I seem to remember that in either very late '76 or early '77, we had a visit from a Belgian A/F Squadron. Being on VASF we had to work with the Belgian Groundcrews on their Dasault Mirages. Rumour control had it that our C/O had been boasting to the Belgian C/O about how much better the Lightning was. Unfortunately he decided to prove the point and took the Belgian C/O up in a T5 to do so. The aircraft went hurteling down the runway with half the camp watching it. The C/O did a perfect Tactical take off. "up to speed , retract undercarriage and rotate. The aircraft shot up vertically and was almost out of sight when we noticed 2 wee black things that appeared to fall off the aircraft, at this point the nose went down and the T5 landed vertically in a field close to Fluegies. As luck had it, the 2 objects seen falling off of the kite were the ejector seats. Never did find out what the Belgian C/O thought of our aircraft.
