Chris became somebody’s Plan B
The archive returned to Plan B, the feature in which Chris offered himself as the emergency replacement when somebody else could not do a job.
This was not a small favour.
A pair of pilots at the British Airways Flight Training Centre near Heathrow needed a third person for a long-haul training exercise in a Boeing 747 simulator.
Chris was invited to fill the spare seat.
The simulator was the real training environment used by pilots, with a cockpit laid out like the aircraft and an outside view designed to make the whole thing feel convincing.
Chris therefore did what any responsible future pilot would do.
He watched Top Gun for the first time the night before.
He arrived with sunglasses and a callsign
Chris took Top Gun-style sunglasses with him and immediately tried to give everybody fighter-pilot names.
One of the genuine pilots preferred to use his normal professional title.
Chris wanted something more cinematic.
He settled on Beaver for himself and attempted to assign Maverick and Goose to the men who actually knew how to fly the aircraft.
Their expressions suggested the training centre had not prepared them for this part of the exercise.
The cockpit was alarmingly convincing
Once inside, Chris was struck by the quantity of controls.
He repeatedly checked that the pilots really did know what all the buttons did.
The view outside recreated Heathrow closely enough to show the terminal and roads around the airport.
Scott, watching the footage back, admitted that the realism would have made him nervous.
Chris was delighted.
He was going to fly it.
Take-off happened faster than expected
With guidance from the pilots, Chris pushed the throttles forward and began the take-off roll.
The speed built quickly.
He pulled back and the simulated 747 left the ground.
His first reaction was a mixture of triumph and surprise that the enormous aircraft had actually responded to him.
Chris later claimed the experience should reassure nervous flyers because even he had managed a take-off.
Scott pointed out that professional pilots might not appreciate that particular interpretation of their training.
Captain Beaver tried the passenger announcement
Chris also wanted to make the sort of calm public-address announcement heard on a real flight.
He introduced himself to the imaginary passengers and tried to point out landmarks over London.
There was an immediate problem.
He began describing a sunny view when the simulator was set at night.
He then had to admit that he was not completely sure where they were.
The exercise demonstrated that sounding relaxed on the flight deck while also knowing what is happening is more difficult than it appears from seat 34A.
Daylight was requested for the sunglasses
The simulator allowed the instructors to change conditions.
Chris, still committed to the Top Gun aesthetic, asked whether they could make it daytime so his sunglasses would make more sense.
The pilots could indeed alter the environment.
For a moment, the most advanced part of the exercise was being used to improve Chris Stark’s costume.
The landing was where reality returned
Eventually Chris had to put the aircraft back on the ground.
The pilots talked him through the approach and gave him corrections as the runway came towards him.
The touchdown was extremely firm.
The video shook with the impact and Scott made clear that he would not have been one of those passengers who applauded on landing.
Chris’s defence was straightforward:
He had got it down.
On another attempt, with a pilot sharing the controls, the arrival was smoother and Chris could celebrate having technically landed a 747 simulator.
Nobody wanted him to progress to a real aircraft
The pilots were generous about his efforts and Chris left feeling he had been a respectable emergency Plan B.
Listeners were entertained rather than reassured.
One message said they had enjoyed watching him fly the simulator but would not trust him with a real plane.
Scott floated the obvious next step.
The answer from everyone was immediate.
No.
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