The giant Victor bomber - named Teasin' Tina - was only supposed to taxi down the runway and stop for a photoshoot before returning to the hangar.That, ladies and gentlemen, is the Right Stuff.
But the bungling 'co-pilot' - an engineer with no flying experience - hit the throttle by mistake and the 75-tonne bomber lurched 150 feet into the air. Stunned pilot Bob Prothero, 70, grabbed the controls as the Victor bomber veered off the runway and climbed into the air on a collision course with the crowd and a nearby housing estate.
Quick-thinking Mr Prothero, who last flew a Victor in the 1980s and whose flying licence has long expired, took the controls and wrestled the gigantic plane to safety.
It landed in a field at the end of a runway without a single casualty or scratch to the aircraft.
The 'Daily Fail', by contrast, can't even wrestle a Google page to the ground in order to check their aviation facts...
4 comments:
That is good stuff and tellingly, from an 80s vintage pilot. These days most would be terrified to be criminally charged with touching the controls of a plane without the required permit in hand.
The story in the 'Express' this morning made a point of mentioning that 'officials had confirmed that no action would be taken against Mr Prothero' over his expired flight certificate.
Which was jolly nice of them, I thought....
Brilliant, lets hope the story remains a glorious accident with the unique consequence of hearts racing and joy for all concerned.
I suspect there may be a whiff of naughtiness going on here and those that had control of the situation took a calculated risk.
Was Bob arrested? Was his DNA extracted and fed to the Great Database God?
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