I don't recall a hose being cut at Lyneham but we did have a bit of a scare when the airborne mail retrieval kit was about to be released to service. The then Wg Cdr Ops decided to have a go himself to prove the kit and that's when it went wrong. The height to fly so that the hook would engage the suspended line was 40 ft and the good Wg Cdr was rather higher than that on the live run. The grapnel foul hooked the line and a 100lb bag was yanked into the air. The direction of flight was opposite to that shown in the pic but it gives an idea of the choice of escape which was to stay right of the M4 and turn before Wootty B (seen at the right). Any likely catastrophe was however averted when the line parted and the bag was dumped into Tockenham pond where it may still be.
