It seemed that loosing jets was a common practice in days of yore!
This apparently is a true story.
There are a few meteor ejection stories at:
www.ejectorseats.co.uk
Date: Late 1950's
Place: RAF Odiham, England.
Javelin taxiing out for take-off.
One hunter on take-off, one on finals, one on down-wind for finals.
Javelin engine fire (not unusual) but unseen by crew.
Air Traffic Controller (novice, in panic) calls 'you are on fire' or words to that effect.
Three Hunter pilots eject un-necessarily and Javelin crew taxi on oblivious until it becomes obvious, too late, that the panic applies to them, then luckily scrabble out unhurt, unfortunately the RAF are four aircraft down.