Just to continue this bit of Military helo nostalgia -( Hi there Wessex & Airborne
)
There was a stude on a course behind me who because of his height was deemed too tall to fit in either a Chipmunk or Bulldog and so he became the first RN Pilot ever to commence his flying training straight off on the Gazelle
He is now CO of the Fleet Air Arm Historic Flight
However, probably half of our course started on the Gazelle with just 10 hours or so Chipmunk flying. The other half also had 80-90 hours UAS Bulldog hours.
The average time to solo on the Gazelle was around 7-9 hours.