has happened in the world, though, since I started writing in March 2020 – some of it rather scary.

The first edition of this book was published in November 2023 to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the last ever Concorde flight. Twenty years. I can hardly believe it. It still seems like yesterday that I was at Filton, as a guest of Rolls-Royce, watching ‘Alpha Foxtrot’, the first Concorde I ever flew, turn gently over the Clifton Suspension Bridge before touching down majestically, like a swan on a calm lake, and confining supersonic airline travel to the history books. For the time being at least. You’ll read, in a few pages from now, how I was at Heathrow twenty-seven years earlier watching the world’s first supersonic commercial service take off, never thinking for one moment that I would play a small part in that incredible ‘Concorde Story’.

It took me three years to write the first edition. Not flat out, of course, but at home in ‘lockdown’ initially, and then in various luxurious hotels around the world, often in the middle of the night, as I cruised into the sunset of my most privileged career, flying Boeing 777s around the world as a Training Captain for British Airways.

Now settled into retirement, and having had some wonderful feedback from people of all ages around the world, I’m delighted to be launching this second edition two years later. I’ve added four more eventful chapters at the end, including tying up a few loose ends that I didn’t realise were loose. And writing for the first time about that other amazing delta-wing aeroplane, the mighty Vulcan bomber, and my privileged involvement therewith.

So, whether you’re an aviation enthusiast or someone who just enjoys a nice easy read that puts a smile on your face, welcome to the second edition.

FOREWORD

Sadly I never had the pleasure of flying with John Tye, as I retired (kicking and screaming) in 1992, some years before he joined the very special family that is the Concorde fleet. So I have only got to know him in the last twenty years or so, meeting at Concorde social gatherings at Brooklands or at the Royal Air Force Club. I realised from the outset that John was a ‘doer’, organising Concorde reunions at Brooklands (which bears comparison to herding cats!) and conducting video interviews for the archives with original crew members to capture their recollections of her entry into service.

Reading this book has simply served to confirm the impressions I had already formed about him. He is a very remarkable chap who has had to overcome many challenges in his life. His inspirational story is an example for any aspiring pilot who might feel discouraged by the obstacles that have to be overcome on the way. John exemplifies the determination necessary for success; obstacles are there to be overcome.

He tells his story with humour and reveals much about himself in the process, notably his compassion for the underprivileged and for those with disabilities, as you will see when you get to India with him or go flying with him on the British Airways Dreamflights. Above all, you will discover that he has had to overcome his own personal disabilities as well as various setbacks on his path to becoming a professional pilot, which I knew nothing about until reading this truly inspirational book. Having said that, I am sure he would be the first to acknowledge that he couldn’t have achieved all that he has without the support of his wonderful wife Lynne. The Tye family are a very close-knit team – as will become clear as you turn the pages.

For any young person dreaming of becoming a pilot this book is an absolute must. It has been a privilege for me to learn so much about John Tye, whose life ethic can be summed up in the motto of the Royal Air Force: Per ardua ad astra.

Captain John Hutchinson

1

THE EARLY YEARS (1957 TO 1976)

HOW IT ALL BEGAN

‘Look at his lovely blue eyes. Can we keep him?’ Allegedly the words uttered by two wonderful people in Sunbury-on-Thames as I lay in a pram in the sunshine in the summer of 1958. Erica and Ron took me in for a few weeks to give my foster parents a break. I never left them. Even at just a few weeks old, it was clear my legs were somewhat abnormal and there was concern that I might never walk properly. Forty years later, I was a Concorde pilot. How did that happen?

I never knew the full story of how I came into this world for another sixty years. I had a wonderful, stable, loving upbringing by Mum and Dad. I never knew them as anything else. Dad was an engineer with the Post Office, which later became part of British Telecom. Mum had previously worked at the BP research centre in Sunbury.

Karen had a tough start to her very short life. She was Mum and Dad’s only natural daughter, born on 4 July 1957. She spent most of her short life in and out of hospital before sadly passing away just six months later, before I came onto the scene.

How any parent can ever get over losing a child is beyond me, and I’m not sure they ever did. Some fifty years later, they were to go through the same dreadful ordeal again.

Lucille was the bonniest baby of the bunch and I took a shine to her straight away when we visited the Barnardo’s children’s home in early 1962. I was only about 4 and didn’t appreciate the responsibility at the time, when we went out to ‘choose a sister’ for me. It probably wasn’t quite as simple as that, with much paperwork and vetting undoubtedly going on behind the scenes, but when she was formally adopted on 17 December 1962, our family was complete.

Family photos show us all growing up happily together in the three-bedroom detached house in Lower Sunbury that Mum and Dad had bought from new in 1955. They never moved from there and it still stands, virtually unchanged, with a lovely family growing up there now.

Lucille and I were three years apart. Despite my leg deformities, I learned to walk and run fairly normally, albeit with some issues. We would play together in the lovely back garden, building camps and forts under the apple trees, with occasional squabbles like any brother and sister, but life was good.

Our family holidays, typical for the 1960s, involved an eight-hour car journey to the English Riviera: either Torquay or Paignton, Minehead in Somerset, or perhaps a slightly shorter expedition to Bournemouth. As a 5-year-old, one of my favourite pastimes was sailing my toy yacht on the boating lake by Goodrington Sands with Dad. Such wonderful days with those memories revisited whenever I see that same yacht stored carefully in our loft.

