VC10
 

https://www.vc10.net/Memories/WhiteWaltham.html
Captain AJ Smith...Alan Harkness was the first officer...we instructed together at Booker...

I agree. I was at the show and I remember the following, all of which are on the list - the Trident, the "Linton Gin" JP4s, which took off and landed on the grass, the AAC "Blue Eagles" Sioux team and the most ridiculously slow flyby I've ever seen - the LF-1 Zaunkönig:

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....d05d7cb02f.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brauns...LF-1_Zaunkönig

The list doesn't mention the VC-10 but I definitely remember it. The earlier picture of a VC-10 is not White Waltham - there are too many trees in the background. However, I don't remember the VC-10 at Booker doing any aggressive maneuvers - just a spectacularly noisy go-around. :)

I don't wish to be a party pooper, but there seems to be some confusion about which display we're talking about.

If it's the VC-10 photo, then it's clearly(!) a Jet Provost T.5 in the first frame on the strip:

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....064bffb381.jpg

The Scramble report makes no mention of a JP T.5 at the Booker display, nor of the Spitfire captured in a couple of frames (if indeed the photos were taken there at all - have we actually established that?).

Morning Dave,

Hmm, you are on to something there, I think yesterday when I looked at the list on Scramble against the photos I forgo to split the album up into potentially two separate years. Unfortunately, my dad's index card in the Negative folder has three Booker events, with the first two listed as 1868. The final Booker list of negatives was left without a year. But this is where he has registered the VC-10. Because I scanned the negatives from the three separate "Booker" into one folder on my computer I was checking the aircraft digitally and used that to cross reference Booker 69. Hope this makes sense as to why I lead to 1969, but you are right, I need to reexamine what was taken when.

Could it have been Bob Knights flying it?

I presume that the participants were mainly balloons. :oh:

Ah, very good, obviously 1968

I'd love to see that bit of film too. The Dak was G-AMHJ.

See my post #3. The VC 10 at Booker was either 71 or 72 as this was the time I was working at LHR and the photo reflects my memory of the flypast.

Probably , the last Trident flyby at Booker ? .......Was Sun 4th Nov. '84 . G-AWZZ LHR 1518 - BHX 1610 .
Lovely day wx wise , had been on ZZ earlier , normal S/Shuttle EDI return . Next sortie was retirement to BHX fire service. I bid for the flt and got a shareoplane skipper mate to bid the Capts seat , and another mate off standby as second F/O.
Had gee'd it up with the LHR tower for a min noise route leave LHR zone north at 2400 ' and ok'd from mate in Booker tower for a left base to 25 , flyby , and G/A to north .
Skip rang up Trident fleet manager , and got the reply ...'' Not below 500' and don't do anything silly '' !
Skip ... '' You've sorted it , your t/o my ldg '' ..
V little fuel , light , thus good excuse to light the boost , max thrust t/o with a V2 clb . No sooner a/b than pushing forward and pulling power off to level at 2400' . North from Burnham 170 kts droop and some flap , when a PA 28 passed by above us , ..... you could see his scramble for the map and dive towards the ground thinking he was in LHR zone .Talking to Booker drifted down 25 at 500'R. , trickle of power , 11000 to gently G/A turning . Talking with Luton who were warning an Aztec about our turning and passing his left wing . Lesson learned ..radius of turn at 170 greater than a C150 at 80 ..
Swopped seats with F/O mate , run by his village in Bucks . Finished with run up 33 at BHX.. full power pull up , cct to land with full reverse in the flare.. From P3 seat I was looking up at fireman standing on Landrover roof taking shots .
Pax home in B.Mid Super Shed .. Liberated stop watch still works .

PS , some months later .. Stewardess friend at a party ..
'' Do Tridents fly out of Booker ? Was taking a post Sunday lunch walk with new boyfriend in woods to west of Booker , when peace and friendship was disturbed by almighty racket of 3 Speys low overhead '' .
Me ... '' So Sorry , we did not see you and only had 11000 rpm on '' !
She married her man , and we still see them regularly now , nearly 38 yrs later .

rgds condor .

im pretty sure I have the video of one of the booker airshows with VC 10 etc....... must dig it out. such a fun era to have lived through !

