Further to my Moscow adventure I will attempt to explain the complexity of a simple starter motor failure for the benefit of self loading, oxygen breathing and leaking freight.
It was in the 70s at the height of the Cold War where some of my mates were flying the pocket rocket through thunderstorms along the Berlin corridors with the real threat of being shot down if they strayed. It was also a time of extremely long ATC delays before continuous descent approaches were introduced. Moscow was a BOAC station with a BEA station manager, probably on his Tod, and we had a travelling spanner with a tool kit.
‘There was a performance limitation which was probably take off segment and we had refuelled for the return leg which is when the problem happened. After a brief trouble shooting which included finding engineering steps and try a manual operation of the starter we had to do a calculation of APU and single running engine expected fuel consumption, order a bowser before we could start. This process was repeated a second time including flight duty limitations and the possibility of only operating to Helsinki where we could night stop rather than sleeping on the aircraft. Station and the engineer communicated with London via telex which involved a journey to the bowels of Sheremetyevo and flight plans needed to be refiled. Each séjour took at least 20 minutes.
The captain stayed onboard where refreshments were served to the pax whilst I worked with our spanner on the top of some dodgy steps with the other copilot at the bottom; all of us dressed in woollen winter uniform and our famous raincoats with smugglers pockets. It was sleeting.
A triple engine start using one starter motor was considered but the captain wisely decided that even if it did work it wasn’t the wisest decision wrt flight safety. Fortunately Station managed to get us exceptional permission to land in the USSR, a bus was organised along with envelopes full of roubles and we were taken to a 4 star? Hôtel which mirrored some of the hotels I have stayed in in France in the 80s with regard to depravity. We were briefed on the BOAC chandeliers incident where the crew had searched for microphones, unscrewed the under carpet fixing plate and given rooms on different floors (male and female) with a babushka sitting at the end of each floor to stop us straying for a bit of home comfort.
The following day we were treated to the delights of a country which appeared to be under rationing but wearing uniforms we had a fabulous time seeing the sights.
None of the pax whinged as they understood the delights of air travel in that age.