The riveting story behind an exceptional test pilot, George Errington, whose career spanned three decades.

At the age of twelve, on hearing that Sir Ross Smith had broken the England-Australia aero record in a Vickers Vimy, Roly Alderson decided that he wanted to fly. Denied a secondary education, orphan Roly was an accomplished engineer by the time he arrived at Cambridge in his home-built car. He left with a degree, a racing Bentley and a pilot’s licence. Alderson had already logged several hundred hours when recruited by Imperial Airways in 1933. His skills were quickly recognized, and he was selected to fly Lord Willingdon, the Viceroy and Governor General of India, on his farewell tour of India. Alderson’s Holy Grail, nevertheless, was to ‘fly boats’, and it was not long before Roly had joined these venerated ranks on the new route to South Africa. while serving as a Captain on Imperial Airways’ prestigious New York-Bermuda service, Alderson reported a number of serious concerns regarding carburettor icing on his Short Empire flying boat Cavalier. His prescience was ignored, and on 21 January 1939, a day after penning a final warning, Cavalier was forced down into the empty wastes of the Atlantic. Due to Alderson’s consummate airmanship and the bravery of heroine passenger Edna Watson, ten of the thirteen souls on board survived. Their miraculous rescue by the tanker Esso Baytown, part of a huge international search and rescue effort, after eleven gruelling hours in cold shark-infested waters, dominated the world’s headlines. Alderson returned to duty on the long-distance flying boat routes to Singapore and Durban, but, following the German invasion of France in 1940, he was transferred to the treacherous West Africa run. After a brush with a U-boat off Sierra Leone, he was tasked with ferrying General de Gaulle back to the UK from Nigeria. After avoiding a suspected poisoning attempt at Freetown and Luftwaffe interception over the Bay of Biscay, the General personally thanked Alderson for his safe return. Later, in 1940 the British Government bought three huge Boeing flying boats to maintain the wartime transatlantic link, and Alderson was promoted to the roster for these. The hours in these behemoths were prodigious, routing via Portugal, West Africa, and Brazil, with the fear of enemy attack a constant and very real threat. Only V.I.P.s and vital mail were carried, although Alderson did once deliver President Roosevelt’s personal gift to Winston Churchill: a critical supply of Havana cigars! Adventure abounds in this remarkable story of a flying boat pilot and captain in both war and peace: racing Bentleys, landing on beaches, black-tie dinner with the Luftwaffe, landing on the Nile, flying across India, and espionage and intrigue in Lisbon.

This is the personal account of an exceptional Spitfire test pilot and RAF and Fleet Air Arm fighter pilot. Starting with lively descriptions of the pre-war Airforce in the mid-1930s, Jeffrey Quill moves on to cover his fascination test flying experiences. He took charge of some of the most important military aircraft of the time and, in particular, the immortal Spitfire, from its experimental, prototype stage in 1936 when he worked with its chief designer, R.J. Mitchell, to the end of its production in 1948.

Testpiloter beretter om oplevelser og erfaringer i forbindelse med deres særlige job

Den engelske luftfotograf Charles Sims beretter her om sine oplevelser under fotograferingsopgaver hovedsagelig taget fra luften i forb indelse med hændelser inden for flyvningens verden

"At Cambridge, as an undergraduate of St. John's, I realized that, more than anything else, I wanted to fly.A lifelong fascination and love of flying and aircrafts is fuel for this engaging autobiography by G J Christopher Paul, CB, DFC; a man bitten by the aviation bug at an air display at the age of four, and thereafter a devotee. His remarkable RAF career was followed by an eventful civilian career in aviation, which saw him organize rallies at places such as Sywell, encouraging 'flying for fun'. Both halves of his flying life are detailed here in chronological order and in his own words. Minor additions have been made to offer technical descriptions to readers unfamiliar with Paul's aviation vocabulary.The fifty year span of his career covered an incredible period of aviation history; from gaining his license in the 1920s to his retirement in the 1970s, there was virtually no iconic or, for that matter, obscure aircraft that Christopher Paul did not fly. Included in the book is an extensive appendix in which Paul details, again in chronological order, every aircraft type he flew during his career. It is a veritable roll of honor of every conceivable aircraft, both British built and International, across arguably the most important period of aviation development.Interwoven with his own career progression and experiences are world events and situations. Coupled with this we can clearly see the development of aircraft over a period of over fifty years. Eloquently written, this is the autobiography of a man who described flying a Spitfire as having 'one's own wings'; the thrill of flight is translated here, and the effect is equally thrilling. A lively account of a life in the skies. "