Originally Posted by
ACW342
I was on duty as a controllers assistant in the Northern Dairies ops room when one of my colleagues took a handover from Midland (the a/c not only climbing out of their airspace but possibly still in the their overhead?) an unrestricted climb to an unspecified height , much to our surprise, was requested by the pilot. The aircraft was a Hastings of 1066 Flt out of our own airfield at Lindholme (Latterly HMP) I can't remember the year but it was probably'71. As far as I remember the a/c got somewhere in the region FL 290 - 310 . This was about 11:00 - 11:15. After coming off console I caught the 12:00 shift change bus back to Lindholme which was duly stopped at the traffic lights on the A614 whereupon that same aircraft we had been controlling came screaming? well, roaring down the runway at low level only to pull up and perform a "sort of" wingover type manoeuvre before turning downwind to land. I think the occasion was to mark the pilots last flight or similar. I'm sure there are others out there who can fill in the gaps in my memory.
A342
Hi ACW 342.. I was the air engineer on the flight you are talking about. I checked my log book and it was on 30 June 1972. The aircraft was one of our C Mk 1A reg TG 568. We had been on a round robin dropping people off at Cottesmore and Chivener. On the leg home we decided to see what altitude we could reach and we received clearance to FL 270. We made it after a protracted climb but the propeller rpm was very unstable. We were actually passed over to Northern Radar as a JP.. The captain was Des Pankhurst a wartime Sunderland pilot from New Zealand and one of the nicest guys you could ever meet. I joined 1066 son from 204 Sqn Ballykelly as a volunteer because I wanted to avoid the Majunga Support Unit that was forming at Honington. I had a great time at Lindhome and I really enjoyed the good old Hastings. I left 1066 Sqn for Nimrods in Feb 1973. I later flew on 747's as well as The Mighty Hunter.