I remember making sandcastles, watching Punch and Judy, riding on the steam train, and when I was a little older, riding the bumper cars at the fair. That long journey to the far-flung West Country would take all day in our Morris Minor, Austin 1100, or by the early 1970s, wait for it, a Hillman Avenger. We would break the journey with a picnic halfway, more often than not sitting among the stones at Stonehenge, which you could do in those days. They weren’t fenced in until 1977.

Those early holidays were only some fifteen years after the end of the Second World War, but I was unaware of that bleak, deadly past. Our family had come through it largely unscathed. I knew little of Dad’s involvement in the war, but as I grew older I learned that it was something rather secret. Now that he has gone, the papers that I have unearthed reveal little. He was a signatory to the Official Secrets Act and was, through his work with the Post Office, an expert in ‘communications’. Sadly, he never spoke of it, but he was probably involved with Bletchley Park, communications in Churchill’s war bunkers or, more likely, secret radar development work with the Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE) in Dorset. That’s all I know about his secret work. I intend to investigate further in retirement.

As a goofy 5-year-old with a crooked fringe, I started my education at the local junior school, Manor Lane, later renamed as Chennestone. They were happy days and I made many lifelong friends. It was quite normal in those days for us to be walking to school alone by the age of 7 or so. It was a quiet fifteen-minute walk through a small residential area, so relatively safe, even by modern standards.

I remember the headmaster, Mr Turnill, being quite strict, but that was probably a good thing, and Mr Williams, the deputy head, was everybody’s favourite with a warm, friendly Welsh accent and a constant smile.

Our family home in Lower Sunbury was about 5 miles south of Heathrow, or London Airport as it was called then. As I write, the debate over a third runway at Heathrow is still ongoing and is likely to be for many years to come. When I was a youngster growing up, starting to develop an interest in those various flying machines of all shapes and sizes, London Airport had six runways. When the wind was blowing from the north-west, the inbound traffic would come right past my bedroom window as the planes made their approach to Runway 33L. Those cross-runways have long since been decommissioned to make way for new terminal buildings and cargo sheds.

Dad was a genius. Keen to support my developing interest in aviation, he built me a very clever piece of equipment. A small box with plywood sides and a couple of knobs on the front could be placed next to a normal transistor radio and it would convert the VHF receiver to a higher, air-band, frequency so it could pick up the communications between the control tower at London Airport and the inbound pilots. I’d spend many hours in the early 1960s sitting in my makeshift control tower guiding the aircraft safely in.

Constellations, DC-3s, Argosies and various other slow, noisy aircraft were commonplace, some with nearly as many vertical fins as propellers. As time went on, the BEA Vanguards and Viscounts gave way to the BAC 1-11 and then the Trident and intercontinental VC10 and Boeing 707. We would often have a wonderful day out to Heathrow taking the bus to the central area and watching all the movements from close quarters on the roof of the late Queen’s Building.

My fascination for aircraft was firmly established by the time I was 6 in 1964.

Dad was very strict with me and did his best to keep me from going off the rails as I grew up. A challenge at times I’m sure, but I’m so glad he did. He was very intelligent himself and excelled in all things mathematical and electronics based. My air band radio receiver was just the start. By the time I was 8 I had a full set of Meccano and we would spend hours together inventing and building no end of clever things. The most memorable was a triangular-shaped robot with two electric motors. We made sensors out of hinged pieces of metal that, when activated, would turn the steering and set the robot off in another direction. This thing would wander around the lounge for hours and every time it bumped into the sofa or a wall, it would set off on another trajectory. If we’d thought to turn this technology into a lawnmower or a vacuum cleaner we would have become millionaires.

My train set won Dad many awards, not for its breathtaking realistic scenery, because there wasn’t any, but for its technical wizardry. It was built, by both of us, of course, upon a 7ft × 5ft sheet of hardboard, which when not in use, could be stored against my bedroom wall. There were switches, diodes, resistors, transistors and many other electronic components all joined together in a logical order to make things work. I learned how to solder by the time I was 9, and how to hide burn holes in the carpet soon thereafter.

The trains would ease out of the platform on schedule, with plenty of empty seats in those days, and make their way around the board, their engines pulling hard to get up the hill to the second level. The centrepiece was a crossroads where two main lines crossed. Sensors would detect an approaching train, activate signals and the associated red light on the other line would bring the conflicting locomotive to a halt, thus averting disaster. It was all very clever and much more than a toy train set.

Dad would spend hours with me, particularly once homework accompanied me home from school. I’d have to sit at the table in the lounge with the TV off and work diligently until it was all done. If I had any problems with maths he would patiently explain it all to me. He would turn anything and everything into a mathematical problem to solve. I think of Dad often when I’m doing the same with my adorable grandson, Harvey. Being a typical boy, as I got older I got lazier, and homework became such a bore. Once I was shut in the room alone, I’d often put the TV back on quietly and sneakily catch up on the comings and goings in Z Cars or Dixon of Dock Green, the latest ‘cops and robbers’ shows. That was until I got caught! A severe telling off followed and the fuse was removed from the plug for the TV. Oh well, back to the homework.

Dad invented a computer.

The computer was, again, built from bits. There were things called relays and valves, many of which were to be found in telephone exchanges in the 1960s. Funny that. He laid them out on a board and, using an old basic keyboard, connected all sorts of electronic components together once again. When it had warmed up and the valves were glowing orange inside, you could get this ingenious device to do calculations for you. It was an early-day calculator but certainly not of the pocket variety. Dad was my hero because he could build and invent things and nurture the imagination of his young son.

