News RIP Eric 'Winkle' Brown:

[Notebook]

The Royal Navy's most decorated pilot, Capt Eric "Winkle" Brown, has died at the age of 97.
Capt Brown also held the world record for flying the greatest number of different types of aircraft - 487.
During World War Two, Capt Brown, who was born in Leith in 1919, flew fighter aircraft and witnessed the liberation of Bergen Belsen concentration camp.
The pilot, who had been appointed MBE, OBE and CBE, died at East Surrey Hospital after a short illness.

That's one record unlikely to be broken, remarkable career.

After World War II‚ Brown commanded the Enemy Aircraft Flight, an elite group of pilots who test-flew captured German and Italian aircraft. That experience makes Brown one of the few men qualified to compare both Allied and Axis aeroplanes as they flew during the war. He flight-tested 53 German aircraft, including the Me 163B Komet rocket fighter. His flight test of this rocket plane, apparently the only one by an Allied pilot, was accomplished unofficially: it was deemed to be more or less suicidal due to the notoriously dangerous propellants C-Stoff and T-Stoff. Brown also flight tested all three of the German jet designs to see front-line action in the war: the Messerschmitt Me 262 and the Arado Ar 234, each type powered by Junkers Jumo 004 engines, and the BMW 003-powered Heinkel He 162 turbojet combat aircraft.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Brown_(pilot)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-35626854

List of aircraft flown:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_flown_by_Eric_"Winkle"_Brown

Tim Peake:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-35628774
N.

 

[Ravenous]

Fascinating bloke - I've heard his name before, he did a lot of tests of carrier landings (another scary duty I guess!)

I was just thinking about the Komet ME-163 (rocket launched "glider") which has always fascinated me...

When I used to do a little sailplane flying, the standard logbooks we were issued had a field for each flight's launch method. Always "W" (winch) for me. But there was a list including "R", Rocket... so I assume there may be some people out there who have done rocket launched glide flights in the past...

Does anyone else know of any non-military rocket-launched glider, modern types or oldies? (I guess it would be ridiculously inefficient for typical low-airspeed sailplanes.)

 

[Urwumpe]

Does anyone else know of any non-military rocket-launched glider, modern types or oldies? (I guess it would be ridiculously inefficient for typical low-airspeed sailplanes.)

It could get you a lot of altitude quickly if your plane survives it ... But I suspect, R means something like JATO bottles.

 

[ADSWNJ]

Fascinating bloke - I've heard his name before, he did a lot of tests of carrier landings (another scary duty I guess!)

I was just thinking about the Komet ME-163 (rocket launched "glider") which has always fascinated me...

When I used to do a little sailplane flying, the standard logbooks we were issued had a field for each flight's launch method. Always "W" (winch) for me. But there was a list including "R", Rocket... so I assume there may be some people out there who have done rocket launched glide flights in the past...

Does anyone else know of any non-military rocket-launched glider, modern types or oldies? (I guess it would be ridiculously inefficient for typical low-airspeed sailplanes.)

Space Shuttle would be the ultimate rocket launched glider! The new Virgin Galactic SS2 is a glide reentry (not sure if it's unpowered right to the runway though).


Godspeed to Mr Brown. Hope he has gone to a better place now.

 

[boogabooga]

I suppose the XCOR Lynx will be the closest thing to an Me-163 experience in the foreseeable future, minus the toxic fuels (hopefully).

Wow, he flew for real just about every plane modeled in Il-2 1946, and most of the add-on ones as well.