Primarily for general aviation discussion, but other aviation topics are also welcome.
#1839787
riverrock wrote:I met him along with others when recieving my Duke of Edinburgh Gold Award at St James's Palace. Was as interested in who the next group of people we would inspire would be as he was in us, wanting to push us, as teens, forward to inspire others.


Minor tangent, but I recall going to St James' Palace in the mid 90s to receive the DofE Gold Award also and being very excited that it was going to be presented by a special guest: none other than Bryan Adams!

Bryan Adams! I mean, pretty exciting for a group of teenagers at a point when he was in his second-wind renaissance. Summer of 69 pretty much an anthem of our youth, teaming up with Mel C and all that in recent years.

Except, of course, it turned out to Bryan Adams, Chief Exec of some random FTSE 100 at the time, that we had no awareness of.

Utter disappointment.

In contrast, I did actually get to meet Prince Philip briefly, around 7 or 8 years ago at a social event marking the inauguration of a new fellowship at the university I was at (and looking to raise some dosh for the uni coffers); he seemed as calm and at ease as could be expected of a man for whom such events were likely an an eternal chain around his ankles. Nice chap, gave a good speech and was pleasant to talk to (albeit incredibly briefly).
By Lefty
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1839842
The Waltham WhatsApp group has several photo’s of when HRH learnt to fly at Waltham in Chipmunk and Harvard. There is also a photo of him flying a single seat Turbulent. Apparently he was attending an event at Waltham and was taken by the pretty little Turbulent G-APNZ, and surprised everyone by asking if he could possibly “have a go”? I’m sure his aides and security guys must have been rather worried as their VIP charge strapped himself into the Turb with just a short briefing on to fly it. So he was always up for a challenge.

Apparently he had over 6000 hours and 59 types in his logbook (although some might query how many of those were actual “Pilot in Command”). Impressive nonetheless.