I was the other co-pilot on that scrapping flight of ZZ to B'ham, as condor 7 will well remember. The circle around my house on the Chilterns escarpment after the low pass at Booker was met by my wife standing in the garden with her fingers in her ears! I remember we also passed over Silverstone on the way. There was some race meeting in progress so we gave them a blast as well.

The captain very (very) kindly let me do it's last landing on 33 after his very low 240kt (droop down I think) flypast down the runway. I was briefed to shout out if the rad alt went below 50 ft. The view out of the window towards the end of the runway was full of chimneys sticking up!! The captain flew the pull up and circuit and handed over to me on the final approach. Full reverse in the flare and we easily turned off down 24 with all tyres intact. A grand day out for sure.

Tried to post a photograph taken by said fireman of us on short finals but it seems I have to post 8 times before being allowed EH?

u118075 (better known as Jim)

Would a Trident ever to have done a low runway pass at North Weald. I remember going to an airshow there, we had an Uncle who lived not far away . I distinctly remmber the Trident , about 1965 doing this, but unsure where, I am sure it was not Booker as I never went there until much older. It was in Red Square livery and as you might expect looked pretty cool (much more so than a 320 or 73 would). Any confirmation or contrary suggestions? (seeing a Trident was hardlya big deal as I lived in Stanwell village virtually on LHR but of course it looked very different close to the ground, gear up and going pretty fast. I always thought the Trident the best looking of that era, the VC10 was majestic but the Trident looked like the hotrod it sort of was being fast and a bit sporty as per its reputation gleaned from here decades later

Tridents were always faster than most other airliners; the only one which was close was the VC10.
When I was handling flight planning at London ATCC West Drayton, they often filed for a climb TAS of 400 kt and a cruise of 500 where all your Boeings etc would file for 460 cruise. I'm afraid I don't remember what mach number they filed but it was somewhere up around 0.9 with others filing about 0.86.

It always puzzles me when I see the Trident referred to as the "ground gripper".
I only went spotting on the Queen's Building a few times when I could persuade my dad to take me - it was 50 miles away - but a Trident take-off was obvious and only needed a glance to identify the aircraft.
Compared to all other airliners, and admittedly at a distance of well over 50 years, a Trident always appeared to take-off at a 45° climb angle.
I'm sure those who actually know will rightly tell me it wasn't 45° but it certainly seemed twice as steep as any other aircraft.

Trident higher MMO, VC10 higher VMO, both faster than DC 9 51 even with clacker CB pulled.
Trident highest ROD with 10,500 reverse, brakes and 365 knots but not as high as F100..chickened out with 16,700 fpm and still p!ssed off CC due deck angle…FO not that happy either.

Probably related to the increased curvature of the Earth at Heathrow.

Watching departures in the period 1970/71 from near where Compass Centre now stands (I was stationed at the old north side radar unit and the staff canteen was a good lookout point) Tridents, VC10s and 737s used to be airborne from 28R/27R just before they passed us whereas heavier types such as 707/DC8 and later '747 were the ground grippers often disappearing towards Colnbrook firmly glued to the ground.
On moving across to the ops centre at West Drayton a year later, you could see the Tridents and 737s climbing away steeply and if anything, the 737s had a better ROC.

The occasions I'm talking about in the mid sixties, the 737 probably hadn't even flown and certainly wasn't in service.

I remember seeing 737s inbound to 08 at Luton in 1967; they used to turn in overhead Halton whilst we were gliding there. They were certainly in service with Britannia befoere 1968.

Trident 1s were re-engined in the 60s iirc.
Hot summers day take off weight limited out of home base.
Infamous incident T3 out of Malaga lost a donk and diverted to Madrid as a larger station without anyone checking the missed approach climb/ WAT limits. As often happened incompetent controller lined up an Iberia which led to a missed approach going down hill; skipper then on the ball..pointed nose down towards lower terrain, accelerated, cleaned up and did a circuit: the Trident on approach was well on the back side of the drag curve.

