This is why you have an editor-except in this case it was the editor who introduced this snafu, rewriting Caygill’s original title and making other changes without telling the author. No matter what the title says, he’d be the first to know that this single-seat interceptor fighter is not “Britain’s only” one in service but rather the only British- designed one. Over fifty of more than 330 Lightnings made were lost-to aerodynamic overloading, canopy separation, engine fire, hydraulic failure-but still pilots were standing in line to strap on the “skyrocket.”Ĭaygill is an eminently competent aviation writer with a number of important books to his credit, including another Lightning book for the same publisher, 2006’s Lightning From the Cockpit (ISBN 9781844153558). There was a six per cent chance of a pilot experiencing an engine fire during a typical tour and a one in four chance that he would not survive.”īritain’s English Electric Lightning (1959–1988) was not the only aircraft combining great potential and a very iffy safety record you only have to think of another superplane of that time, the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter there’s a reason it was called The Widowmaker. “During a period in the early 1970s the attrition rate was the loss of a Lightning every month. Lightning Eject: The Dubious Safety Record of Britain’s Only Supersonic Fighter
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