Draft:Ian Strachan

Strachan Ian William

Ian William Strachan was a Wing Commander in theUK Royal Air Force (RAF). During his service he acquired awards of MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire), AFC (Air Force Cross), and became a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society (FRAeS).

After gaining his Air Force "Wings" he was based at the RAF base at Marham in Norfolk, UK, from which he flew to North America, Europe, the Middle and Far East. He then became a flying instructor and gained a A1 category, the highest available. After this, he graduated from the Empire Test Pilot School (ETPS) and after a tour at Boscombe Down he became Chief Test Pilot at the RAF research base at Farnborough.

On ground assignments he was a lecturer on Guided Weapons at the RAF College of Air Warfare. Later in the Ministry of Defence in London he was in charge of specifying and seeing into service new types of Flight Simulators for operational training.

On retiring from the RAF he became an author of articles on military subjects, particularly on training and flight simulation.

He was also a glider pilot and was twice UK National Standard Class Champion. He served on several gliding committees in the UK and internationally. This included chairing the committee of the International Gliding Commission (IGC) which co ordinates the use of devices which record GPS positions during flight.

Early History

Having obtained three A levels at school and in 1955 he gained a Private Pilot Licence (PPL) under a scheme for cadets of the Air Training Corps (ATC) that he had joined in 1952. His pilot licence was before he passed his car driving licence, an unusual sequecnce.

In 1956 he entered the UK Royal Air Force (RAF) as a trainee pilot. In 1959 he graduated from theRAF College, Cranwell, with pilot "wings" after flying thepiston enginedPercival Provostand the jet poweredVampireaircraft.

He also flew gliders and gained a Silver C certificate which requires a flight of 5 hours, a gain of height of 1000 metres and a cross country flight of over 50 kilometres.

Operational Flying

In 1960, he became a co pilot on theValiant bomberaircraft at RAF Marham in Norfolk UK. This was part of theNATOdeterrent against theSoviet Unionand itsWarsaw Pact allies that had threatened Western Euopean countries for many years. In this role he flew from Marhamto air bases inCanada,Germany, and theUSA. He was with a Valiant in the USA during the "Cuba Crisis" when the US Navy was able to turn back a Soviet fleet that was bringing missiles to Cuba that could have attacked the USA.

As a glider pilot with a Silver C he was an instructor at the Fenland Gliding Club and later became its Chief Flying Instructor (CFI). He climbed to 25,000 feet in a cumulonimbus cloud flying the club's Olympia glider, gaining the "Height Diamond" of the International Gliding Commission (IGC).

On becoming a Valiant Captain in 1963 he was posted to a squadron that specialised in Air to Air Refuelling (AAR). In that role he refuelled other aircraft and was trained to take fuel himself from other tanker aircraft. This enabled him to fly a Valiant from Aden directly to the UK, refuelling from another Valiant over North Africa. Refuelling other aircraft included Exercise "Shiksha" which enabled Javelin fightersto be deployed to India. After landing at Bombay, he flew on to Changi in Singapore, the HQ of the RAF Far East Air Force (FEAF), and later flew to Calcutta in order to returned the Javelins to the UK with the aid of Valiant air refuelling

In 1965 The Valiant suffered from metal fatigue due to turbulence at low levels, and flying was reduced except on tanker squadrons that had always flown at high altitudes. However, the entire Valiant fleet was grounded in December 1965 by the new Labour government and Strachan may have flown the last Valiant sortie, refuelling Lightning fighters over theNorth Sea. The UK in-flight refuelling capability completely lapsed for about a year, when some Victor aircraft were converted to tankers.

Flying Instructor

Un 1966 he became a Qualified Flying Instructor (QFI) on the Jet Provost aircraft, progressing through instructional categories B2, B1, and A2. He sent students solo and prepared others for their Final Handling Text (FHT) before they were awarded their RAF "Wings" at the end of the course.

In 1968 he was assigned to the unit that flew with other instructors to ensure a common standard. He also tested students on their final handling test before they were awarded their "Wings" at the end of their course. After check flights with a senior instructor at the RAF Central Flying School he was awarded an A1 instructor category.

Test Pilot

In 1969 he completed the Empire Test Pilot School (ETPS) course Boscombe Down nearSalisbury, UK, and was promoted to Squadron Leader. During the course he flew 10 different types of aircraft with 1,2 and 4 engines, plus the Scout helicopter.