Dad was a quiet, introverted chap – a boffin type really. He was very active in St Mary’s church in Lower Sunbury and set up their first PA system, often tinkering with it mid-service to ensure the best sound reproduction, much to the vicar’s frustration.

Hi-fi, as it was known then, was his other passion. He would listen to classical music and I still have an original wind-up gramophone with a fold-out horn on it, that he inherited, which must date back to the early 1900s. The sound quality is dreadful. Dad was what we might call a perfectionist, and over the years, he strove to achieve the best sound production from his equipment.

By 1972 he had conducted much research into sound waves, frequencies and amplitudes, resonance and materials to build loud speakers. Our lounge was transformed into a workshop.

A trial single corner-shaped 6ft tall monstrosity emerged several weeks later and, as a family, we were presented with an incredible sound from this unique speaker. This was rather like 001 in the Concorde assembly line though, a pre-production prototype. After much tinkering and even more research, Dad disappeared back into the workshop again. The lounge was, once more, out of bounds. This time special tools were bought. If he couldn’t get what he wanted he would make it. Jigs and clamps filled the room and the smell of glue was overpowering at times. Eventually, two enormous wooden cabinets emerged, each 83in tall, 16½in wide and 12in deep. I know that because I’m sitting in front of them today listening to Dire Straits as I write, nearly fifty years after they were built.

Even to this day you’ll struggle to find a better natural sound reproduction. The secret is in the piping inside. They are called transmission line speakers. Dad wrote a detailed technical article about how he had developed this technology across two editions of Hi-Fi Monthly in the autumn of 1974.

Around 1976 I became friends with the bass guitarist with Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, Colin Pattenden. He certainly knew much about LOUD speakers and accurate sound reproduction. He was fascinated by my tales of what Dad had built and came around for a demonstration. Colin thought about the commercial opportunities for such a wonderful piece of furniture that reproduced music to the best quality imaginable. It wasn’t long before we had a couple of Japanese gentlemen from Sony in our lounge for a demonstration. Perhaps this invention would make us millionaires even if the self-driving lawnmower principle had passed us by.

It wasn’t to be as they weren’t suitable for mass production. They agreed that the sound quality was better than anything else they produced at the time, but they were far too specialised to take their interest any further. They remain unique and very special to me. They are enormous and some might be as rude to say an eyesore in our small lounge. My wife, Lynne, is most understanding.

In those days we didn’t express our feelings and love for our parents like we do now and it wasn’t until much later in life I told Dad how much I appreciated all that he did for me. If he hadn’t inspired me, shown me all these clever things as a child, been strict with me and made sure I did my homework properly, I wouldn’t have been in Seville in February 1999, counting backwards from three.

When he was an old man, inspired by the Mike and the Mechanics song ‘In the Living Years’, I did hug Dad, told him I loved him, and thanked him for everything he had done for me. He died three days after the Concorde crashed in Paris on 25 July 2000, the 114th (indirect) victim of that dreadful accident, as I’ll explain later.

Lucille was growing up three years behind me. We got along well most of the time but, of course, being from totally different natural backgrounds, we lacked the bond of blood siblings.

We had lovely neighbours in Sunbury and Mark next door was a similar age, as were Peter and Elizabeth three doors away.

Their dad, who we called ‘Uncle Jack’, was another hero of mine. He had a garage full of tools and lathes and would make all sorts of things to amuse us. Pedal cars and go-karts would emerge from his workshop after many late nights and much noise. Jack worked at a place called BAC Weybridge, which I didn’t know much about, apart from the fact it had something to do with aeroplanes. As I got older I learned more about what went on there and what he actually did. During the 1960s they were building a new supersonic airliner. Apparently Britain and France, which I learned was a country not far away on the other side of the Channel, were working together on this new invention. It was all very exciting and much of it was being built at Weybridge, just a few minutes’ drive from our home. Jack was very involved in the design and development of the electrical system for Concorde. Who would ever have thought, that, forty years later, I’d be moving switches and sending ‘wiggly amps’ through those very electric cables as I piloted that supersonic marvel. Once Jack retired he continued as a volunteer at what was by now Brooklands Museum. He helped maintain the VC10 and Concorde once she was exhibited there. It was an honour for me to see him, late in his life, enthralled by my tales of flying the very aircraft he helped design and build.

SCOUTING FOR BOYS

Robert Baden-Powell took some youngsters camping on Brownsea Island in Dorset in 1907. It was a great adventure and the following year he wrote a book, Scouting for Boys. In 1910 he left the army and founded the Boy Scout Association. I joined the 1st Sunbury troop, which had its headquarters in a converted school building in Lower Sunbury. It was the making of me. I joined just before my time at Chennestone finished, aged 10, and made many more lifelong friends.

We would meet once a week, on a Friday, and dash to catch last orders at the local fish and chip shop when we finished. We would go camping, learned to cook on open fires, build large structures out of wooden poles and ropes and have sports days and trips away. We would earn much sought-after badges as we qualified in first aid or orienteering, whatever that was.

I went on to become a patrol leader and by the time I was 15, I was developing my management skills keeping the young brats, I mean Scouts, in order and leading a team of six boys, pitting our skills in various games or competitions against the other patrols.

Our Scout Leader was a wonderful inspiration to us all. As we trod the delicate path into our teenage years, Ray had the perfect balance, keeping us in order, while letting us spread our wings and learn some valuable life skills along the way. Ray was sadly taken from us prematurely in his early 50s with that wicked motor neurone disease (MND). It was dreadful for us to see somebody who was so fit and energetic slowly waste away.

