Beats me as to what the hell the guys in the tower are doing. Don't they look at approaching aircraft anymore.??
Often the answer is 'no' as they're probably busy with other tasks and don't simply watch landings. Learning Command and FJ stations used to have a runway caravan with an alert chap in it who, over the years, probably saved HM a fair bit of dosh!
I was Duty Pilot at Scampton once; we only had to be in the tower if one of our aircraft was within 100 miles (this was in Vulcan days). Whilst waiting for an aircraft to return, I happened to glance out of the window as a JP appeared at 250 ft over the nuclear weapons storage area, did a split-arse 180 and returned whence it came.
"Did you see that?", I asked. Neither controller nor assistant was looking out; in fact the NCO controller said he didn't even know what a JP looked like....
Well, I did. In fact the canopy shape and tip tanks clearly identified it as a Finningley Mk5. So..."Finningley please...click, buzz...Finningley here....JP Ops please...."
"JP Ops"
"Scampton Duty Pilot here. My compliments to whoever it was for the impressive but unannounced low level simulated attack on our nuclear weapons site a couple of minutes ago - it was most entertaining. However, I suspect that the pilot and his lad were probably after Blyton disused - please tell them that they can find it at about 340/12 from here! Fortunately no-one important seems to have noticed, so just a quiet word in the shell-like will do. Goodbye...click"
Happy days....
