Danny puts his Foot in It. (Part 2)
There it is ! "Field in sight"......"Over to local"...."Silversand 21 joining" ..The bored Local Controller puts down his Sunday paper: "21-04left-1019-circuitclear-calldownwind". I watch the runway as a cat watches a mouse, never taking my eyes off it. For I know, from bitter experience, that in these conditions you only need to look away for a couple of seconds and it's gone. Thrashing around trying to find it again is no good, you have to swallow your pride and go back to Approach for steers to bring you home again (this does no good at all to your image).
"21 Downwind".......Call finals-surfacewind-020tenknots". The local Controller hasn't seen me, but in any case he wouldn't expect to in this smog, and besides, I'm behind him as he sits in the Tower. And he's entitled to assume that a pilot is where he says he is...."21 finals, three greens".."21, land". I swing round and down to the runway.
Half way round, something strikes me as odd. Prewar, there had been a small road running close to that side of the boundary. The runway was extended during the war, a section of the road was closed off, and had been incorporated into the new taxiway. Post war, the road had been reinstated, some 200 ft of the runway had been cut off with an angle-iron and wire fence across. (The useless stub of runway and its verges were a popular picnic spot for the locals; there they could watch the flying as they scoffed their sandwiches).
Landing on 04, you came over this fence to the displaced threshold. But the fence had gone ! Someone had taken it away ! Nobody had told me ! I hadn't flown for ten days or so, had I missed something on the crewroom blackboard ? I was very low now, concentrating on the "piano keys" (did we have them then ?). For the first time, I had a quick glance to my left. There were one or two gliders far over on the grass. Thornaby didn't fly gliders ! Help ! - I'm having a nightmare ! - Where am I ?
Even then the penny didn't drop, but instinct (at last !) took over. "Get out of it !" I slammed the throttle open, but the Goblin spools-up only slowly. The Vampire settled and I felt the wheels rumbling on the tarmac. And then, at the far runway intersection, an old sit-up-and-beg cyclist appeared, making slow and stately progress across my bows from left to right.
Clearly, he hadn't heard me (must have been deaf as a post) - and there was no reason for him to expect aircraft on a Sunday. I'd to decide whether to swerve in front of him, or behind, or wet-hen over the top, for I knew instantly that we would arrive exactly at the middle of the intersection together. Time started to pass in milliseconds. At this point, some sixth sense warned the old chap that all was not well. I cannot swear to it, but I'm sure I saw a puff of smoke from the back tyre and the bike do a "wheelie". It shot out of my field of vision.
Back in the air again, over the far end of the runway, and all became clear. In an impossibly small field lay a crashed Meteor. A few days before an AFS student had stalled on finals to runway 22 at Middleton, and pancaked into this tiny spot. No one could imagine how he had done it; it hadn't done him any good, he was severely injured and the aircraft, seemingly undamaged, had a broken back. It was still there as the engineers couldn't work out how to shift it. The fame of this incident had spread round the North East, eveybody in the air with a few minutes to spare had gone to have a look, and MSG were getting quite stroppy about it.
This sad sight clinched it: now I knew where I was. A few seconds more, and I was over the railway viaduct at Yarm. No way of getting away with it -there had been too many witnesses. I sighed and called Local: "Ring Middleton and apologise for me - I've just done a roller there by mistake". Now 608 had come back on the frequency, so it was a public confession. Guffaws and catcalls filled the air (I'm afraid R/T discipline was rather poor in those days !).
I nipped back ahead of them into the circuit, round and down. There shoudn't be anyone in the Flight Office just now, I should be able to book-in and get out without anyone seeing me. Too late! - the snitch in ATC had phoned the Squadron as soon as he'd hung up on the SDO at MSG. Boss Martin was there, and he addressed me more in anger than in sorrow. What the devil was I thinking about, a pilot of my experience, to do a damned silly thing like that ? The Squadron would get the blame for this: it was one of his aircraft, they would be the laughing stock of the Command. And what about the gliders ? Supposing there had been a tow wire awaiting pickup on the runway ? How far would I get with that wound round a wheel. ?
I thought it unlikely that MSG would be doing aerotows in these conditions, winch-launched C&Bs at the best, but it didn't seem advisable to make the point just now, or to mention the little matter of the cyclist. Boss had got his Vampire back without a scratch, hadn't he ? I'd done his airtest for him, hadn't I ? What had he to moan about ?
All my service life, I'd enjoyed stories of pilots who had done just this very thing (the favourite being the tale of a Very Senior Officer who landed somewhere or other, but remained very taciturn until he'd a chance to read DROs - and so found where he was !) How could anyone be so stupid ?, I thought. Now I knew.
In my defence, I could say that the runway patterns, the orientation of hangars and control tower, and the main runway headings were identical. The fields were only six miles apart (say little more than two minutes' flight), and the visibiltiy was appalling. I couldn't even see the oxbow in the Tees (about a mile to the west) which points like a dagger at Thornaby. But none of this exculpates me. I should have overshot as soon as I noticed the missing fence.
Good news travels fast. It had got back to my unit before I did (tail between my legs). People were very kind to me at tea in the Mess. Jack Derbyshire answered the phone and came over, sympathetically: "Old Man wants to see you in the morning - 0900".
Malcolm Sewell was a man of few words: "Three extra auxiliary weekends SDO"......"No more than I deserve, Sir".
That's all, folks.
Danny42C
Please sir, I'm not lost - it's just that I don't know where I am.