Test, Fame and Glory

I love that in the early 1900s aeroplanes were met with both trepidation and fascination (a lot of people had all their eggs firmly in the zeppelin basket). But one thing's for sure - the pilots of these early craft certainly didn't fly below radar (pardon the pun). They were celebrities. The pre and interwar period in particular saw pilots jostling to break records, flying faster, higher and further, and often (in the UK anyway) encouraged by dizzying prize money offered by the Daily Mail.

This being pre-pressurised cabin-days, mean't all sorts of dangerous and giddy attempts at world firsts including the first Atlantic hop (16 hours) by Captain John Alcock and Arthur Whitten (10 grand and a Knighthood, thanks) and the first attempt to successfully fly over the summit of Mount Everest in 1933 (almost 33, 000 feet). Flight Lieutenant David Fowler McIntyre and Douglas Douglas-Hamilton managed it in just over 3 hours in a plane that looks terrifyingly toothpick-y, and required both pilots to wear heated electric flying suits.

Other cool test pilots include:
Chuck Yeager who broke the sound barrier in 1947, proving going that fast doesn't turn you into steaming blancmange or a robot's fart, Eric 'Winkle' Brown, who has flown more aircraft types than anyone else in the world and Maria Popovich who set 107 world records on 40 different craft.

And of course, a ton of astronauts. Including Neil Armstrong. Listening to BBC Radio 4 recently I was absorbed by an interview with author and journalist Andrew Smith. He was talking about test pilots in relation to the Virgin Galactic crash, and the conversation naturally segued into space travel and his book Moon Dust, an affecting account of the men who went to space, so many of whom had test pilot backgrounds. I bought the book. I am half way through. I can feel my life changing.

So there it is. Test pilots. The pioneers, prize winners and famous dare devils who became the bridge between aeronautics and astronautics. The thread that ties it all together.

Which of course, now flings this blog wide, wide open...

Your pressure keeps lifting me higher, than I've ever been lifted before

After my last entry focussed on the incredible out-window barfing that happened on commercial planes in the 20s and early 30s, my thoughts turned to the comparatively less dramatic (but no less skilled) branded in-bag barfing that accompanied the age of the pressurised cabin. Other added bonuses included higher speeds and higher altitudes without sacrificing good people to hypoxia and enlarged hearts (you only want one of those if it's a metaphor for you being totally ace.)

The Boeing 307 Stratoliner was the world's first commercial plane with a pressurised cabin, in 1938. And the first pressurised commercial jet airliner (designed to pop up to 36,000 feet) was the British De Havilland Comet (1949).

Boasting large, square windows it looked dreamy. Until it crashed in 1954. Twice. From metal fatigue. But the best thing to come out of the true horror of that double disaster was a simple change in design. The corners of the De Havilland's fancy square frames we're to blame. Wonder why all jet planes have oval windows? As soon as the problem was uncovered, the only way was (quite literally) up, and the only shape was round.

Sometimes cutting corners totally works out...

Now for some gratuitous plane pictures from my pressurised friend Ryan Air. The journey was Stanstead to Barcelona. We had to wake at 5am to get this flight. 5am. That's time's equivalent to the highest altitude ever.

One in one out...

Pyranees.

Some doofus who thinks she's a 6-year-old boy.