Believe it or not!

'Airport' was a 1970 Hollywood blockbuster film starring Burt Lancaster and Dean Martin that had grossed nearly $100,500,000. This film, based on a bestseller Arthur Hailey's 1968 novel of the same name, focuses on an airport manager trying to keep his airport open during a snow storm, while a suicidal bomber plots to blow up a Boeing 707 airliner in flight. The story took place at a fictional Lincoln International Airport located near Chicago, Illinois in USA.

Great success achieved by this film, opened the floodgates of films about disasters on airplanes and airports. Number of new films on similar subjects were released in later years. One of the favourite subject for such air disaster films was the mid air incapacitation of the pilot due to some reason or other and then successful landing of the aircraft by a passenger, with very little prior flying experience.

Actually, two films, touching the same subject and titled as "Flight Into Danger" (1956) and "Zero Hour" (1957), were released much before “Airport.” The former film showed the pilots falling victim to food poisoning and a small planes pilot t taking over the controls of a large passenger plane. In the latter movie once again the passengers and pilots were affected by food poisoning. In this film, an air force pilot, lands the plane. Other films about airplane disasters include, "Airport 1975" (1974), "Snakes on a Plane" (2006), "United 93" (2006) and "Air Force One" (1997).

Readers might be wondering as to why I have been listing Hollywood flicks here. The sole reason for this is that these kind of incidents, which I had so far considered to be the realm of Hollywood imagination, has actually become a reality. It is surely a case for believe it or not!

Sandtoft Airfield, also known as Sandtoft Aerodrome, is located in Belton, North Lincolnshire, England. It is managed and operated by Sandtoft Flying Club Ltd.,who operate a flying school and cafe at the airfield. On 8^th October 2013, a Cessna 172 aircraft took off from this airstrip, with only two people on board, the pilot and a lone 77 year old passenger, John Wildey. They were scheduled to fly to Skegness, which is a seaside town and civil parish in the East Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England. The flight was uneventful and later the passenger- Pilot duo, again took off from Skegness to return to Sandtoft. As they were nearing their destination, the lone passenger in the aircraft, John Wildey realised that the pilot had just collapsed in the cockpit of the plane. He instantly became aware that he was in serious trouble, because even though he was a flying enthusiast, he had never had taken a flying lesson. He had flown before on several occasions as a passenger but never flown an aeroplane on his own before. He didn’t know the layout of the aeroplane. He didn’t have lights on so he was absolutely flying blind as well.

It is not known, how he managed to contact the air traffic control, which called two flying instructors to advise the passenger, named only as "John", on how to bring the plane down and a RAF Sea King helicopter was scrambled to provide assistance. Under instructions, John Wildey actually changed the flight course to a nearby airport at Humberside. This Airport is a small international airport, situated at Kirmington in the Borough of North Lincolnshire, England.

The two instructors talked down to John Gildey and correctly brought the plane on the runway. Deborah Zost, operations director at Humberside Airport says: “ "We had to get him to do two to three circuits. The last one was not very good so we told him to go round again and on the fourth one he managed it. He did a beautiful landing in my opinion. He was calm. He was answering the calls I made to him quite professionally. I would not be frightened to fly with him."

Observers on the airfield saw sparks as the plane landed. It came down with a bump, hit the front end down, I heard some crashing and it came to a halt. Police, fire and ambulance crews, who were ready at this North Lincolnshire airport, removed the passenger and the pilot out from the light aircraft at about 18:25 PM. And the aircraft was towed away as if nothing had happened. Only Two incoming flights were delayed in the whole affair. Only then it was realised that the pilot had actually died in his seat.

Later, John Wildey spoke to reporters. He said: " I had plenty of doubts, because I just didn't know what was going to happen. Luckily [the instructors] were talking to me on the radio all the time, so that was helping me. They gave me confidence." He was however very sad for the loss of his pilot friend, who according to him was a brilliant man.

One of the flying instructors, Roy Murray, who brought John Gildey safely down says: "For somebody who is not a pilot but has been around airfields and been a passenger on several occasions to take control is nothing short of phenomenal. The man is nothing short of a hero."

I think all of us would agree with that, won't we?

11 October 2013

Looking for hidden fighter planes

In the fading years of the world war II, the war with Japan still raged on in Asia. Royal air force had sent in 1945, number of brand new Spitfire fighter planes to Burma for fighting the war. There is a story going round British military aviation circles that on the orders of Lord Mountbatten, scores of brand new Mark XIV Spitfires were buried in 1945, somewhere near the Mingaladon airfield of Yangon, a major British base in Burma. The Spitfires were all in unused and unassembled condition and were packed into crates and buried.

A farmer and an aircraft enthusiast from Lincolnshire in Britain, Mr. David Cundall, heard the story in 1996 and was absolutely fascinated by it. The Spitfire aircraft have a very special place in British history as they were actively involved in the Battle of Britain. Today, even to find one Spitfire could be considered as a major find. According to this story, 36 planes were supposed to be buried at that site.

Mr. David Cundall decided to find out the truth about the story. He first sought out eyewitness accounts from American and British service personnel, who told him how number of brand new planes were buried in 1945 in Burma under the orders of Lord Mountbatten. He then travelled to Burma to corroborate the rumours with eyewitnesses. He met one local Burmese man, who recalled that his father and he himself (15 year old that time), had transported timber (used to make crates) to the place where the Spitfires were buried and even took him to the spot where the planes had been buried.