Before Ray lost his battle with MND he led us all into the grown-up Venture Scouts, now renamed Explorers. Our trips away became more adventurous with minimal red tape and bureaucratic hurdles. We would go camping and potholing in the Mendip Hills in Somerset and mountain climbing in Snowdonia. Lulworth Cove was another popular destination and by the time we were 16 or 17 we had our own cars or motorbikes and would often travel down to Dorset in convoy after school on a Friday night. I drove a white Hillman Imp by then and anybody taking a lift with me had to share my taste in music. I had one cassette tape, Bad Company by Bad Company. All the way there and all the way back.

One of the highlights of the summer of 1975 was the First Sunbury Venture Scouts expedition to Corsica. We travelled by train and ferry to this beautiful French island in the Mediterranean, arriving at the picturesque port of Bastia, on the north-east corner.

We set up camp locally and made final preparations for our assault on Mount Cinto, the highest on the island at nearly 9,000ft/2,700m. I’d found Snowdonia a bit of a struggle, partly because of my leg issue, and this was three times as high.

It was wonderful walking through the foothills in the sunshine. We hardly saw anybody along the way but found it difficult to suppress a fit of giggles one afternoon when we passed a German couple going the other way … completely naked.

We set up camp each night in the hills and had a lucky escape one night when a team of noisy pigs came charging and foraging through the campsite. They ripped the tents apart, eating anything they came across but we’d had the experience and foresight to tie our food high up in the trees, so they passed the 1st Sunbury troop right on by.

As the air got thinner and the going got tougher, the group started to spread out a bit. The more energetic were striding ahead, while some of us were hanging back somewhat, with enthusiasm waning slightly. We were by now 18 and some of us had discovered beer, cigarettes and women.

The weather started to deteriorate with heavy thunderstorms forecast for the next few days. A planning meeting was called and we decided to split the group into two. The keen mountaineers would push on for the summit while the less energetic group would head back down and make for the west coast town of Calvi. We agreed we would meet there in a few days’ time. As a former patrol leader, it was agreed that I had suitable leadership skills to steer our party downhill to safety on the coast.

We arrived in Calvi, found a suitable campsite and set up home. All we had to do now was to enjoy ourselves until the serious mountaineers returned. In between the showers the beach was lovely, the bikini-clad women even more so, and the beer was French and chilled.

Early one evening the heavens opened. The campsite was awash. The tents and most of our belongings were soaked through. I made an executive decision to lead the troops to safety. We abandoned the campsite and took minimal possessions into town. The lads looked upon me for leadership. I didn’t disappoint.

We found a local hostelry that looked particularly welcoming. It had a red frontage, steps that led down to a bar area, and it was quite bustling for an early weekday evening. There were many friendly locals in there who found our arrival fascinating. The water from the torrential rain was flowing down the steps, so we had to roll our trousers up and keep our feet up on the chairs. The beer was quite expensive, but any port in a storm. Most of the clientele were young ladies but gentlemen of various ages and backgrounds came and went during the evening. While we thought we were worldly wise, in fact we were still quite young and naive and it was quite a while before this former patrol leader realised that he had managed to lead the 1st Sunbury Venture Scout unit to the local brothel.

I was introduced to motorcycles at the age of 16.

In fact, mopeds were all you could drive at that age, with a maximum 50cc engine size and a governed speed of 30mph. They had to be fitted with pedals that gave credence to the definition of moped. ‘A small type of motorcycle equipped with bicycle pedals’ was vague enough for the likes of Yamaha to produce the best-selling FS1E. They were quite expensive and several of my friends were treated to them by their generous parents. With their metallic yellow fuel tanks and distinctive exhaust scream they were the babe magnets of the day.

I saved up my pocket money and bought an old Raleigh Runabout, which was much more of a bicycle with an engine, rather than a motorcycle with bicycle pedals. It was bright red with matching leg shields to protect you from the bracing wind at 29mph. The Post Office delivery riders had used them in the post-war years. It cost me £16 and I loved it. I was proud that I bought it with my own money too. Dad let me keep it in the shed at the end of the garden as long as I was careful and always closed the door. It was part shed and part greenhouse, and Dad’s tomatoes were a delight to behold.

I had just turned 17 in the December of 1974 and had secured a part-time job as a banqueting porter at the local Elizabethan Hotel. I was invited to the staff Christmas party and now old enough to drink. Or so I thought.

Mum and Dad didn’t drink. I’d seen them have a drop of something called ‘whisky’ every now and again, so as that’s the only thing I’d heard of, I ordered one of those accompanied by something called ‘American’, which was supposed to dilute it and make it last longer. The drinks were subsidised, so very cheap. The more you drank the more you saved. I’d never experienced this strange feeling that slowly enveloped me but it was all rather pleasant. All right, I might have had the odd drop of cider or beer somewhere.

It was a Sunday evening and house rules were such that I had to be home by 10.30 p.m. on a Sunday. Fridays and Saturdays were more lenient with a 11 p.m. curfew and occasionally 11.30 p.m. for birthday parties or similar. Barely able to read my watch by now, I realised that I had to get cracking to get home in time. It was only about a mile to get home so what could possibly go wrong?

The magneto on my moped was getting a bit tired, so starting it was a real palaver, particularly on a cold December night. You had to pedal this thing round and round the car park to get it fired up. My balance wasn’t too good for some reason, perhaps the cold air was getting to me, and I fell off a few times. It didn’t hurt though and my good friends helped me out. They took turns pedalling it around until it fired into life and I was ready to get going. They even helped me on with my crash helmet and my imitation leather biker’s jacket. I was all set to go.

