The Best And Worst Aviation TV Programs of all time!
 

Hey there!

Best:
Flightline - Discovery Wings
Flight Deck - 'Wings
Airline - ITV
Airport - BBC
And some program about pilot jobs which I can't remember the name of - 'Wings
Wings Sitcom - Paramount
Friends In High Places - 'Wings

Worst:
First Flights With Neil Armstrong - Discovery Wings

Trislander.

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"Ayline 221 airbourne"

[ 29 July 2001: Message edited by: Trislander ]

Obviously: Gary Halliday

Less Obviously: Moonstrike
The Aeronauts

Worst doesn`t matter cos I`ll still watch it.

GH

Can't agree that 'airline/Airport' are good!

I'd put them in 'worst'category, with excepetion op 2 'Airport' episodes:

The one where the 757 crew were doing sim checks.

The one where they followed a Lufthansa A320 crew.

Most progs on TV about aviation are sensationalist pants IMHO.

Except v good doc on Kegworth aircrash a few years ago.

Worst:

-Airport
-Big Sky (so crap that it is actually enjoyable to watch)

Best:

-Black Box

[ 20 July 2001: Message edited by: Dave Incognito ]

Best:Test Pilot (ETPS documentary, mid 1980s)

Worst: The uninvited (aliens invade earth at an RAF base in Scotland)

G

Best:

Blackadder IV - when they join the RFC.

Can`t agree about "Flight line" mostly because of the presenter.

Most of the other stuff on Discovery Wings is good except for the depressing number of repeats.

Loki,

Do a search on Brendan O'Brien on the PPRUNE search facility- Everyone had a masive debate about him (the main presenter on Flightline) and it was quite funny.

Airport/Airline are interesting to me because it is behind the scenes of everything that happens outside the aircraft. After all, there would be no flights for us to fly if they weren't there!

Trislander.

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http://www.aurigny.com/images.gb%20/trislander.jpg
"Ayline 221 airbourne"

Best - Reaching for the Skies, 12 part (I think) series screened a few years ago which I bought on video as it was so good. Well worth the ackers.

Trislander (why not BN3?):

Yes, I witnessed the mega threads on the subject of Flightline and its presenter. I decided not to be too controversial with my post in order to prevent people going off thread.

I watched the programme the other day with the sound turned right down; much better.

There was a Canadian-produced series called Flightpath a couple of years ago. Quite well done, if a bit 'populist' at times. I taped the episode about aerial firefighting.
I believe it was only shown on Canadian TV which means it was seen by me and oh, maybe 50 others.

We can get Flightpath in the UK on Discovery Wings Channel. I agree, it is well-produced but sometimes not the most interesting.

(LOKI: You mean BN3 instead of BN2A Mk.III-2 Trislander? The answer is, I don't know!!!)

Tri

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http://www.aurigny.com/images.gb%20/trislander.jpg
"Ayline 221 airbourne"

There was a three-part series following an Air Canada 767 from YYZ to FRA which first aired last year on Discovery (CA). It was very professionally done, and featured every aspect of the trip i.e. ATC, flight crew preparations, maintenance, etc.

As for Airport, as someone previously mentioned: some episodes are fantastic, whilst some new ones (Series VI) could take place in a shopping complex and no one would tell the difference.

Cheers,

klik (back after a while)

I seem to remember a program years ago called "Diamonds in the Sky" It followed aircraft development from the early days to the present.

It was a good series but I have not seen it repeated. Anyone have more info on it?

Michael111 - Diamonds in the Sky was presented by Julian Pettifer and first appeared in the late 1970s. It was repeated again a couple of times, but would be seriously dated now - Freddie Laker had a starring role in one of the episodes, as did Dick Ferris, the former CEO of United.

Surprised no one has mentioned Airline as one of their favourites ... nope, not the Orange crowd; the one wi' t' Yorkshire lads (headed by Jack Ruskin, played by Roy Marsden) and their DC3s!! Apparently, this was a semi-biographical thing about a combination of the Keegans and Laker.

Oh, and don't forget Buccaneer either, which was a very biographical series about Redcoat (cunningly disguised as Redair in the series) and their Britannias...

Anyone remember 'Piece of Cake'?

Pretty dire Sunday night viewing (from the early nineties?) but the aerial shots were great. I think Stephen Grey and his Duxford collection were involved. Can clearly remember Spitfires taking off from a Country House lawn and alternately breaking left / right.

There was a drama series in the late 70's / early 80's about the RFC. Not bad as I remember, but I was only a kid then ;)

Piece of Cake: good flying footage, but plot, acting etc dire, so didn't get a single repeat. Also woefully innaccurate (Mk 1 Spits flying from French airfields during Battle of France and so on). The book (in which they fly Hurricanes) is OK but I think overrated. Not a patch on Deighton's masterly and truly horrifying Bomber, for which he justly won the Booker Prize in 1970. The BBC Radio adaptation of it from 1995 is also stunning: available on tape. Likely to induce tearfulness so take care if listening in the car.

The WW1 TV thang was called Wings, which as far as I recall was low budget !!!!!e with hardly any flying. Sort of Upstairs Downstairs with wizz bangs.

Somebody mentioned the Aeronauts: superb! Cheesy French 1970s Mirage jocks and bottom-slappers wear big shades, have gigantic sideies, shag 15 blondes, smoke 90 Gitanes, beat up 20 crooks, then shoot down terrorist bad guys in Magisters over Central Paris. Also coolest theme tune ever.

I have to get this off my chest - who the hell does Neil Armstrong think he is!!!!???!?

I was watching Discovery Wings last night, and up pops NA with his First Flights, talking about the DC8 and the 707. Great. Then he emits the immortal line (which damns him for ever in my book) -

"Before the British Comet started falling to pieces.... the 707 was shrinking the world"

OK. Technically it is true that the good old Comet I had some undesirable tendencies. But to use this to try and forget the whole aircraft in favour of making the DC8 and 707 out to be the first jet airliners??

Yeuch.

Diamonds in the Sky has to be no 1 for me. Does anyone know if it is out on vid/DVD?

TA

Just about anything on discovery wings at the moment esp the prog about the B1 at Mountain home AFB and the one about the B52.
Downside,that **** of a presenter on flightline.
The same trailers during every break.

Piece of cake was a great book, anyone read the sequel; "A Good Clean Fight"?.About the Western Desert in WW2.Like to see that adapted for TV.Likewise "Bomber" by Len Deighton which I have just finished for the nth time.

Slightly off message but the worst aviation type movie at the moment has got to be "Pearl Harbour".Utter bilge

Twin Aisle: I watched the very same "First Flights" show as you did and remember thinking the exact same thing!!! I was appalled at the way he put the british designs down. He made out that the 707 and DC8 revolutionised air travel. How can something be revolutionised one year after the Passenger Jet Comet was introduced??? He also said, after the comet thing: "The British did invent the turboprop, though. BUT THE AMERICANS LED THE WORLD WITH THEIR PISTON-ENGINE TECHNOLOGY!" What a load of patriotic tripe! He really annoys me. As for the things he says, I now support the "Apollo 11 never landed on the moon" Theory.

Neil Armstrong was the first person on the moon. Was he? Oh.

A couple more programs I recommend on Discovery Wings @ the mo:
-A Plane Is Born (With Mark Evans)
-Friends In High Places (With Jennifer Murray & Co.)
Enjoy these programs a lot.

Cheers for now,

Tri

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http://www.aurigny.com/images.gb%20/trislander.jpg
"Ayline 221 airbourne"