On graduation he became a Test Pilot on B Squadron at Boscombe Down. This included testing handling and new types of equipment on multi engined aircraft including the UK"V" bombers(Vulcan and Victor), and the Nimrod maritime aircraft (developed from the Comet 4). He was appointed Project Test Pilot for the Canberra and flew 7 different marks of this versatile aircraft, the B2, PR3, T4, B6, B8, PR9 and TT18. On one high level test in a Canberra PR 9 he reached a height of 65,000 feet.

He also flew the Hunter fighter and others with one engine, the Sea Vixen with 2, Tristar with 3, the Comet, Nimrod and others with 4, to a version of the Shackleton with 6 engines (4 piston and two jets).

Expert in Guided Weapons

In 1973 he was posted to the Air Warfare College at RAF Manby (on the Lincolnshire coast) as a lecturer in Guided Weapons (GW), having operated some in his Test Flying career. The unit at Manby closed and the College moved to Cranwell as the Department of Air Warfare (DAW) and was able to liaise with other units at Cranwell including engineering courses. After visits by College teams to the US and other NATO countries and discussion with other GW people, he became an expert in this area.

He was able to increase the fidelity of Guided Weapon functions in what was called "War Games" that were regularly held as part of the Air Warfare Course (AWC), and were also part of other college courses and study periods. These were not "Games" but complex exercises that tried to model future conflicts. This was important in assessing the way NATO would oppose the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies in the event of a future confrontation. He obtained increased GW fidelity by obtaining results from actual GW use both in recent conflicts and in firing tests on instrumented ranges. This enabled GW effects in War Games to vary from shoot down to major and minor damage, and in some cases a complete miss, instead of previous simple "Kill/no Kill" methodology based on optimistic estimates of GW efficiency rather than actual results.

He visited other units with teams from the RAF College and gave presentations to the UK Army and Navy, also to headquarters in Germany. In addition there was an annual visit to the Tri Service college in Iran, a country still under the rule of the Shah to whom he had demonstrated the Nimrod maritime aircraft while at Boscombe Down.

For this work in refining weapon assessments he was awarded an MBE which he received from Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace in London.

Test Flying at Farnborough

He was then promoted to Wing Commander and in 1977 was posted to Farnborough to command its test flying activity. This included both fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters, and before arriving at Farnborough he attended a helicopter conversion course and gained helicopter "wings".

As well as more routine test activities, he was able to use a TV screen in a Hunter cockpit to enable flight at low level at night. This was developed by the Marconi company at Rochford, headed by fellow glider pilot Peter Hearne. This started with "low light" monochrome TV imagery from a camera in the nose, but as Strachan had some experience of helmet-mounted Night Vision Goggles (NVGs) in Farnborough helicopters, he started using these in the Hunter, initially as "safety pilot". He soon found that NVG imagery was not only satisfactory for low flying but also allowed the pilot to see the imagery when looking left and right, which was not possible with the fixed camera in the nose. Speeds were increased in prudent steps to 420 knots and heights lowered to between 200 and 300 feet above the ground at night. A report was produced and over 100 copies distributed within the Ministry of Defence. The United States Air Force (USAF) also showed interest and sent a General over to Farnborough to be briefed. The General was impressed because we were flying lower at night than his aircraft, and this led to Strachan demonstrating low flying in the Hunter to a USAF Major who returned to the USA to continue the activity.

In addition, for the Institute of Aviation Medicine (IAM) based at Farnborough he tested pressure breathing under high "G" and reached 9.2G in a centrifuge and 6G for over 2 minutes in a Hunter aircraft. The addition of pressure-breathing when under high G was found to reduce the possibility of "black out" and automatic pressure breathing under high-G conditions is now the normal in aircraft that can pull high G.

For this work at Farnborough he was awarded the Air Force Cross (AFC). Like his earlier MBE this was presented by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.

Further Test Flying

After Farnborough, in 1981 he continued test flying at Boscombe Down. This included flying to the United States Navy test range in Florida to test underwater sensors and weapons on the latest mark of Nimrod maritime aircraft.