It was a quiet lane that led up to the road home so I took it very carefully. Once in the hedge though, I had the presence of mind to make sure I didn’t stall the engine knowing that my support team were now back in the bar and I certainly wouldn’t be able to get this thing started again on my own. Keeping my right hand working the throttle then, I managed to free myself from the brambles and get back on my way. I was somewhat concerned as it must have been getting close to 10.30 p.m. by now.

I followed the road successfully, made the left turn OK into The Avenue, but our house was on the right, so this was going to be a challenge. Look, signal, manoeuvre was the order of events I’d been taught in my training, but it was the simple act of turning my head to look over my right shoulder that was my downfall. Perhaps a gust of wind had caught me at the crucial moment but I was fairly comfortable leaning against the fence of the house opposite ours having safely mounted the kerb and crossed the verge and pavement without any obvious damage. I was getting the hang of this now, but with the end in sight and success just about in the bag, I decided, most wisely, to push it from there. The entrance to the shed was only just wider than the handlebars so, under normal conditions, I’d stand behind the moped and walk it carefully in. This wasn’t normal though and I must have stood behind it and flung it the rest of the way. Oops!

I’d hoped the sound of the glass smashing wouldn’t be heard in the house and I could at least avoid the inevitable conflict until the next morning.

Nope! Dad was there to meet me as I staggered somewhat inebriated back down the garden path. ‘Somewhat inebriated’ was perhaps a bit of an understatement.

I was braced for an absolute rollicking, but all he said was, ‘I hope you know you’re going to have to fix that tomorrow,’ or similar. All very reasonable under the circumstances.

I’ve never touched a drop since, of course. In actual fact, I couldn’t stand the whiff of whisky for many years. I was bought a nice bottle of something special for my 60th and am working on it slowly and very carefully. I’ve seen what it can do to you if you’re not careful.

Our group of Ventures, as we were known, all had bikes of some sort and once we turned 17 it was time to move up to mightier machines. Triumph Bonnevilles and Norton Commandos alongside big Suzukis and Kawasakis. Little old me saved up and bought a 1965 Honda 160, the smallest of the chapter.

Talking of ‘chapters’, the Richmond Hells Angels were a smashing bunch of young men. Yes, they looked pretty scary in their filthy, greasy jeans, big boots and leathers with their ‘colours’ on the back, but they had some wonderful motorcycles. With their Triumphs, BSAs, Royal Enfields and other great names, and with extended forks, raised handlebars and amplifiers instead of silencers, they sounded like a squadron of Lancasters as they cruised down the road. Every weekend in the summer they would gather on the island in the river in Sunbury. Us junior bikers would look up to them in awe.

We would drink cider in moderate doses. I’d learned one lesson already about drinking and driving. We’d smoke Players No. 6. They were the cheapest at the time and came in handy packets of ten. The Angels would sometimes smoke some other funny-smelling, home-made cigarettes, which were clearly rather precious as they had to share them around.

They were armed, of course, but only with fairly harmless bike chains and axes. The stories of sawn-off shotguns were clearly an exaggeration of the facts.

Around this time the charitable nature of the Ventures was coming out more. We organised Friday night discos to raise money for our Scout group. The headquarters building was very old and vital maintenance was coming up. We wanted to do our bit to help. The discos quickly became legendary and sold out quickly. This was good news but brought with it inevitable trouble. Gangs from as far away as Feltham would appear on fleets of Lambretta scooters and fights would break out. It wasn’t pretty but our friends from the Richmond Chapter were keen to provide security for us and peace was quickly restored. Their visual presence was all that was required and our fundraising efforts continued enthusiastically. Not once was an axe or bike chain used in anger.

A group of us paid a total of just £8 for a BSA Bantam. A bargain between three of us. I’m not quite sure how we divided eight by three, but Dave (Spec), Pete (Kraut) and I bought it between us. We all had nicknames in those days and weren’t sure where most of them came from. This rough and ready motorcycle certainly wasn’t roadworthy and at 15/16 years old we certainly weren’t either. We kept it tucked away behind the Venture Scout hut, an educational engineering project, you understand? It had no mudguards, number plates, lights or much at all really apart from a noisy 125cc engine and some dodgy brakes. We would take turns riding it over the gravel pits behind the Scout hut. We didn’t have a helmet or a pair of gloves between us and, as it was a single-seater, those not riding would keep guard at the end of the road in case the police came along. Quite what we would do if they ever did, we weren’t sure.

I lost control of this beast as I went through a ditch, up the other side and through an open gate into the adjoining school field. An immediate left turn was then required and that’s where it all went wrong. The right handlebar struck the solid concrete post a split second after I’d taken my hand off it. My unprotected head continued its path and I hit the post just above my right eye.

The blood started to flow but I wasn’t badly hurt. My main concern was how to get the bike back. The throttle cable and brake lever were hanging off and the handlebar badly bent. Scouting had taught us initiative, so I found a way of riding it back with the throttle cable wrapped around my right hand. The others had scarpered by the time I got the damaged machine back to the pits and I couldn’t go home in this state, so I hid the bike and went to Nick’s house nearby. He had really cool parents. I wouldn’t get such a telling off and his mum used to be a nurse so I was sure she could fix me up and nobody would be any the wiser.

‘That’ll probably need stitches,’ said Nick’s mum.

Luckily it didn’t though; she was able to patch me up herself and by the time I got home I’d come up with some kind of tale about falling off my bicycle and hitting my head on a brick. The scar is still there today, mostly hidden by my right eyebrow.

