Classic Cockpits - Flying the de Havilland Vampire

If you can remember the time when the whine of a jet engine was the most exciting sound you’d ever heard; when jets burned kerosene, not Avtur, when Geoffrey De Havilland was a household name and his Vampire was a frontline jet fighter, you simply have to buy this DVD.

The mission: formation aerobatics.

Your instructor, Brett Emeny, who lives and breathes aviation, is beside you. You’ve done the walk-around and the cockpit tour, and now you’re about to have the ride of your life.

You launch from New Plymouth’s main runway, and another de Havilland Vampire, flown by Paul “Huggy” Hughan, slides in beside and just in front. You’ll be his number two.

You tuck in tight beside the lead aircraft, very close. You’ll stay there for the next fifteen minutes.

What follows is a blur of sights and sounds and sensations. The inexorable pressure of “g” pulling up into a loop. The flash of sunlight, the blur of sky, sea, and ground. Brett’s calm voice in your headphones, telling you what he’s doing, talking you through.

You glance at his face. He never takes his eyes of the lead Vampire. One sure hand on the stick, the other constantly making minor adjustments to the throttle. Five ‘g’ coming out, and then a tight turn, to line up for roll off the top, followed by a barrel roll.

And then low and fast straight down the runway. Very low, and very fast.

Up again and then around to break for landing. It seems to take forever to slow the Vampire down. A very clean aeroplane. One of the first operational jet fighters… a classic Still flying in New Zealand. And you have flown in it.

Something to tell the grandkids.

Better still, get this DVD and show ‘em!