Kisses From Nimbus Read online

  Chairing the meeting was, the then, General Manager Operations BA – Douglas Newham. Douglas had been a Royal Air Force pilot with Bomber Command during the Second World War, and for his many exploits he had been awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross. We got along well together, and we would later become good friends. He made it clear to us that the prime minister of the day, Margaret Thatcher, had instructed him to provide us with whatever resources the company had to hand.

  Before the meeting closed, and we all retired to the boardroom for lunch with the chairman, Sir John King, it was agreed that British Airways would make two things available to the regiment.

  The first was access to any of the wide range of aircraft, then operated by them, for the unrestricted use of the UK antiterrorist team. Provided the company received reasonable notice, then an aircraft would be positioned onto an RAF airfield, normally Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, and left entirely at the regiment’s disposal. The SP team would then be able to practice assault techniques in a much more realistic environment, than a prefabricated mock-up shell.

  The second thing that was agreed, was that they would provide me with anything that I may need, in order for me to build up my cover to become a convincing airline pilot. We came up with the suggestion that if I received sufficient training, then I was likely to be able to get on board a hijacked aircraft, provided the negotiators could reassure the hijackers that a change of crew was necessary.

  I managed to convince everyone around the table that to become a credible airline pilot, experienced on just about any type of airliner, would take much more than simply donning an appropriate uniform. Apart from learning to fly a wide range of aircraft, from the small turboprop boneshakers used for island-hopping around the UK, to the very latest 747 transcontinental jets and the supersonic Concorde, I would also need to become totally familiar with the everyday routines of an airline pilot. The only way to do that was to, effectively, become a British Airways Senior First Officer. And so, the stall was set for my next three years of employment as a private soldier, more often referred to as a ‘Jundi’, in the Special Air Service.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Strange though it may seem, I found the introduction to my new life as an airline pilot somewhat exciting. Of course, I was still a soldier, as I had been throughout all my adult life, but I felt that I was about to embark on a new career. Not as a soldier, but as an ‘actor’. And an actor is exactly what I would have to become since my whole connection with the airline industry would, of course, be a complete sham. I was convinced that if I were to play the role of Patrick James Riley, airline pilot then I would have to do it as meticulously as I possibly could. I knew that if ever I was thrust onto the stage in earnest, there would be no prompt to help me out, and any fumbling of my lines could result in desperate consequences, not only for me but possibly for many other people.

  Doug Newham, who I later became good friends with, agreed with the concept of me becoming, for all intent and purposes, a full-time pilot employed by British Airways. Doug introduced me to Captain Mike Channing who was nominated to become my mentor in the early stages of my transition. He, in turn, introduced me to Flight Engineer Peter Robinson, who could cover for Mike whilst on flying duties. Both Mike and Peter took me under their wing and helped me to find my way around the huge complex of offices. They also lead me through the procedures to take up my new appointment as a qualified Royal Air Force pilot joining the company.

  I spent a couple of days in and around the Queens Building, familiarising myself with the day-to-day things such as; carparking, administration offices, catering facilities, security and such like, and was then issued with an employee number and identity card. After being allocated the rank of Senior First Officer, indicated by three broad silver bands on each arm, I was issued with two full sets of uniform.

  Mike Channing liaised with a chap from the UK Civil Aviation Authority by the name of Neil Monks, who arranged for me to be issued with a current Airline Transport Pilots’ Licence. The specific aircraft type upon which I was supposedly qualified, and normally included in the licence, was intentionally left blank for me to simply fill in should it ever be necessary for me to produce it to a hijacker.

  At that stage of my life, I was a reasonably well-qualified pilot with over five thousand flying hours under my belt, albeit with the clear majority of them on helicopters. As I strapped into the right-hand seat of the Lockheed L-1011 TriStar, I recalled that the last time I had flown a fixed-wing aeroplane was on my ab initio flying training with the Army Air Corps. The basic Army Pilot’s course was in those days, undertaken on the de Havilland Chipmunk T10, a tiny two-seater piston-engine trainer weighing less than a tonne, and capable of cruising at around ninety knots.

  The aircraft I was now strapping on to my back was enormous, weighing in at over two hundred tonnes and having a cruising speed in excess of five hundred knots. It felt to me as though I would be able to fit the tiny Chipmunk I had last flown into the cavernous cockpit of the fifty million pound TriStar airliner.

  In the left-hand seat, with the flying checklist in one hand and a steaming cup of coffee in the other sat Captain Dave Martin. Dave was a large powerful man, ruggedly handsome, and with the top button of his shirt undone and sleeves rolled up, he looked more like he was about to start digging a trench than to supervise my flying. He hailed from Liverpool, where his father had once been Chief Constable. He was a no-nonsense sort of bloke with a booming laugh and a great sense of humour. “Ok, Red let’s have a couple of circuits and bumps to start with. Just don’t make the bumps too big and, for heaven’s sake, don’t bend the aeroplane or make me spill my coffee.”

  Dave received clearance to taxi to the hold of runway three one from the Air Traffic Control tower and gave me a nod as he nonchalantly took a sip from his beaker. Jim, the flight engineer sitting between us, and a little to the rear leant forward slightly and gave me a ‘thumbs-up’.

