The Spitfire

The Spitfire – It was at Speke aerodrome where I first piloted a Spitfire after about one hour dual and two hours solo in a Miles Master aeroplane with an in-line Kestral engine. The Miles Master had a long nose which, in a way, acclimatized the novice for the very long nose of the Spitfire and it, also, offered training in the handling of the in-line engine. The pilot’s cockpit was at about the middle of the length of the Spitfire. The old MKI Spitfire had an undercart which had to be retracted by pumping it up by hand; thirteen strokes on the hand-pump, if I remember correctly. The lever of the hydraulic hand-pump was on the starboard side of the cockpit, so one had to hold the control column with one’s left hand while the right hand pumped up the undercart. For the novice making their first flight, the take-off was comical to watch as there was a natural reflex to push on the control column with the left hand in a forward and backward motion as the right hand simultaneously pushed forward and backward on the pump lever. Consequently, the Spitfire was doing this,, after it lifted from the ground and the undercart was being pumped up. The poor instructors had kittens watching their fledglings jack-rabbit through the air, yet too closely to the ground, in the old Spits.