100% lightningmate.
I arrived at Wattisham IMC with a ‘radio failure’ glued firmly to a formation member’s jet pipe. This resulted in a line astern GCA, transitioning to a pairs landing as the wheels came down.
“… then there was Arthur, a hangar and no brakes”.
A hilarious episode, except I was just leaving the hangar door next to the window which Arthur hit !
The ‘bang’ was totally disorienting, as was the brick dust fog.
A Firestreak appeared through the haze; in the flower bed – the shear bolt had gone.
Then a silhouette of the Lightning nose, stuck into an office window like an animal eating fodder. And it ate, with a roar and loud pops and ‘farts’ as the office contents (and bricks) were sucked into the intake and dispatched, duly mangled by two RR Avons, in further clouds of dust.
As senses returned, a hasty retreat was made along the front of the hangar, to be joined formation like, by Arthur hotfooting it from the cockpit, but one story up on the roof of the hangar office.
Interested parties arrived to view the spectacle; one brave engineer with a ladder near the cockpit attempted to shut the engines down by closing the HP cocks, but without success due to jammed throttle linkages. As time progressed, the roaring noise and digestion increased, the crowed slowly retreated, allowing the crash team to view the scene.
Small huddles formed to consider how to stop the engines; elects (fuse pullers), mechs (spanners), airframe (hammer), crash team (flood it). After a considerable period, panels were opened around the engines and the throttle linkage disconnected which finally stopped the engines.
With no more flying allowed, the day ended in the bar.