  I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do next – the huge array of instruments and switches in the cockpit seemed to overwhelm me and my mind suddenly went blank. Not wanting to look like a complete ‘dick’, I decided to give it my best shot and just pretend that I was once again in the tiny Chipmunk. With my right hand on the miniature steering wheel down by my right knee and my left hand on the three power-levers, I released the brakes by tapping my toes on the top of the rudder pedals. I gently eased the power levers forward simultaneously, and gradually the two hundred tonnes of metal and plastic started to move forward. As the enormous mass surrounding me started to gain momentum I panicked, and at that point I had two options. I could squeal for help or I could slam the brakes on, and I didn’t hesitate to go for the latter.

  Dave lurched forward spilling his precious hot coffee over his knees.

  “What the fuck?” he exclaimed, tossing the checklist over his shoulder and frantically brushing the steaming liquid off his trousers. “We’ve not even got off the ground and you’ve managed to give me third-degree burns.”

  “I just thought I should check that the brakes were working,” I muttered meekly.

  Dave took a deep breath as if to calm himself. “Ok, so from now on let’s assume that the brakes are working just fine. Remember momentum is equal to mass times velocity, and I guess you are dealing with a lot more mass than you are used to, so let’s have another go.”

  I acknowledged Dave with a serious expression and a nod. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Jim, with his head in his hands and his shoulders rocking as if he was trying to stifle uncontrollable laughter.

  I managed to taxi out to the ‘line-up and hold’ point for runway Three-One by anticipating that the aircraft would take much more time and distance to respond than I would hitherto normally expect.

  Having now recovered the discarded checklist Dave read out the pre-take-off checks. I responded to each item in turn and, with Jim’s help, set the correct configuration ready for take-off.

  Air Traffic Control passed
the message, “Speedbird Two-Two you are clear to take-off.”

  It appeared to me that Dave had decided not to take any more chances. He knocked back the last dregs of his drink and placed the empty beaker in the cup-holder to his side.

  The L-1011 TriStar was the first ever commercial airliner capable of flying from take-off to landing fully automatically, but today we were having none of that. Every phase of flight had to be done manually with me in control, and although I don’t recall feeling nervous, I certainly would have had to concentrate intently.

  “Right Red, let’s go. Relax and enjoy the ride. Don’t forget, it’s only an aeroplane but I think you are about to find out why people call her ‘The Queen of the Skies’,” said Dave with a smile.

  With Jim’s hand on top of mine, I eased the power levers forward and slipped my feet from the brakes. As the speed started to increase I could control direction down the runway with my feet on the rudder pedals. I was a little bit wayward to start with, but it didn’t take me long to be able to steer accurately along the runway centre line.

  As Dave monitored the flight instruments he calmly called out each reference speed as we reached it. “Eighty knots – vee one – Rotate.”

  At this speed, I eased back on the yoke and, almost imperceptibly, The Queen of the Skies lifted into the air.

  The TriStar was a beautiful aircraft to fly, being very responsive to any control inputs, and performing like a much smaller and manoeuvrable aeroplane.

  Apart from a huge bounce on my first attempt at landing, which lead to a few classic, Liverpudlian expletives from the captain, I soon got the hang of things. Dave put my ‘depth perception’ problem down to me not being used to sitting so far up from the ground, and after a few circuits and bumps, I became reasonably proficient at flying my first wide-bodied passenger jet.

  I was heartily congratulated by Dave and Jim later that evening in the bar as they presented me with a, quickly knocked-up certificate stating that I was now fully qualified to fly ‘The Queen of the Skies’, and ordered to get the next round of drinks in. Before leaving it was agreed that arrangements would be made back at Heathrow for me to make my debut trip ‘down the line’, with a recommendation to fly to Dar es Salaam and Kilimanjaro with a four-day stopover in Arusha. A trip that would, eventually, become a reality and would turn out to be extremely memorable, and not just for the flying.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  My phone call to the British Airways Operations department, who were arranging my first long-haul trip for later that month, was interrupted by Bob Waters, the second-in-command of Ops Research. ‘Just getting reports of a 737 hijack situation taking place right now and reported to be heading towards London,’ he said seriously.

  By the time I had grabbed my hold-all and flight bags and driven around to CRW, the SP team were lining up their vehicles and were, just about, ready to go. Corporal Dave Pearson, from the Intelligence Cell, was passing amongst us, confirming that a British aircraft had been taken by armed aggressors and was about to land at Stansted Airport, north-east of London. We were ordered to make our way there as quickly as possible.

  The whole counterterrorist team, in a wide range of civilianised vehicles, left Hereford in a convoy with blue flashing lights and police sirens. So intent was the team on getting to the scene of the incident without delay, we didn’t even stop at the ‘greasy spoon’ cafe on the A417, which was an almost compulsory ritual during any road trip to the capital.

  In my hold-all, I had two complete sets of British Airways Pilots uniform, one for a captain and one for a senior first officer. I also had with me two, standard, black leather flight bags which had been modified by the ‘Spookie’ technicians at Fort Halstead not far from Milton Keynes. The bags had been fitted with listening devices to transmit any conversation from on board the aircraft back to the Incident Control Room.

