PPRuNe Forums - The development of Automatic Landing

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I recall an "I learned about flying from that" story in Air Clues from the 80s submitted by a Canberra pilot who was diverting from a midlands airfield after the weather got bad. On the way to the alternate, he was passed to Bedford Approach on the way to his diversion destination. He heard a callsign in the radar circuit staing that he was going to do an ILS to roll (touch and go). Obviously, the weather at Bedford was better than our hero though, so he changed his destination and asked for vectors to the ILS. The other aircrat rolled in front of him, so he was suprised that he didn't see the lights at 200'. He was fed in again and had to go round a second time despite the other aircraft doing another roller. Now he was desparate. He had to land off the next approach or jump out. So he flew past minimums and got the lights in the flare. He taxied in with difficulty, shut down on fumes just as the other aircraft taxied past. It was a Varsity with the words "Blind Landing Experimental Unit" written on the side!

The story, or a very similar one, appears in Neil William's book, 'Airborne'. IIRC he was in a Hastings (but you could be right about it being a Canberra) and the tale was pretty much as you tell. One of the other things that convinced him the weather was OK, was that the Varsity crew told the Tower to let Ops know the weather was suitable for training and they would stop at some point for a crew change. :ok:

Flt. Lt. Grogan
My apologies for not responding earlier to your addition to this thread but I saw it only recently. It is fascinating - not boring at all.
BLEU had carried out some fog flying in the early 1950s, mostly in the DH Devon. You and Pinky Stark were obviously doing it for real, in something rather larger. I certainly did not do any landings in fog during the development in Canberra WJ992, nor in fact in the Varsity.
Talking of WJ992, that venerable aircraft is no more except in virtual form as a bolt-on to the MS Flight Simulator, available as a download at http://www.flyingstations.com/canberra-pack-tugs-trainers.html. So I can “fly” in it again after 54 years!

WJ992 is not quite gone

CANBERRA - T.4 - WJ992

Thunderbird167

That is an interesting collection of photos. The latest one I have found, said to be at Hurn, was from 2007. A few months ago I sought local information on the current situation and was advised as follows by someone from the Bournemouth Aviation Museum: "The Museum has a cockpit/nose section of Canberra PR7 WT532 which we recovered from the Hurn Fire Dump and refurbished some 6 or 7 years ago. There is no formal scrapyard on the airport and during the past 20 years that I have been associated with the airfield I have not seen WJ 992. A number of various Mks of Canberras have arrived and departed." So there's something of a mystery!