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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 1314.PDF
416 FLIGHT, 14 September 1961 Illustrated mainly by Flight photographs Farnborougfh Week FARNBOROUGH 1961, the twenty-second SB AC FlyingDisplay and Exhibition, will be remembered as having beensuccessful at several levels. As to attendance, there were nearly 9,000 guests from overseas; on the public days, 24,000 peoplecame last Friday, 85,000 on the Saturday and 100,000 on the Sunday. From a commercial standpoint the Society's president,Mr H. G. Nelson, expressed himself satisfied: many of the visiting VIPs, he said at a summing up Press conference, were of "decisionmaking level"; further, equipment stands in the exhibition had done a fair amount of business. Taking a look ahead at future displays, the president said thatthey would continue in much the same form, though the Society was seeking information from its members regarding a differentapproach to the show. The Flying Display would be generally on the same lines, with the Services playing a prominent part and"a sprinkling of new types of aircraft." 1962 would be "a vintage year" for new machines, including the D.H. Trident and 125,Hawker P.I 127, Vickers VC10 and Bristol Type 188. In the following report, the three public days are dealt with first,then—on pages 417-441—the trade days and the static exhibition. Friday As the Army Air Corps was making its SBAC debut thisyear, an opportunity of flying in their Skeeter formation seemed too good to miss; so Flight's day began at the Army Air CorpsCentre, at Middle Wallop. From there, soon after our Gemini arrived, Maj Stuart Whitehead, the display leader, took off with thewriter for Aldershot in Skeeter XM565. After bowling over the Hampshire countryside at a comfortable 80kt, within half an hourwe touched down on the grass area known as Queen's Parade. During the morning, nine more Skeeters arrived from Wallop—giving a reserve of two aircraft in case of unserviceability. An R/T control had been set up on the parade ground, and there was arefueller. After the pilots had had a chance of seeing the show curtain-raisers, the gay Turbulents and the RAE-rebuilt SE.5a withits realistic machine-gun burst, they had a final informal briefing from Maj Whitehead. At 1519 we started up. Over the R/T the wind was given as 040"less than 5kt" (ideal conditions for this type of demonstration). "Blue" leader had radio unserviceability, so had changed to one of thespare aircraft, which had been started in readiness. At 1525 we were airborne, swinging away to starboard over the blue roofs ofsome of the Aldershot barrack buildings. The other three "red" aircraft slipped into diamond formation ahead of us, so that wewere then the last machine in the section. Maj Whitehead called: "Red leader, formation: Z minus two, Z minus two, now." Hethen gave Z minus 1 £ and Z minus 1 and called Farnborough Tower: "Are we clear to come in?" The answer came: "Thirty seconds to your target time," and Whitehead replied, "Red section crossing threshold now" as we entered the airfield area over the eastern end of the main runway. From the opposite end appeared the four Skeeters of "blue"section, and as Whitehead called "spread out" we passed through each other opposite to the president's enclosure. At the end of therunway we pulled up into a torque turn, performed with stick fully back and left "rudder" on. As we gathered speed in the oppositedirection, Whitehead called: "Slowing down, go: stopping, go." Then we did an inwards turn towards the crowd and each sectionwent into "clover leaf" formation, the four aircraft facing each other. From clover leaf we formed echelon and did a backwards take-off; then went into a left turn (rather like closing a double gate), coming to face each other in line abreast. Forward again, spreadingout so that the two sections could pass through each other; then again into line abreast, closing up in front of the spectators, after asecond torque turn. Finally, bobbing up and down—odd numbers up, even numbers down, and vice versa; an outward turn andWhitehead's last instruction in the display: "Forward flight, go." And so back to Queen's Parade. Saturday For brilliance of weather and of flying, this was thecrown of the week: there was hot sunshine and blue sky in abun- dance, bringing out all the colours, and the pilots seemed to revel inthe conditions. Special tribute should be paid to the Tiger Club for their delightful "Rainbow Nine" of Turbulents. These pretty littleaeroplanes created just the right sort of show atmosphere for a sunny Saturday afternoon. Messrs. Trephewey, Gilbert, Griffiths,D. Phillips, P. Phillips, Dempster, Francis, Baring, Hutchinson, Jones and Miss McKellar alternating during the three public days,put on a most commendable show, supported by a lively com- mentary from John Blake. By contrast with Turbulence at near-ground level, 40 Bomber Command aircraft flew high above the airfield in a steady cqntrailing stream Another unusual item which graced the public days was theFarnborough-rebuilt SE.5a flown today and on Friday by Gp Capt P. Hanafin, O.C. Experimental Flying, and on Sunday by Farn-borough's Wing Commander Flying, Wg Cdr R. A. Watts. Sunday This final day's display was carried out in dull weather, agreat sheet of overcast covering the airfield at about 10,000ft, the effect presumably of a trough of low pressure forecast to crosssouthern England during the day. But the programme was not impeded, and the cloud gave the effect of a theatrical backcloth.
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