EVENTFUL DAYS AT BIG SCHOOL

While all this Scouting for Boys was going on, my secondary education was progressing. I took the 11+ entrance exam and secured a place at Hampton grammar school, something I wouldn’t have done if Dad hadn’t taken the fuse out of the telly and made me knuckle down.

I started at Hampton in September 1969. Concorde had flown for the first time in March of that year and the Americans had landed a man on the moon in the July. Colour TV was just catching on for those who could afford it and appreciated BBC2, the first channel to broadcast this latest technology.

I had a new school uniform and was soon allowed to catch the bus on my own, changing at Hampton Station or walking the last mile if I missed the connection. I soon made new friends as most of my contemporaries had moved to the brand new Bishop Wand secondary school in Sunbury.

In September 2019 we were invited back, fifty years to the day since we had first walked down the long central drive at Hampton towards the imposing tower. It was wonderful to see old friends again and meet the new boys who were wearing the same uniform for the first time that day. None of us had changed in that time of course. I created a bit of a stir by wearing my school uniform, not the one I started with as an 11-year-old, but my sixth form outfit, which was only 44 years old. The black flared trousers were a little snug and the blazer tugged slightly but it went down well. In fact, it was the only time I ever made it into the school magazine.

Hampton was a good old-fashioned grammar school in those days, open only to boys who had passed the 11+. In the mid-1970s it changed to a fee-paying establishment and, as we saw on our recent return visit, has expanded significantly, with state-of-the-art facilities, creating tremendous opportunities for the boys.

We worked hard and played hard. The school had a long sporting history, with boys excelling in rowing and rugby in particular. My legs were quite strong in those days but my ankles were weak. The calf muscle in my right leg, in particular, was abnormally large, but my toes lacked strength and movement so my balance was poor. I couldn’t run well even though a few laps of the enormous school field were compulsory on games afternoons. I fell over frequently and was always last. Sport wasn’t for me.

Academically, I did OK. Maths, physics and geography were my A-level subjects and I achieved sufficiently good grades to be offered a place at City University to study Air Transport Engineering. I didn’t go though.

The school Combined Cadet Force (CCF) was also the making of me. I joined the RAF section and was kitted out with a pair of very itchy and heavy wool trousers and a blouson, and black lace-up boots with toe caps that had to be polished to within an inch of their lives. Parade was a very disciplined affair on the school playground.

My interest in aviation flourished during this period of my life. I didn’t like people shouting at me and making me march around the tarmac in all weathers, but I did like the idea of going flying. The school even had its own glider, armoury and shooting range.

The glider was fun, a very early single-seater that was launched by a bungee, rather like a large and powerful rubber band. It had spoilers fitted to the leading edges of the wings though to ensure it didn’t get completely airborne. The wings would generate just enough lift to permit a short hop across the ground at an altitude of not much more than 3ft. We learned about the principles of flight and put into practice what we had learned in the classroom.

I definitely wasn’t one of the group who found how to remove the spoilers and fly the thing over the fence into the girls’ school next door, but it did happen. Once.

GETTING AIRBORNE – 1

My first flight ever was in a Chipmunk at RAF Benson sometime in the early 1970s. I remember not liking the smell of the rubber face mask and not taking too well to aerobatics, but having never even flown as a passenger in an airliner, it was wonderful to be airborne for the first time and look down at life in miniature beneath us. I took the controls and we played around the puffy white clouds and swooped low across the stripy fields, but all too soon, it was over. I was hooked though.

GETTING AIRBORNE (ALMOST) – 2

I had crashed the hovercraft into the bike sheds. Oops.

Wednesday and Friday afternoons were dedicated to games. As I’ve already explained, I really didn’t take to any of these outdoor sports. I couldn’t run without falling over. My legs were unstable and, to be honest, I was quite lazy. I stood on the boundary fielding in cricket a few times, but was never going to make a name for myself there. I spent much of the time watching the aircraft landing at Heathrow instead of the path of the ball. When the wind was in the west and they were landing on 28L, the southerly of the two runways, they would pass just over a mile to the north of the school field. I missed a few catches because I wasn’t paying attention, but was watching these new enormous 747s coming in from all around the world.

The hobbies section of a local dairy, of all places, had started on a project to build a single-seat hovercraft. They had given up and kindly donated the box of bits to the Hampton Grammar CCF. My good friends, Graham Marley and Rob Brook, joined with me to form the Hovercraft Restoration Club. We were given special permission to work on this instead of doing games. We were in our element.

The bright-yellow chassis was intact and fitted with a sturdy red rubber skirt, unlike the girls at Lady Eleanor Holles school next door, who were gaining our interest around the same time. The box of bits included two chainsaw engines and various drive belts and fans.

The target was to have this thing working in time for a star appearance at the school open day at the end of term. We used bicycle brake levers mounted on a joystick for throttles, one for each engine. The first engine powered a downward-facing fan, which filled the skirt and lifted the craft off the ground, while the second engine drove the other fan, mounted facing rearwards behind the pilot, to provide forward thrust.

I set off on the first test flight late one afternoon on the grass area behind the bike sheds not far from the rifle range. Directional control in a hovercraft is a bit of an art, and I wasn’t much good at art either. There was a rudder mounted behind the rear fan to direct the airflow as appropriate, but why can you never find a good hovercraft driving instructor when you need one?