Mr. Cundall has been consistently pursuing his efforts for last 16 years to dig out these aircrafts from their graves. He had to overcome many hurdles to realize his ambitions. He has repeatedly visited Burma under control of a military junta and has faced the subject of international sanctions against Burma. He has poured in tens of thousands of pounds of his own money into the venture. An electronic scan was carried out on the site in 2004, which revealed that some material of "high electrical conductivity" was buried between 30ft and 50ft below the ground.

In spite of all the confidence and the efforts put in by Mr. Cundall, nothing could proceed since Britain had enforced total sanctions against Burma, which were lifted only this year. (2012). Mr Cundall was in contact with the British Prime minister, who finally requested this year, the president of Myanmar, if the Spitfires could be recovered and there was broad agreement. British Government allowed Mr. Cundall to negotiate the terms with the Myanmar government and also to sign the contract, which was done recently.

He collected a small group like minded people who were equally interested in the project. Dr. Roger Clark, a Leeds University geophysicist, who has been involved in the Spitfire search since April 1998, Dr Adam Booth of Imperial College London and Andy Brockman, who is the Project archaeologist are in Cundall's team. A gaming company Wargaming.net has agreed to provide financial support for the hunt. After the contract was signed Mr Cundall managed to drill a borehole at one of the sites and managed to lower a camera down the borehole. According to Mr. Cundall, what they saw and thought was an aeroplane but obviously there was nothing conclusive as it is uncertain, what condition the planes might be in, having been underground for 67 years. However Mr. Cundall remains 100% confident, that the objects detected below earth, are the missing Spitfires.

In January 2013, a team of about 17 people, will fly out to Burma for the excavation. This team will include British archaeologists, academics from Leeds University and an American film crew. It is hoped that the digging, which will involve examining layer by layer of soil, will begin in January itself and that the first evidence of the Spitfires should be available in a few days time later.

Mr. Cundall is confident that if the Spitfires are found, it will be possible to fly them again. However, no one knows, what condition the planes might be in, having been underground for 67 years. According to an aircraft restoration company, cost of rebuilding each machine is likely to be between 2 to 3 Million British Pounds.

If Mr. Cundall is able to sale any of the salvaged aircraft, he is expected to retain 30% of the profits, rest being shared by his agent and the Burmese Government. British government has already released any ownership rights and are not involved in any commercial arrangements regarding the dig and did not claim any rights to the Spitfires. They however hope that these beautiful World War II machines, which were part of Britain's history, grace the Skies of Britain again.

We must admire the fortitude, doggedness and sheer perseverance shown By Mr. Cundall in pursuing what his heart desired and should wish him all success.

1 December 2012

The Staffordshire Treasures

 

There are people, who always hope to find a hidden treasure under ground or inside a wall of a ruin. Mr. Terry Herbert of Burntwood in Staffordshire, England is one such person. He however looks for hidden treasures with a metal detector. For this purpose, he uses a state of the art metal detector.

 

Terry was looking for hidden treasures under a farm, belonging to his friend. The exact location of this farm has not been disclosed, for obvious reasons. All of a sudden, the metal detector started buzzing. With a feeling of great anticipation and expectation, Terry and his friend started digging the ground on that very spot. They fond several wooden boxes, buried at that spot. They lifted the boxes out of the ground and opened them. They just could not believe their eyes with what was stacked in the boxes.

 

All the boxes, which Terry and his farmer friend had dug out from the farmland, were packed with gold and silver weapon fittings and warfare paraphernalia, including sword pommel caps and hilt plates inlaid with precious stones. The collection contained articles weighing about 5 kilograms of gold and about 2.5 kilograms of silver. In al,l there were 1500 items including a gold strip with a Biblical inscription.
Terry and his friend immediately called Mr. Duncan Slarke, liaison officer for Staffordshire. He says that he was wonderstruck with what he saw and could not even utter a word for some time. All the boxes contained articles, which were superlative examples of Anglo-Saxon workmanship. What really surprised him was the total absence of any article of feminine use such as dress fittings, brooches or pendants.

Work on cataloguing and valuing the treasures is now going on in the Birmingham Museum under expert guidance of Dr Kevin Leahy. He says that all the archaeologists who have worked with the treasures have been awestruck. He also felt that it has been actually quite scary, working on this material, which is of such great wealth.  The treasures appear to be from a period around 700 A.D.
It appears that after a war fought in that period, the victorious army must have removed all the weapon trappings and other articles from the defeated soldiers and their generals. They might not have been able to carry the war trophies or the loot with them at that time for some reason or other and must have buried it for safekeeping for the time. Due to some unknown reasons, they were never able to retrieve the trophies again, the treasures were hidden underground until Terry, and his friend found it. There is also another theory, that some person must have buried his lifetime collection of these articles for safekeeping. Birmingham museum would keep the exhibits open for viewing by general public until 13 October 2009.
Mr.Terry Herbert feels that some dead souls or spirits of yesteryear tell him, where to find gold coins. That day, instead of coins, they told him about gold.