Ahh yes, the good old days before horse riders calling their ambulance chasing lawers 20 seconds after something fast and grey goes overhead at 250' and 450kts became the norm.
I was in the Yorkshire Dales some years back with a bunch of pongos from the Royal Engineers, who were assisting with a footbridge replacement project in a rather steep sided dale.
They'd decided to stay for the week rather than travel to Catterick and back every day, so the field above the bridge was occupied with 4-tonners, landrovers, cranes and other assorted lifting gear, along with a field kitchen and a couple of large tents.
One particularly sunny afternoon a pattern of looping contrails above us gave away the fact that a punch-up of the fast-jet variety was taking place a few thousand feet above our heads. A short time later an F4 came up the Dale at a height of about 1000' and the wing dropped as he came over the top of us, obviously having a look-see at all the 'greenery' parked in the field.
About 5 minutes later, the ba$t@rd came out of nowhere, right over the top of us at tree-top height, stood the machine on its tail with the afterburners lit and barrel-rolled up into the heavens. Our bodies and the very ground itself shook.
To this day I've never heard so much profanity fall from the lips of a group of men, nor for such a prolonged period of time.
