Hi, Andrew, are you old enough to have acquired the spotting habit by spotting engines at Bletchley?
Pat L.
I'm not ..
still some decades off my
biblical term. I'm not sure where I picked up the interest but I think it was a combination of flying oilfields in
Africa and middle East, as well as frequent visits to Cuba. One gets to see and fly many interesting rusty and dangerous planes in such a life. As recently as 2000 I travelled on an oilfield service Viscount (1949 vintage) to the Shetlands. Ilyushin 62s (copy of Vickers VC-10), Ilyushin 18s (a copy of the Bristol
Britannia) and Antonov 2 biplanes were
still in common use on my last Cuba visit a couple of years ago, not to mention slightly more modern Yakolevs and Tupolevs. In a recent visit to Sao Paulo it was great to see a line-up of still-operational 707s, working for a freight company. I was happy to fly Concorde a few years back, a 1960s plane. Not so very long ago I flew an Air Gabon 747-100 with that spiral staircase going to the upper deck. It was apparently an ex Pan-Am plane, one of the original 1970s delivery batch. I flew a while back in a 727 from Linea Congo whose tailplane was shot-up in a firefight in Brazzaville the same day. There was an extensive debate as to whether it was
still safe to fly the bullet-riddled plane, concluding with switching it out for a rusty 737-200 with far fewer seats. Everyone just took their baggage on board the smaller 737 and filled the aisles with it; the excess passengers just
sat on their bags in the aisles or in the galley/door areas. They were as safe as anyone, as there weren't many working seat belts in the proper seats anyway. Great fun! Though one of my colleagues
had an extreme touch of nerves. We fed him excellent Congolese beer.
I'd collect and fly antique planes like these if I could, but they take up too much space. Coins are smaller. And safer. Though "safe" can be dull.