by captjeff | May 9, 2020 | Plane Tales
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Ian Palmer’s life has hardly gone as smoothly as he might have wished. Born into a family of musicians, particularly drummers including Carl Palmer of the band ELP, he started off as a very successful drummer himself. What he didn’t know was that he suffered from a condition that carries great stigma and frequently leads to ruin and death… alcoholism.
This is the first part of an inspiring and brutally honest interview that follows his life from drumming into aviation.
Title image: Ian Palmer with Steve White of the Paul Weller band, Brian Bennett of The Shadows and Pete Cater.
Ian Palmer… drummer.
Images with thanks to Ian Palmer.
by captjeff | May 2, 2020 | Plane Tales
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Born in Wales to immigrant parents he would grow to a height of 6’ 6” and climbing into the cockpit of a World War II fighter was going to be a problem… but he managed it and before long had earned the moniker Lofty. He would pen books that charmed children for generations and generations for Lofty, who was an army officer, fighter pilot and spy was better known as the renown author who sold over 100 million copies of his books, Roald Dahl.
Roald Dahl.
The Gloster Gladiator.
Roald Dahl’s WWII flying helmet.
Roald Dahl in later life signing books in Amsterdam in front of an adoring audience.
Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to Paramount pictures, the US Library of Congress, the British Government, DeFacto and Rob Bogaerts.
by captjeff | Apr 27, 2020 | Plane Tales
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Fifty three years ago a man fell to earth. He came from space having survived the appallingly hostile conditions that exist there. Apart from the hard vacuum, the electromagnetic radiation, the intense cold, the cosmic rays and other damaging particles that exist there. Despite overcoming numerous failures on his Soyuz-1 spacecraft he had achieved the near impossible and piloted a manual reentry… all he had to do now was to wait for the life saving parachutes to deploy.
Colonel Vladimir Komarov
The Soyuz 1 capsule.
The aftermath of the Soyuz 1 crash.
The commemorative plaque and the Fallen Astronaut sculpture left on the Moon by the crew of Apollo 15.
Vladimir Komarov with his wife Valentina Yakovlevna and daughter Irina.
Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to NFCC, Smithsonian Institute, NASA and the US Gov.
by captjeff | Apr 18, 2020 | Plane Tales
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The German name for the Shrike songbird is Würger, which also means Strangler and by coincidence, was also the name given to the Focke-Wulf 190, a World War II fighter which quickly became one of the most feared Axis fighters of the 2nd World War. Various dubious plans were made to get hold of one to reveal its secrets but then along came Oberleutnant Armin Faber.
Armin Faber’s gift in RAF markings.
The Shoreham Aircraft Museum.
Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to the Imperial War Museum, FO Watkins and the Shoreham Aircraft Museum.
by captjeff | Apr 13, 2020 | Plane Tales
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Dick Andrews was flying over the battle of A Sầu in Vietnam and feeling deja view as he saw what was going on beneath him. It took his mind back to the day in WWII when he landed his P38 Lightning in a field to rescue his leader who had crash landed there. Now he was watching the same thing happening below except a Skyraider was landing amongst enemy Viet Cong and not German troops. A remarkable coincidence and a remarkable pair of stories.
Bernie Fisher wearing his Medal of Honour in 2008.
Fisher and Myers after the rescue.
Fisher’s damaged A-1E.
Dick Andrews and Dick Willsie squeezed into the same P38 cockpit.
Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to the USAF and March Field Air Museum.
by captjeff | Apr 5, 2020 | Plane Tales
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I was about to enter the Devil’s Triangle, the Limbo of the Lost, the Twilight Zone or the Hoodoo Sea… more commonly referred to as the Bermuda Triangle. What dangers awaited, would I disappear like the famous loss of the 5 Avengers of Flight 19! Listen to this terrifying story of myth and mystery!
A fine example of a Pseudoscience.
The Bermuda Triangle.
Images under Creative Commons licence with thanks to Lt Cdr Horace Bristol, US Navy, Alphaios and People’s Cyclopedia of Universal Knowledge (1883)
