I knew TCT from her days working at The Fighter Collection at Duxford and had flown with her several times over the years in various aircraft. She held a New Zealand CPL and a British and FAA PPL and was experienced flying her ’Ryan’ and previously ‘Chipmunk’ aircraft along with an assortment of several others. The ‘Ryan’ is quite demanding to fly during several phases of flight – ask Harrison Ford!
In preparation for one of her ‘epics’ she had asked me to bring her up to speed on the Garmin GNS430 and navigating with this, bearing in mind the Stearman she was going to be flying did not have a Direction Indicator, just a compass!
We used a Modern Air Piper Archer for the ‘mission’ and I disabled the slaved compass system to replicate her aircraft’s equipment. We departed for our navigation sortie around the Luton CTR using BPK, BNN, HEN, WCO and then direct back to Fowlmere.
The weather was actually IMC at 2,300ft and TCT settled nicely into the cruise, flying on ‘Limited Panel’. I did think about abandoning the exercise as it was now going to be quite demanding flying with the compass only for direction and entering the waypoints in the GPS however the ‘student’ was coping well and as we approached BPK she loaded the next waypoint (BNN) into the GPS and around the zone we went. I remember being ‘impressed’ and thought it was a very worthwhile exercise and that it had not presented TCT with any difficulty.
The compass errors are significant particularly during turns and it did make me realise that her proposed flight was going to be more challenging than I had realised and I remember asking whether a DI could be fitted!
I was fortunate to be invited to Farnborough for the departure party and introduced to several sponsors including Diana Rigg from ‘The Avengers’ and of course the ‘Bond’ movie. It was slightly surreal for me to be sitting in ‘The Aviators’ Bar with this elegant and charming lady sipping Champagne.
The next day we departed in ‘loose’ formation. Me flying the ‘chase’ aircraft (GJACS) for the first couple of legs across France in CAVOK conditions. We went to Merville to clear Customs and refuel; easy when you arrive in a Stearman and another Stearman owner just happens to be there! On we went to Charleville for a night stop. As I went to depart back to Le Touquet the next morning TCT generously handed me her dirty washing to take home!