Sky is not the Limit

Man has always been fascinated with flying. All the great epics whether it’s the Ramayana or the Odysseus mention episodes with flying vehicles. Maybe they existed or it was the imagination of the writer to be able to do what no man has been able to do is a tricky subject! Every little child looks up at the sky and desires to fly like the bird. Now of course we take flying for granted and the romance associated with it has dwindled.

 When I was growing up it captured my imagination and during my college days I wanted to become a pilot. The staid principal was of the opinion that either you become an engineer or a pilot but following both inclinations was an impossible task! This only whetted my appetite for it, for Man is a contrary creature! College timings were not conducive to this indulgence of mine as studies took up the whole day and the airport was 15 Km away.

I suppose when you desire something with your whole heart the Universe (The secret!) helps you to fulfill it. Years later I was posted at Bhubaneswar which had a flying club for three years. I needed one year to complete my training and license. Oh! those days still fill me with excitement! I single mindedly pursued this with a devotion I had never had for anything. I went early in the morning without any breakfast for my lessons and went to office at 9 am. My Chief instructor was Capt. Chatterji. As he liked my aptitude and punctuality he allowed me to go on solo flight in less than 10 hrs of flying. To get a private pilot license you need 20 hours solo and a total of 60 hours of flying; added to this I did one extra night flying.

To join the club I had to pass an oral test and a medical test. I was issued a student pilots license, which allows you to fly under the supervision of an instructor. After PPL you are allowed to carry a passenger, but were not allowed to take up commercial jobs. This was meant for owners of aircrafts in the olden days.

The training day started at 6 am when the wind is still and the sky is clear. Initially the chief and at other times the instructor flew with you and when you are ready you are allowed circuit and landing which takes about 6 min. The tower gives you visual signals- green to take off and again green to land, when no commercial flights are on. Initially it looks easy and you take off and land mechanically. The real event is the first solo, which the chief allows without warning! He gets off on the middle of the runway and asks you to take off! Suddenly you find the other seat is vacant and you are the master with no other help forthcoming.  

After I completed three perfect landings the Chief gave me a break of seven days. This is to check whether you have learned properly. On eighth day he gave me a kind of check not holding the controls, and allowed me in the sky for an hour so that I could complete the Puri –Konark- Bhubaneswar triangle and get into landing pattern and land. This way I had to build up my mandatory 20 hours solo.

Simultaneously I had to sit for an exam conducted by DGCA.  It was the first time I sat for an objective test- for me it was new though now days most schools follow it. The pass percentage was 75%.The subjects were Meteorology, Aircraft specific, and Flying in general. The feeling of satisfaction when I cleared it in my first attempt is unparalleled!

A log book duly certified by the aerodrome and the club is maintained throughout the training period. The log book with a flight test record along with the pass certificate for the exam is sent to DGCA for the issue of the license.

 Pushpak was the first plane I trained in and flew. It had a Rolls Royce engine made of steel frame with a cloth cover.  It had two seats side by side with two controls and a throttle which was in the centre. The next plane I flew was the Tiger Moth. I had to pass another exam specific to this aircraft. This was the craft on which all the English and Indian pilots were trained. It is like a motor bike with two seats in tandem; it has no roof or brakes! The control stick was really a stick unlike other half circle steering wheel type.  For braking, the tail rubs on ground and comes to a halt. You have to wear goggles and helmet to fly, as it is open to sky.

With this aircraft we once went for a cross country flight. We flew over the bed of Mahanadi to Narsingpur for about 60 miles and back. It was very cold at an altitude of 3000 ft and so we went lower. The wide blue river and the green forest on its banks looked magnificent. I remember that to communicate with the co pilot you used a speaking tube! On the way back I found that the fuel level was low. There is an emergency tank, where you have to pump using a manual pump; unfortunately this is a reverse pump i.e. pumps while pulling, so nothing happened, and we had to do an emergency landing on the grass in the airport.

My first passengers after successfully getting the license were my wife, two daughters and a friend of theirs whom I took separately on different days. While flying over Nandankanan I was showing my wife the animal enclosures rope way etc, but she was worried about our daughters who were waiting at the airport. Her thought was if we both die in an accident, what would happen to them!

I was a flying executive member along with Raja of Ranpur and Biju Patnaik who was the chairman for two terms, and at the club we used to hear stories of Ranpur’s exploits. This was an exciting and wonderful world, very different from my day to day work. It introduced me to a set of sophisticated people who enjoyed life in a different way.

In the early eighties I got posted at Gauhati. In my Official capacity I had to go to the airport to receive and send off visiting officers from our Head quarters.  I took this opportunity to indulge in flying! The Chief instructor was also the owner of an aircraft which was gifted to him by the Maharaja of Darbhanga. He had a wife from Mauritius. The Instructor was a young Muslim. Along with him I took off for a cross country flight to an airport 90 miles west, landed, got it certified by the aerodrome officer and came back to Gauhati. This fulfilled my requirement of cross country flight and my license was open now.

Before landing we saw number of monkeys on the airstrip, which was abandoned after World War- II. I asked the instructor to stand guard and went to the office for endorsement. The airport officer offered me biscuits, which I declined, since he had only two left! The nearest market was several miles away and there used to be two commercial flights a week. The journey was perfect with the mighty Brahmaputra with its lush green banks below.

After this I was transferred to the capital of the country and I joined the Safdurjung Delhi Flying Club. The club, I noticed had a board with the name of Biju Patnaik having passed in 1936 both as a pilot and an engineer. (I remembered my old college principal!)

Renewal of license every year was a ritual with the Chief and his Assistant. The respect that I used to get at Bhubaneswar or Gauhati was missing here. The embassy chaps with all their money were preferred to my government appointment!

The circuit and landing was a routine exercise. The flyover on the landing path and the Rashtrapati Bhawan were the only restriction. Here I used to meet various categories of pilots and flew the Cessna which is the third category. If you qualify for four aircrafts and 750 hrs of flying you get an open license meaning it is not specific to the aircraft. Unfortunately I could not do this. But Sanjay Gandhi did this and died with our chief instructor at the same airport!

With my license I used to request the pilot of commercial flights to sit on the co- pilot seat both in India, Iran and England. The license lapsed when I went to Iran for couple of years, where they do not recognize our license and thus ended my flying carrier of over 20 years.

Flying your own plane is an experience by itself; doing something like the birds is exhilarating! The achievement of my dream of flying taught me that nothing is impossible if you put your heart and soul into it. For even the sky is not the limit.