Your recollections are very faulty.
Brittannia received their1st 737 in July 1968: late delivery necessitating lease og BKS and Laket Brits (one each)

Britannia 737s As far as I am aware first 737-200 for Britannia was G-AVRL delivered to Luton July 8th 1968. I am told G-AVRL Boeing 737-204 c/n 19709 line number 38 - Registered to Britannia Airways Ltd 14.07.1967 - First flown at at Seattle 28.06.1968 - Handed over to Britannia Airways at Seattle 07.07.1968 and delivered Seattle-Montreal-Goose Bay arriving at Luton 08.07.1968.

AFAIK, the only 737s to be seen in Europe before Britannia's deliveries were Lufthansa's 737-100s from December 1967 onwards.

If Wiki is to be believed, Lufthansa as launch customer received their first 737 on 28/12/67 and it/they didn't enter service until February 1968.

I realised fairly early on that I had no interest in modern airliners and apart from the obvious like a 146 or a 747, I can't tell one from another unless it's written on the tail.

Sorry I must be a year out then unless another carrier operated 737s in/out of Luton in '68; the date I have was May which looks too early for a BY flight.
Certainly when I joined NATCS as an assistant at West Drayton in Mar 69, 'RM and 'RN were regulars in/out of Luton although I don't recall 'RL being flight planned.
My first flight with BY in a 737 was in GAXNC in Mar '75 when I managed to break the aircraft! I was on an ATCO Familiarisation Flight Luton - Madrid and return and as I entered the flight deck and went to shut the door in order to unfold the jump seat, the emergency exit hatch set in the door fell out - just popped out in me 'and guv!!

Tridents and speed

I remember two occasions where the flight deck cheerfully pointed out how fast the trident could go . Once going to Stockholm we overtook a Scandi DC9 which the captain said had left LHR 15 mins in front of us and we caught up by the Danish coast, I guess he knew the call sign/flt number as about every other aircraft around there would have bena Scandi DC9 .

Othertime was Rome to LHR and we overtook a VC10 en route , this seemed to give the crew particular pleasure to be going faster than 'the other lot''

As to the Gripper nickname having seen innumerable take offs from what was 28L the Trident didnt look too bad. It couldnt match the DC9s , the Comet4Bs it was replacing, or the occasional 707s (only going as far as Brussels or Paris ) or even Caravelles. but of course, 2 engined airliners are all somewhat overpowered since they need to survive with one if there s a problem and back then i dont think there was much reduced thrust take off going on. I think the Trident was going pretty fast at unstick speed compared to some bigger-winged/more modern types so perhaps that made it look more scary.

As to the boost engine , that amde a distinctive noise and was clealry different from the 1s and 2s. I think it was more widely used than has been suggested I often saw/heard them use in departing 10R which even if they left from one of the intersections (block79) it was still a pretty long runway. Tridents used to emit wisps of white smoke/steam as they started rolling any ideas what that was about. of course it was nothign to the clouds of muck from CV990s, 727s and even Electras

I was in the tower at Glasgow for about 6 months in 1972 and was able to observe the booster being lit many times; just as they were passing the control tower taxying out on 24 (now 23) , first there would be a plume of vapour then a gout of flame as the engine lit.

In their last years of service I was in a T3 on a Manchester-Heathrow Shuttle, in the rearmost of those rear-facing seat rows in the forward cabin. Directly opposite, forward-facing, was my right grumpy old client. Short sector, light weight, as we lifted off and climbed out the angle was such that, had it not been for my seatbelt, I would have landed squarely in the growling old so-and-so's lap. And by his facial expression he suddenly thought so too !

Definitely NOT a Gripper !

The boost engine on the T3 had a couple of restrictions: if used for take off it had to be shut down before climbing above 6000 ft and once shut down it could not be relit in flight (although relight capability became available in later years). So the Madrid crew were operating with only two of their three-and-a-half engines available and might not have been aware that their approach to a high elevation airport exceeded the go-around WAT limit in the circumstances prevailing.

Obviously discorde..not helped by our documentation, the way it was formulated and how the criteria was (or wasn’t) communicated.
I was always amazed at how good we were at saving fuel compared with the plog (later sword) until one of the opposition ex fuel saving committee explained that contingency fuel was included in the route fuel and all were calculated at max take off weight rather than a realistic weight based on forecast load.
At a guess Cyprus had a better understanding of the latter which was the reason they had a higher success rate at not tech stopping.
They peed pass one day and we laughed at the fools..they had gone home by the time we got into queen’s.