Tracey Curtis-Taylor finishes UK to Australia biplane flight

"Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana" (as the late, great Sir Terry Wogan once said) and once again time has indeed flown by - like an arrow, if not like a banana - since my last post on here.  You can't keep a good blogger down, though, so here I am again with a news item from last month featuring a wonderful lady adventurer who this blogger greatly admires.



Tracey Curtis-Taylor finishes UK to Australia biplane flight 

I've featured the adventures of modern-day aviatrix Tracey Curtis-Taylor on this blog before, specifically when she set out a couple of years ago in her 1942 Boeing Stearman biplane to retrace the route taken by the pioneer female pilot Lady Mary Heath from England to Cape Town, South Africa in 1928.  That journey was subsequently made into a B.B.C. documentary and jolly fascinating it was too.

Towards the end of last year Ms Curtis-Taylor undertook a new challenge - to follow the same route Amy Johnson took on her famous England-Australia flight of 1930.  In the same Stearman biplane as before Ms Curtis-Taylor took off from Farnborough in Hampshire in October to make the 14,000-mile journey across Europe, the Middle East, India, South-East Asia and Australia, just as Amy Johnson had done more than 80 years previously.

As the above article explains, Ms Curtis-Taylor landed at Sydney airport on the 9th January, thereby completing this massive trek and following in the slipstream of one of her inspirations and a proper heroine.   Tracey Curtis-Taylor is both of these as well, not only for her remarkable recreations of historic endurance flights but also for helping to keep the memory of these early aviatrices alive today, not to mention her involvement in encouraging more young women into the field of mechanical engineering.

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Tracey Curtis-Taylor mentions "not wanting to stop [flying]" in the above clip and the good news is she that she isn't intending to any time soon.  That report briefly mentions the shipping of her aeroplane to Seattle for Boeing's centenary celebrations next year, but before that Ms Curtis-Taylor has stated her intention to fly her biplane across the breadth of the United States as her next adventure and I for one can't wait to follow her progress on this new feat of endurance, continuing to emulate the pioneer women pilots of the early 20th century.  Congratulations, Ms Curtis-Taylor, and the best of luck on your next endeavour!

**Further good news in relation to this story is that the B.B.C. will be broadcasting another documentary later this year following Tracey Curtis-Taylor's England-Australia flight.  No details have been released as yet but expect it to be shown on one of the main B.B.C. channels some time in the Spring.**

Ohio museum volunteers constructing vintage B-17

Ohio museum volunteers constructing vintage B-17

As volunteers and enthusiasts at the Lincolnshire Aviation Heritage Centre here in Britain continue to work towards getting a third Avro Lancaster bomber restored to airworthy condition, so their counterparts at the Champaign Aviation Museum in Urbana, Ohio U.S.A., are undertaking an even more mammoth task - to rebuild an example of the United States' primary Second World War heavy bomber, the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress.

Of the forty-six surviving B-17 airframes known to exist around the world, thirteen are currently in airworthy condition - including Sally B, the only flying example in Britain, based at the Imperial War Museum Duxford.  The majority are of course located in museums across America and in a few years' time, if all goes well, they will be joined by this fourteenth - Champaign Lady.

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The volunteers at the Champaign Aviation Museum - many of them U.S. Air Force veterans themselves - must be commended for taking on this project, for it is so much more than a simple restoration.  With no more complete or intact airframes forthcoming, these enthusiasts have taken to scavenging parts piecemeal and - where they no longer exist - making them themselves from Boeing's own original blueprints.  In effect, then, this is more a completely new-build aircraft than a restoration, with the promise of a machine better than a Boeing production model from the 1940s at the end of it.

With the famous Memphis Belle currently undergoing restoration at the nearby National Museum of the U.S.A.F. and destined never to fly again following designation as a national treasure, it is more important than ever that airworthy examples of this aircraft continue flying in the future.  The prospect of one built to modern tolerances with largely new parts is an exciting one, as it will no doubt ensure that at least one B-17 Flying Fortress will be flying and thrilling new generations for decades to come.  Good luck to them, say I, and I can't wait to see it!

WWII veterans take flight in vintage biplane

WWII veterans take flight in vintage biplane 

I chanced upon this story from across the Pond last week and as well as involving a classic inter-war biplane the whole idea behind it brought such a smile to my face that I just had to share it.

The concept of ex-servicemen being taken aloft decades later in the very machines they flew during the Second World War is not unheard of - it has happened here in the UK with Battle of Britain pilots going up in 2-seat Spitfires, for example - but the instances in this case are sweetened by the wider story of the flights, not to mention the great geographical expanse of the United States which makes a countrywide "barnstorming" (!) aerial tour much more of an adventure than, say, a simple flip up to Scotland or across the Channel would here.

It's the kind of pioneering experience one would expect to have read about in the early years of flight, when barnstorming was a new, exciting way of seeing the country and there's always been a certain romantic quality about the freedom of being able to fly where you pleased and give the people on the ground a thrill as you passed through.

Father-son duo bring high flying memories back to veterans

As such it's great to see these two chaps "living the dream" in such a wonderfully old-fashioned way and, what's more, having the kindness and selflessness to recognise the debt of gratitude owed to the men who learnt to fly in the same aircraft 70 years ago and to give them the opportunity to fly again.  Well done, and here's wishing them many happy landings!

Aircraft sets hypersonic record at six times the speed of sound

Aircraft sets hypersonic record at six times the speed of sound

Another story of mankind's continued attempts to push the boundaries of known science and technology, this time with the successful testing of the Boeing X-51A scramjet. It might not look like much at the moment, but contained within that missile-like shell is the potential future of hypersonic flight. If you thought Concorde was fast at twice the speed of sound, try and imagine something three times as fast! London to Sydney in little more than 2 hours, for example. Of course this is only the first flight of the first of its kind and we're talking years, probably decades of development before any real practical use my be arrived at. But just to read about this successful test and to know that there are people out there tirelessly working to "push the envelope", to strive for further advancements in technology and ability, is thrilling stuff. It shows that there is still so much for us to achieve and discover and that once again the human imagination seemingly knows no bounds.