Sqn Ldr Clive Rowley MBE

Lightning marks flown: F.1a, F.2a, F.3, F.6, T.4, T.5, T.55

Lightning flying hours: 1,188 hours

Personal Lightning Story:

"The Lightning seemed an ungainly beast on the ground, sitting on its tall, spindly undercarriage and thin high-pressure tyres, but in the air with the undercarriage retracted, its highly-swept-wing planform gave it a sleek and purposeful shape which made it look fast even when it was flying relatively slowly. The cockpit and the pilot seemed to be almost an afterthought, squeezed onto the top and front of this ‘rocket ship’. The sheer performance of the Lightning was remarkable, especially for the era. My first exposure to this amazing performance, as a student pilot at the Lightning OCU, was a truly awesome experience, even for someone used to the fast-jet performance of the Hawker Hunter. A reheat take-off and climb gave a brakes-off to 36,000 feet time-to-height of about two and a half minutes whilst covering a ground distance of only 16 nautical miles. I was wondering if I would ever be able to keep up.

The Lightning could be rather dangerous. During the 28 years that the aircraft was in service, an amazing 76 Lightnings crashed or were totally written off from 280 built for the RAF. The chances of being involved in a serious incident or accident were therefore quite high, and Lightning pilots took their simulator emergency training seriously. A particular problem with the Lightning was that pipes containing inflammable hydraulic fluid and jet fuel, under pressure, were crammed into tight spaces within the aircraft’s fuselage, often close to heat sources such as the engines and jet pipes. If a leak of fuel or hydraulic fluid occurred, it was likely to lead to a major and, possibly, catastrophic fire. In addition, the Lightning’s flying controls were purely hydraulically powered with no manual back up. There were only two hydraulic systems supporting the flying controls, each driven from one of the engines and if both systems failed for any reason, for example if one engine failed and then the other hydraulic system failed, the controls would freeze solid and the pilot would be forced to eject. Failures of this type occurred quite frequently.

The Lightning was not a particularly difficult aircraft to fly, but it did have some vices, particularly at slow speed, and also things tended to happen quickly and could go wrong equally fast. The aircraft was always short of fuel, virtually from take off, and the fuel contents and the distance from home or the nearest suitable airfield needed to be monitored constantly and carefully. Use of reheat would eat into the available fuel very quickly indeed. There, surely, has never been a Lightning pilot who hasn’t, at some point, been below his minimum landing fuel some distance from the airfield. The aircraft demanded respect and the cockpit workload could be very high indeed; pilots needed to stay well ahead of the aircraft to keep up with the pace of events and had to possess high levels of what is known as ‘airmanship’.

Operating the radar and conducting all-weather intercepts further increased the cockpit workload. The radar in the Lightning was basic and limited in both its capability and its detection range. Control of the radar was extremely ‘manual’; there was virtually no automation, or at least none that we used. Tactical thinking had moved away from locking the radar to a target as soon as possible, which gave steering cues in the scope, as this was also likely to alert a target’s radar warning receiver. The radar hand controller mounted on the left side of the Lightning’s cockpit behind the throttles was a masterpiece of ergonomic design. It incorporated seventeen different controls and switches which could be manipulated entirely by feel as each was different in shape, feel and operation. The fact that there were so many switches and controls is indicative of the radar needing considerable pilot input. To start with, just pointing the radar in the right place with the gain set correctly to be able to see radar contacts on the screen was a feat in itself. To conduct practice intercepts (PIs) took a considerable amount of mental capacity and mental arithmetic to calculate the target’s heading and height and to achieve the necessary lateral displacement, so that a 60-degree banked 2G turn would provide a roll-out one to one-and-a-half miles behind the target, in range to fire a Firestreak or Redtop missile. Meanwhile, of course, the business of flying the aircraft and managing the cockpit and fuel still needed constant attention.

Many Lightning pilots who, like me, have flown most marks of the aircraft believe that the F.2A was the best to fly operationally, as it was the ideal compromise. It carried the most internal fuel (10,300 lbs) with the large ventral tank, whilst retaining two nose-mounted 30mm Aden cannon. The two Rolls Royce Avon 211R engines produced a total of almost 29,000 pounds of thrust in full reheat, endowing the aircraft with more than sufficient power, whilst being more economical than the slightly more powerful engines of the Lightning F.3 and F.6. During the period when the Lightning F.2A was operational in Germany, it generally outperformed all comers in the quick reaction low-to-high-level visual interception role that was so crucial to NATO’s forward air defence against possible attack from the East. The Lightning’s outstanding performance and its simple weapon system made it a match for any other aircraft that it was likely to tangle with, either in training or for real. Most of the fighter and fighter-bomber types on both sides at that time were either cannon-armed only or, if fitted with air-to-air missiles, had a capability no better than the Lightning and its stern-sector heat-seeking missiles.

For an aircraft designed as an interceptor, the Lightning proved to have excellent air-combat-manoeuvring (ACM) dog-fighting capabilities with a good turn rate and an excess of power, especially below 15,000 feet. As an indication of the power available it was possible to set a Lightning into a 5G turn at 450 knots at low level and then, with full reheat selected, fly a climbing 5G spiral maintaining speed and G up to 15,000 feet, quite impressive for that era.

In later years of its service life the Lightning suffered from a lack of investment and development and was increasingly out-classed by more modern fighter types. Its raw performance though was still impressive to the end.

Overall, I feel privileged to have been allowed to fly Lightnings for a total of over seven years and more than 1,000 flying hours. It was an exciting and demanding aircraft to fly and although rather dangerous with an element of risk attached, that just added to the excitement. Lightning pilots felt part of an elite group and there were never actually that many who flew the Lightning operationally."