With a tremendous amount of noise and flying grass cuttings (note to self: goggles required next time), off I went. All went well initially, but it wasn’t long before the bike sheds started to become a bit proximate. Just to be on the safe side I thought I’d bring the beast to a halt. All I had to do was release both the throttles and the engine rpm would drop to idle. That was the idea anyway. In reality though, even at idle power there was enough airflow to keep the skirt inflated and some residual thrust from the rear-drive department. Releasing the throttles, in fact, just meant I hit the bike sheds at a lower speed than I would have done otherwise.

The damage to the bike sheds was fairly minor and with any luck they wouldn’t even notice it.

Safely back in the workshop we discussed potential modifications.

To think that while we were doing this, the Concorde design and development teams, not far away at Weybridge, were having similar issues with their progress towards supersonic passenger flight; but I suspect there was a bit more science involved in their project.

It was simple really. We would fit an ignition cut-out switch. That would kill the engine immediately and ensure no residual thrust could carry us into further trouble. Off I went again. The magnetic effect of the bike sheds came into play once again so, somewhat smugly, I activated the new kill switch. It killed it all right, but we hadn’t anticipated that the skirt wouldn’t necessarily deflate symmetrically. The hovercraft stopped dead and the left side of the ship dived to the ground, flinging me out in the same direction in a most spectacular fashion.

It was quite an easy modification to fit a seat belt.

We worked long into the evenings approaching the open day to make sure our hovercraft was ready to display to all the guests. We were now ready for a final test flight but it was dark and we hadn’t fitted any lights to our wonderful creation. The plan was to take her out for a proper run onto the main school field. It was a vast area, so less chance of hitting anything, with several rugby, cricket and football pitches. We knew we needed to see where we were going with big posts erected everywhere associated with these strange sports.

Graham led the way on his Honda 175 motorcycle with his headlight on full beam. All was going well and we felt we were well placed to perform a demonstration flight for the crowds at the weekend. With two unsilenced chainsaw engines going flat out behind a motorbike with a bright light, we fully understood why the neighbours had feared a gang of Hells Angels were ripping the school field to bits and called the police.

Luckily the police took no further action. It was all a simple misunderstanding.

Aircraft spotting was my favourite pastime and the school field was a perfect location. I’d spend all my tea and lunch breaks with the other enthusiasts in the best vantage points armed with our CAMs and ‘poles’ (telescopes.) The CAM was a paperback publication (Civil Aircraft Markings) with many of the world’s civilian aircraft listed in order by their registrations. Some of the boys had enormous poles. Mine was quite small, and not quite powerful enough to read the registration letters from afar, but those with the better telescopes would read out the letters for us. We would underline them in our CAMs once a new sighting was confirmed.

Before I was old enough to go alone, Mum and Dad had taken me to the roof gardens on top of the Queen’s Building at Heathrow to witness all the comings and goings from close quarters. Who could have guessed that I’d be working there in the not too distant future.

A biennial highlight was a trip to the Farnborough Air Show to watch all the latest flying machines being put through their paces, both military and civilian. The Red Arrows, of course, were everybody’s favourite. I didn’t know then that I would get to know the team well at the end of the millennium. Concorde was the star of the show in 1972 with test pilot Brian Trubshaw putting on a fantastic display. Who would have guessed that … you know the rest.

The Vulcan Cold War bomber was another impressive machine. With a camouflaged delta-shaped wing and four Rolls-Royce Olympus engines, she bore a resemblance to Concorde and certainly made as much noise. It wasn’t until many years later that I got to know the Vulcan display pilot, one Jon Tye, unrelated but now a good friend.

Concorde first flew in March 1969, exactly six months before I started at Hampton grammar. In the seven years that followed she was refined and tweaked. She matured and was made ready to go out into the big wide world, with the first commercial flight taking place exactly six months before I finished at Hampton.

It had taken exactly the same amount of time to make me ready for the big wide world, and I was a far simpler affair. Mum played a big part in that. I was now approaching the end of my teenage years and hadn’t gone too far off the rails along the way. Cider, motorbikes and cigarettes were about as far as it went, although, like any teenager, I’d probably caused Mum and Dad a few sleepless nights. Lucille was doing well at Bishop Wand school and arguably gave them a few more sleepless nights along the way. She was in the Brownies as a young girl, but it wasn’t really for her and by the time she was in her teens she was keen to join the army, an ambition she went on to fulfil, albeit briefly.

As in most homes, Mum held the family together. She had given up work to have Karen, the sister I never met, and took on a full-time job, looking after us all. The house was always immaculate. The parquet flooring in the hallway shone in the sunshine with the toothpaste in the gaps marking out a white staggered roadway to nowhere. Oh, hadn’t I told you about that little mishap?

In the 1950s and ’60s, pre-Amazon days, it was normal to have some household items sold at the door and each fortnight a nice man would come with the family supply of soap, washing powder, cloths and, yes, toothpaste. Money would change hands on the doorstep, all very legal of course, despite the fact that wartime rationing only ended three years before I was born. Mum would put these items out of my reach on the banister at the bottom of the stairs until she made her next trip to the only bathroom at the top of them. They weren’t always out of my reach, of course, as I was a growing boy. The cap on the toothpaste tube was easily undone and the contents squeezed in a most artistic fashion into the parquet floor until I was caught red-handed. I can’t recall if that was categorised as a ‘wait until your father gets home’ level of punishment, or was dealt with by just a mild ticking off from Mum, probably with a slight smile of amusement. It was nothing that a decent rug, and later when they could afford it, a fitted carpet, couldn’t put right.

