COMBAT AND COMPETITION.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

CHAPTER TEN
CHARIOTS OF FIRE
In the following spring - as the engineering graduates at Glasgow
University waited for their degrees - the pilot employed by Elliotts of
Newbury created a unique piece of aviation history.
Clearing customs at Lympne, on his first aerotow delivery flight
to the Danish Air Force, he started to prepare for take off as the glider
pilot hurried across the airfield to join him. Anxious to save time he
connected the tow rope at both ends, applied the parking brake on the
tug, and swung the propeller with no one in either cockpit. The engine
started immediately, the throttle was too far open, and the brake was
not on after all.
A few seconds later Towgood, that really was his name, had
succeeded in destroying Elliotts 1 prototype aeroplane and a brand new
Olympia to boot!
An extraordinary accident which resulted in the offer of a free
ride to Denmark when the next sailplane was ready for delivery. And
I found myself a few weeks later on tow, low over the Scheldt estuary,
heading towards Rotterdam and the Zuider Zee. A cavalcade of
wartime memories - rudely interrupted on the second day, at
Leeuwarden, by a Dutch Meteor which came screaming in from
behind when the Olympia was barely a hundred yards from
touchdown.
We had been cleared in advance, and instructed to land on the
runway, but glider pilots do not argue with jet fighters. I closed the
brakes, squeezed in an 'S' turn to land on the grass, and the Meteor
didn't even go round again.
After that we flew higher, in the heat of the day, and landed at
Esbjerg to clear customs. The last leg was like a dream world. Low
level once more. The Olympia hanging motionless behind the tug,
while the gentle contours of Jutland slipped by and the shadows
lengthened.
A nostalgic trip and an excellent way of unwinding after sitting my
finals, but I doubt that Lome Welch, in the Auster, saw it in the same
light. Lome, CFI of the Surrey Gliding Club, had experienced a very
different war. Shot down on his one and only operational flight. On
the first thousand bomber raid. One of the OTU crews, brought in to
make up the numbers, before he had even joined a squadron.
Escaping from prison camp with another pilot they managed to
break into an airfield only to be recaptured in the cockpit of an
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