Royal Aeronautical Society Podcast

Classic Lecture - ’Offers They Couldn’t Refuse’ : Mergers in the UK Aircraft Industry, 1957-1962

Prof Keith Hayward takes us down the corridors of power and into the boardrooms to show us how the Government issued Britain’s iconic aircraft companies with ‘offers they could not refuse’ and, so doing, transformed the industry. A mixture of The Godfather and Yes Minister, Hayward chronicles the struggles between companies and individuals, shows the broken engagements and draws light on the ghostly figures in the background and the archvillain, Duncan Sandys.
Prof Keith Hayward FRAeS addressed a meeting organised by the
Royal Aeronautical Society’s Historical Group on 2 April 2009. The lecture is introduced by Dr Kit Mitchell FRAeS and the podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.

Classic Lecture - Curiosity, The Next Mars Rover by Dr Matt Wallace

NASA's Matt Wallace, of the Mars Science Lab, describes the development and testing of the Mars Curiosity rover - a ground-breaking mission delivering the largest ever rover to date to the Martian surface via an innovative 'Sky Crane' descent system.
Dr Matt Wallace addressed a meeting organised by the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Space Group on 17 July 2012. The podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.

Classic Lecture - Pilot Training in the RFC & RAF, 1912-18 by Wg. Cdr. Jeff Jefford

The army’s first pilots were gentlemen trained by civilian schools and then, if accepted into the air battalion, their expenses were reimbursed. Wg. Cdr. Jeff Jefford tells the fascinating story of how pilot training evolved in peacetime and was revolutionised in the heat of war, most notably by Major Robert Smith-Barry and his Gosport System.
Wg. Cdr. Jeff Jefford addressed a meeting organised by the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Historical Group on 8 November 2012. The lecture is introduced by Peter Elliott and the podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.

Rewind - The first attempt to fly round the world by Wg. Cdr. Norman Macmillan

On Empire Day 1922 three men set out to be the first to fly around the world, via Calcutta and Vancouver. The pilot, Wg. Cdr. Norman Macmillan, tells the boys-own adventure of how they took off in an untested aircraft and, with a less than perfect route, flew over parts of Europe, Africa, the Middle East and India, before their attempt failed in the Bay of Bengal.
Wg. Cdr. Norman Macmillan addressed a meeting organised by the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Historical Group on 28 October 1963. The lecture is introduced by J.L. Nayler FRAeS FAIAA, the recording was digitised thanks to a grant from the RAeS Foundation and the podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.

From the Archive - Sir Roy Fedden on interwar engines & the wartime German aircraft industry

“A giant among those pioneers who put our country in the forefront in the field of aero engines between the two World Wars”, he was the brain behind the Jupiter engine and set up Bristol Aeroplane Company’s engine division. In these reminiscences, Fedden discusses his early life and career, how he became involved in designing aero engines and gives insights into his time at Bristol.
Fedden left Bristol in 1942 and became a consultant at the Ministry of Aviation. He discusses his mission to Germany in the early months after the war which did much to bring back to Britain the cutting edge technology being pioneered under the Nazi regime. He also reflects on a contrasting mission to learn lessons from American aircraft firms.
The recording of Sir Roy Fedden HonFRAeS was made on 5 December 1969, it was digitised thanks to a grant from the RAeS Foundation and the podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.
Please note, due to the age of this recording, there are periods of poor sound quality during the lecture.

Alan Bristow Memorial Lecture 2020

Lee Evans, Senior Test Pilot at Leonardo Company delivered an incredible aviation story about operating Lynx helicopters to a Royal Navy ice breaker in the harshest environment on our planet. Using incredible video footage and photographs from his time as a Fleet Air Arm pilot on-board HMS Endurance, Lee highlighted the challenges of operating helicopters in Antarctica – the harshest environment on Earth.
He talked about the history of Antarctic helicopter Aviation and how shipborne helicopters from HMS Endurance provided essential support for the UK Hydrographic Office, Foreign Commonwealth Office and British Antarctic Survey. He also spoke about what it was like to be a filming pilot for the BBC Natural History blockbuster ‘Planet Earth’ and how the crews had to overcome unpredictable winds, snow, ice, mountains, wildlife, icebergs and rough seas on a daily basis.
Thank you to our sponsor and continued supporter, Leonardo.
https://uk.leonardocompany.com/en/home

Rewind - Aviation In The Antarctic : my sixty years on ice by Dr Charles Swithinbank

Glaciologist, qualified pilot and experienced navigator Dr Charles Swithinbank spent sixty years using aeroplanes to help him study ice sheets in an era when the aeroplane was replacing dogs and boats as the main way of studying and visiting the polar regions. In this lecture he retells many fascinating stories from his career, including pioneering the use of radar on aircraft to measure the thickness of ice, finding natural runways suitable for the landing of aircraft of any size and in his 80s, accepting invitations from NASA to pick his brain on how his polar experience might inform future manned missions to Mars – he volunteered to go to Mars and help, but NASA politely declined.
Dr Charles Swithinbank addressed a meeting of the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Historical Group on 3 September 2012 and the podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.

Mental Wellbeing and Human Performance

This webinar will focus on the new EASA regulation that airlines operating in Europe must implement by Autumn 2020 and also offer a unique opportunity to preview what the Conference in 2021 will have to offer.
The FSF have published a document on aviation professionals maintaining personal wellbeing both under current circumstances and more broadly. The Guide is a short practical document, based on academic research, that is intended for individual use and can be found at the FSF website on the following page for download: https://flightsafety.org/toolkits-resources/covid-19-safety-roadmap-and-punch-lists/

COVID-19: Helicopter transport – challenges & experience

The COVID 19 outbreak has presented challenges worldwide to the helicopter operator. A mixture of military, civil utility and aeromedical helicopters have been pressed into service to transport patients, and the rapid development of the pandemic has allowed little time for ‘best practice’ to be developed. In the face of operational pressures manufacturers, military regulators and operators have pressed solutions into service to meet demand.
The purpose of this webinar will be to provide for the first time a common forum for key stakeholders to come together and share experience – good and bad – of how those in the front line of service provision have managed the enormous challenges presented.
The UK military guidelines that underline operations being performed by the Royal Air Force and Royal Navy will be described. The OEM view from Leonardo Helicopters will be shared, with particular emphasis on operations in North America. Closer to home, the operations of coast guard providers in Iceland, Ireland and the UK will also be reviewed to capture complex operations being executed in that domain.

Rewind - Handling the Olympic and Paralympic traffic at Heathrow by Andy Garner FRAeS

Putting tens of thousands of extra people through an airport in a short period is always a challenge, especially if they have three times the average amount of luggage containing such things as firearms, specialist wheelchairs and canoes – now try putting it through the world’s third busiest airport; a bad press might affect future plans and, by the way, twenty thousand of those additional customers are from the world’s media.
Andy Garner, BAA’s London 2012 Director and the man responsible for the smooth running of the Olympic Traffic at Heathrow tells members of the RAeS Air Transport Group Lecture about the challenges the airport faced in 2012 and how they overcame them with record-breaking customer satisfaction rates.
Andy Garner FRAeS addressed a meeting of the Royal Aeronautical Society’s Air Transport Group on 23 October 2012 and the podcast was edited by Mike Stanberry FRAeS.