Mum spent most of her time, like everybody’s mum in those days, cooking, cleaning, washing and gardening. She was always welcoming to my school friends and while reminiscing recently in our 60s, David reminded me how she would always offer you a cup of tea, regardless of your age, the size of your motorbike or the length of your hair.

All mums are special, but it wasn’t until 2016 I appreciated how special she was, when she was awarded the British Empire Medal in the New Year’s Honours List. I’ll explain more later.

THE SUPERSONIC ERA BEGINS AND LOTS OF BROKEN CHINA

‘3-2-1 Now,’ announced Captain Norman Todd as he applied full power to launch supersonic commercial services at 11.40 a.m. on 21 January 1976. Sitting in the co-pilot’s seat was Captain Brian Calvert and behind them was Senior Flight Engineer John Lidiard.

Much later in life I found myself in the same hospital ward as Captain Todd as he was recovering from a car accident. A party broke out when many visitors from the Concorde family arrived to celebrate an anniversary of some sort, perhaps that first commercial flight. Just over forty-two years later, I was privileged to spend time with John Lidiard and his wife Anne at their home in Bristol, just a month before he passed away. He had some fantastic stories to tell about the early Concorde days. I was there with a film crew to capture them all for future generations.

Here I was clinging to my precious piece of chain-link fence along with my good friend Graham (from the Hovercraft Restoration Society) on the perimeter of Heathrow, close to Hatton Cross. At 11.40 a.m. precisely, the gleaming profile of Concorde commenced her rapid acceleration down Runway 28L. The reheat lit up. The ground shook and thousands of people watched in awe as supersonic passenger flight commenced. A hundred paying passengers or invited guests were riding in luxury on their way through the sound barrier to the edge of space for the very first time, and we were there to witness this grand historic occasion.

Quite how we came to be there instead of in double geography on a Wednesday morning, I’m not quite sure, but we’ll gloss over that bit.

I recently gave one of my Concorde talks to a local group and told that story, including the bit about bunking off double geography. Afterwards, a lovely elderly gentleman came up to me and said, ‘Did you say you went to school at Hampton? My name is Tony Creber. I was your geography master!’

If somebody had bet me a million pounds that one day I would fly that very aeroplane, I would have laughed and not taken the bet. Another missed opportunity to become a millionaire.

The summer of 1976 was the hottest ever and the year we were taking our A-levels. Our whole future depended on the results and we had benefited from six years of the best education and opportunities, so the pressure was on. In hindsight, I’m not sure the deck at Sunbury outdoor swimming pool was the most effective venue for last-minute revision, but the sun was hot and the girls were pretty.

SCHOOL’S OUT FOR SUMMER

The title of Alice Cooper’s big hit in 1972 and one that was played endlessly every summer at the end of the school academic year in the 1970s. It was time to move on to the next stages of our lives. Our days at Hampton had flown by. We’d learned much more than we realised at the time, formed lifelong friendships and we would remember some of the masters (teachers) fondly, particularly the strictest ones for some reason. Ernie (Mr Badman to you), for example, would command immediate respect and silence as soon as he entered the room, mainly because he would frighten the living daylights out of you. He taught maths and history and you would also learn how to duck and dive without hesitation, to avoid the flying board rubber that was coming your way after your momentary lack of concentration had been noticed.

While we awaited our A-level results it was appropriate to find some part-time summer employment to keep our motorbikes running and fund our developing social lives. I’d already had a weekend job as a banqueting porter. Remember the staff Christmas party? By the time I was 17 and still at school, a few of us were taken on at Hampton Court Palace. Well, the Tiltyard Cafe in the grounds to be more accurate. It was great fun, hard work and we had to work every weekend, but were paid double time on Sundays and bank holidays.

I was qualified to make sandwiches, load the industrial dishwasher, clear the tables, work the tills and chat up the girls. Pranks and practical jokes brightened up the long days. It honestly wasn’t me who put one of our disposable paper hats in a tuna mayonnaise baguette, but I must confess to following its progress on to the counter and a tourist’s tray soon after.

Mr Engle, the general manager was fair, but firm. He would pose as a customer when he did his spot check rounds, but the pact was that whoever spotted him in the queue first was duty bound to announce his arrival loudly in the kitchen. He only ever saw us at our best and the final warning he gave me was delivered in a fair and friendly manner.

I’d been taking part in one of our regular staff competitions and was well placed to win. The challenge was to see who could get the most plates, cups and saucers on their trolley when clearing the tables. ‘Yes sir,’ was the answer I gave Mr Engle when he discreetly suggested I was perhaps dangerously overloaded and should return to the kitchen to unload. I was by now a skilled trolley operator, so managed to uplift a few more place settings before heading for base. The slight slope up to the dishwasher loading area was a bit of a challenge, but could be managed if you took a bit of a run at it. I never did find out who placed the upside down teaspoon at the top of the slope, which had a similar effect to the cut-out switch in our hovercraft. I hadn’t quite made the finish line and Mr Engle wasn’t impressed.

Clockwise from top left: Me aged 2 or 3; with Lucille (8 and 5); Scouts and Guides (14 and 11); on holiday in 1965.

Dad with my ‘award-winning’ train set.

Dad with one of his loud-speakers, 1972.

Clockwise from top left: The hovercraft, with the bike sheds behind, June 1976; me and my Honda 160 with Mickey Mouse bendy toy on the front; me and the Raleigh Runabout, before it went through the greenhouse.

Me as a sixth-former at Hampton, 1976.

Wearing the same uniform, forty-three years later.