  If the police negotiators could manage to convince the hijackers that they would be allowed to fly away – provided they would agree to a change of the flight-deck crew, then I, plus one other ‘pilot’, would get on board with the modified flight bags. Rest assured dear reader that the plan was never for me to get on board and save the day, in a blaze of glory. Taking out the terrorists single-handedly with deadly jabs and kicks, fashionable at that time with the likes of James Bond, or Bodie and Doyle from The Professionals, was certainly not for me. Once on board, my job would be simply to pass as much intelligence as possible back to the team prior to them storming the aircraft.

  Over the past few weeks, we had worked out a system of codes by using veiled-speech and the aircraft transponder, to give the team their best chance of a successful outcome. How many terrorists? How many weapons? Are any of the doors booby-trapped? Is there any evidence of explosives? My responsibility was simply to keep talking and try to paint a picture of the situation on board. With any luck, I would be able to indicate whether the hostage-takers might be becoming agitated and therefore extremely dangerous.

  Upon arrival at the airport, we were marshalled into a holding area which was well out of sight of the hijacked aircraft. The aircraft was a British Airways 737 and had been taken over whilst on a flight from Tunisia to Edinburgh with one hundred and sixteen passengers and crew on board, most of them returning from holiday. It was thought, but my no means certain, that there were three armed men involved and they had taken control of the holiday jet just before entering the airspace of the UK.

  Apparently, one man, armed with a pistol, had held the gun at the captain’s head and demanded that they turn back and land at Houari Airport on the northern coast of Algeria. The crew managed to convince the man that they had insufficient fuel to do that, and they would have to land at London to refuel before they could attempt the trip back to Algiers. The captain had then discreetly selected the transponder code indicating to Air Traffic Control that the aircraft had been hijacked, and soon after that requested an immediate landing at London Stansted. Upon receipt of the transponder code, the Senior Air Traffic Controller had alerted the police who, in turn, contacted the Ministry of Defence.

  Plans had been in place for some time with the UK authorities to deal with a situation such as this and it was then a policy that in the event of a hijack, attempts would be made to steer the aircraft towards a landing at Stansted Airport. There an area had been designated for parking the aircraft and an Operations Centre had been set up with the necessary reception areas and facilities for the police and the SP team to rehearse and prepare for a possible storming of the aircraft.

  At that time, I had no idea whether a change of crew would be negotiated and I would be required to take on my new acting role, but I had to be prepared. Whilst trying to keep my ‘stage-fright’ under control and appear calm and confident at all costs, I looked around for someone who might be willing to come on board with me as the second crew member. Mick Gold had been brought into CRW in a most unusual way. He had been recruited directly from civilian life to make use of his highly impressive fighting skills and had become the regiment’s unarmed combat expert and adviser. He had recently spent time with me working on how I might best be able to deal with an armed aggressor within the confines of a cockpit. As you are by now aware, I was never the sort cut out to be involved with taking out murderous terrorists with my bare hands, nevertheless what Mick had taught me did leave me feeling quietly confident that if the situation ever arose I would be able to make a pretty good fist of things. Ideally, a qualified pilot would have been asked to volunteer to join me but no one in the vicinity fitted that bill. I decided to ask ‘fighter’ Mick. Not because of his knowledge of hijack situations, or because of his fighting skills. It was purely because he was, more-or-less, the same size as me and I only had one spare uniform available.

  Despite not knowing the first thing about how to fly a large passenger jet, Mick volunteered without hesitation. We donned our uniforms and stuffed our modified flight bags with flying paraphernalia while at the same time I brought my new co-pilot u
p to speed, as far as I could, with the code system I had worked out with the Control Room staff. We waited, rather nervously, and watched with interest to see how things would develop.

  About an hour before last light the police negotiators agreed to send food and drinks on board and steps were put in place by the front left door. As the door opened one hijacker, holding an AK-47 was photographed and identified as the leader, who called himself Achmed. The food trays, two of which had discreet transmitters built into them, were taken into the aircraft and the door was quickly closed.

  As darkness descended the lead terrorist and spokesman became very agitated and threatened to start shooting the passengers unless the aircraft was provided with fuel immediately. The authorities, once again, agreed to the demands and the aircraft was topped up with enough fuel to provide more than sufficient range to fly to Algiers.

  A little while later, Achmed could be heard screaming at the pilots. Telling them to start-up, take-off and set course towards Africa at once. Both the Captain and the First Officer were heard making excuses, insisting that they were too exhausted and distressed to fly and they were unwilling to put the lives of all the innocent passengers at risk.

  Suddenly a shot rang out. A few seconds later the plane’s door was opened and the body of, what appeared to be a man in uniform, was placed on the top of the steps. Two members of the team were allowed to recover the body, which was then identified as the young British Airways first officer.

  At this point, it was decided that the lives of the hostages were now in real and imminent danger and control of the situation was handed over to the senior military commander on the scene. Negotiations were continued with Achmed and it was agreed that a fresh Flight Deck crew, who would be willing to fly to Algeria, would come on board provided the women and children would be permitted to disembark.