Careers and Vampires
DANNY 42C--Yes Danny I could follow all your saga--I would never had made it- Sports---could never understand ,when at school ,the fun involved in running around in winter in short trousers and shirt wrestling in mud in rotten weather===then in summer you wore long white trousers,a shirt and pullover--so except for squash I was cured of "sports" early in life.
A friend here was a Boulton and Paul apprentice and became an RAF pilot in the 60,s--went on to Shackletons and as an F/O was told he would make a good JUNIOR officer!--so he bailed out but got no joy looking in the UK civil field. It was at the time of Vietnam and US airlines werent getting the usual flow of ex US service pilots, American Airlines recruited him in London along with several other ex RAF pilots--including some with only singles experience. Retired at 60 as a Captain on 767,s Which reminds me
26ER----Didnt BA or BOAC pilots retire at 55?--I assume that, as here , it is now 65
Union Jack The ex RAF friend I referred to lives in Alicante. Several years ago he was going to write a book about his experiences-- the stories made wonderful e mails!---but he never did go ahead with the book and is now not in the best of health. He had ended up on 737,s with Air Algerie but earlier he was "trooping"with Hermes to Africa and the FE
BTW I note several comments on the lethal F104----around 1965 I visited HFB in Hamburg where they were developing the Hansa twin jet---forward swept wings. They had engaged an American as test pilot. Swede????. Earlier he had been a test pilot for GE ---the 104 had a GE engine--he had dead sticked a 104 at Edwards AFB. After I met him he went on with the Hansa to Madrid for hot weather trials--got into a deep stall,bailed out but was caught by the tail and was killed.
Too many of my stories seem to end in tragedy---apologies