The Gloucester Aircraft Corporation had re-designed and extensively modified the Mark II Goshawk for a longer-range ground-based fleet protection role some years ago. More recently, as an expedient to cover the period◦– as little as three and as many as six years◦– before the first generation of jet interceptors was likely to come into general squadron service, the Mark III, a heavier, slightly slower and less nimble version of the Mark II but with approximately twice the operational range, had been given a significantly more robust undercarriage and structurally strengthened to enable it to fly off, and the hard bit, land on the pitching deck of an aircraft carrier at sea.
On the plus side, the Mark IV’s 1,475 horse-power power plant made it the Mark II’s match for speed, if not manoeuvrability and because of its bull-like construction on land at least, serious take-off and landing ‘incidents’ were statistically speaking, occasionally ‘survivable’. The problem was that the Goshawk Mark IV was the Royal Navy’s principal sea-borne scout-interceptor and each of the new Ulysses class ships were listed to carry at least two squadrons of them and there were not enough naval pilots to fly the aircraft now rolling off the production lines.
Old hands like Alex had been asking themselves how on earth the Navy was going to find the pilots to fly so many Mark IVs. Now he knew and putting a good spin on it was not going to be straightforward. It was this which had impelled him to commandeer the first three Goshawk IVs delivered to Idlewild Field and to lead his best two jockeys on this little ‘proving flight’.
The base’s Royal Navy Liaison Officer (RNLO) had tried to give them a pep talk last night, and◦– give him credit, he was a persistent cove◦– that morning before the off.
‘There’s nothing to it,’ he had explained. ‘You crank down the hook and let the birds glide onto the after part of the flight deck. The ‘sweet spot’ is marked by a big cross and smaller markings indicate less ideal but still safe touch-down points where you are still likely to catch a wire…’
Obviously, it was not that simple.
A Mark IV’s stalling speed was around seventy-eight or nine knots◦– about ninety miles per hour◦– at sea level which normally meant a minimum safe landing speed was going to be in excess of a hundred miles an hour, maybe as high as one hundred and twenty. Any faster and the kite would squash down on its under-cart, breaking something, or ‘bounce’ back into the air, either way a pilot was liable to lose control and it was going to hurt. In a nutshell, landing on a carrier’s flight deck entailed putting down on a moving runway◦– one-fiftieth the size of the target on land◦– steaming into the wind at around twenty-five knots. Moreover, to avoid bouncing over the four evenly spaced ‘traps’◦– tensioned steel hawsers raised off the deck just high enough to catch a plane’s tail hook◦– a Goshawk Mark IV had to hit the deck at a closing speed of around a hundred knots.
Four ‘traps’ sounded reassuring… sort of.
However, there was a reason the Navy called the fourth ‘trap’ the ‘FOR CHRIST-SAKE’S WIRE’: because even if your hook caught it the odds were that the best one could hope for was a crash with◦– or without◦– the aircraft nosing forward onto its propeller or worse, slewing over the side of the ship…
The RNLO had briefed Alex about the advanced ‘mirror landing system’ installed on all the big carriers; the CO of 7NY had been more interested in the Landing Officer’s ‘light board’, visible for two to three miles distant.
Two reds◦– too high, abort.
One red◦– too high, adjust.
Green◦– on glide path.
Green and red◦– left of the glide path.
Green and yellow◦– right of the glide path.
‘Watch for the WAVE OFF officers standing in the small sponsons either side of the fantail of the ship. Watch their bats very hard during the final approach…”
In extremis these latter ‘bat men’ had been known to fire flares directly in front of, or directly at aircraft that looked as if they were going to crash into the stern or the wake of a carrier.
‘Look, don’t be upset if only one of you gets down successfully and the others have to return to Idlewild,’ the RNLO, a Naval Air Service pilot of Alex’s vintage who comported himself with the exaggerated care of a man who had taken one knock too many. “That’s par for the course. Give your chaps a couple of goes at this. The third attempt is usually the stickiest if a fellow has had to abort a couple of times.’
HMS Perseus looked like a floating wall of steel from the quayside but right now as Alex began his approach from the north-east, she looked like a tiny grey speck in the distance.
He was still too far out to be worrying about mirrors and light boards. To either side of him his wingmen, both old-timers◦– real old lags◦– like him, had taken up formation three or four wingspans away, attempting to conform to his every move. They would peel off at about eight hundred yards from the carrier, hopefully, if he got down in one piece, they would have got a feel for the right glide path and throttle settings by then, giving them a better chance at lining up for their own landings on the postage stamp size crosses on the deck of the Perseus when their turn came.
TWO REDS!
Jesus, those lights were bright!
No, not going to abort this far out…
He chopped back on the power and the Goshawk sank towards the grey, white horse-flecked North Atlantic.
ONE RED!
Still over three miles out but suddenly closing horribly fast.
Maximum flaps!
GREEN AND YELLOW!
How the fuck did I drift left?
Perhaps, the wind had shifted?
Once a carrier was landing aircraft it would not change course unless the wind backed or it was under attack.
Alex had no excess mental capacity to check to see if his wingmen were still clinging to his coat tails. This was one of those scout pilot’s classic every man for himself moments. He blinked, sweat stinging his eyes, a spasm of cramp shot up his right arm.
Try not to grip the stick so bloody hard, old man…
GREEN!
Shit I’m almost on top of the bloody ship!
He glimpsed the Landing Officer flattening his big paddles across his chest.
The Goshawk hit the deck with a jarring crunch.
Alex was brutally snapped forward in his straps.
The engine was roaring but the aircraft was stationary.
Without conscious thought he cut the throttle to idle.
There was a man already pulling back his cockpit hood.
“UNHOOKED!” The man in the greasy yellow dungarees of a flight deck crewman yelled in his ear. He reached in and thumped Alex’s right shoulder. “Gun the engine, sir!” He said into the pilot’s face as if cognisant that he was still in a state of shock. “Hit the WINGS FOLD switch and taxi STRAIGHT AHEAD! We’re parking you forward of the island.”
Presently, he was ordered to kill the engine.
Strong arms helped him out and manhandled him clear of his aircraft as a gang of men in yellow, black and red dungarees pushed his Goshawk so close to the edge of the deck he thought for a moment they were going to pitch her over the side. Then he was being escorted through a door into the quiet of the ‘Island’, HMS Perseus’s bridge superstructure located approximately half-way down the vessel’s starboard flank.
It was not until he stepped into Flight Control, the fiefdom of the Commander, Carrier Air Wing (CAW), that Alex truly started to get his faculties back into gear.