On April 2 1982, Argentina invaded the British-owned Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic. The government under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher decided on military action to regain the islands. Work at Boscombe then became a 7-day a week exercise to test new weapons and sensors, and to modify the Hercules and Nimrod for Air-to-Air Refuelling (AAR). Strachan proposed to the Ministry of Defence that the Nimrod should be used for cutting the runway at the Argentine-occupied Port Stanley airfield instead of the Vulcan, but this was not taken up because the Vulcan/Port Stanley planning was too far advanced. Using the Nimrod would have reduced the number of tankers needed, and its more advanced navigation systems compared to the Vulcan would have ensured more navigational and bombing accuracy.

As an air-refuelling expert since his days flying the Valiant, he was key in assessing the handling of aircraft new to the AAR function and also training operational squadron pilots who had not refuelled before.

Ministry of Defence Flight Simulation Expert

In 1985 he left Boscombe and was put in charge of the Flight Simulator office in the Ministry of Defence (MoD) in London. This was possibly because in his test flying career he had flown many types of aircraft including helicopters and Flight Simulators were used for all front-line types.

He soon found that due to opposition to high-quality simulators by senior officers who wanted training to be on the aircraft, military flight simulators had become less capable than those used for civil airliners.

However, simulation can include situations that are dangerous in the aircraft itself such as failures of engines and other aircraft systems. An example of hazards from the past is where the RAF lost more Meteor and Canberra aircraft (and pilots) by practicing real engine out training in the aircraft rather than using simulations. However, by the 1980s simulation technology had developed so that it could cover tactical and combat situations including modeling a variety of enemy aircraft, and it was straightforward to incorporate these situations in the database of new military flight simulators.

He pushed these advantages of up-to-date simulation within the Ministry, but became unpopular with some senior officers because in the 1980s they wanted to continue most training on the aircraft itself and limit simulators to basic functions. This may have prevented further promotion in rank, although the full use of flight simulation is recognized today by the military. As well as delivering more comprehensive training than is possible on the aircraft, it enables the life of aircraft to be extended because less high-G training is now required, and there are fewer accidents.

In 1987 he was selected to make a presentation in Beijing, China, on UK military procedures for testing and acquisition of equipment. This was because the Chinese military had decided that their previous ideas and systems could be improved, and were willing to take advice from other nations on how best to proceed (quite a breakthrough for China at that time!). The UK government decided that our procedures were not particularly secret or sensitive and that they should co-operate with the Chinese request. However, it was also decided that a low-key person should make the presentation rather than an Air Marshal or a General. As Strachan had been at the centre of such procedures for some time, he drafted a presentation on UK military acquisition procedures. This was approved at higher levels and translated into a slide presentation with Chinese Mandarin lettering. He insisted that at the bottom of each slide, the same words in English should appear in small letters, so that when he was speaking he knew which slide was on the screen. He gave the presentation in Beijing with an interpreter at a second rostrum, who would repeat in the Chinese Mandarin language what Strachan has just said in English. Chinese hospitality was great and involved hosted visits to the Imperial City in Beijing and to parts of the Great Wall of China north of Beijing. This hospitality included much of a Chinese favorite drink called "Mao Tai" about which we were briefed by the Senior Britich Officer in Beijing.

In his final era in the RAF, Strachan became budget manager for his department in the Ministry, managing finances of up to 100 million pounds. In that capacity he was able to take the lead in updating the basic computers that had been introduced earlier in the 1980s. He was able to replace the 286 versions which had only floppy discs (one for programs, the other for data) with the latest PC versions with large internal memory that had become available.

He retired from the RAF in 1995 after a last year in which, in addition to his work in the Ministry he was asked to analyse the future of the ETPS course which to some financiers had seemed to be costing too much. After suitable research, he was able to write a paper which pointed out that the cost of sending potential UK Test Pilots to train abroad would be substantial and would deny the present ETPS income from training students from overseas. The conclusion was that the ETPS course was still cost effective and should continue, which was accepted by the Ministry of Defence.

Flight Simulation Group

Before leaving the RAF he became a member of the Royal Aeronautical Society (RAeS) Flight Simulation Group (FSG). He was involved in organising many FSG conferences at the RAeS HQ in London and making presentations to several of them. He also wrote papers on the technology of Flight Simulation that were posted on RAeS web pages (see references at the end).

Writer on Flight Simulation

Having left the Air Force, as a result of contacts made before his retirement, became one of the editors for Jane=s All the World=s Aircraft (JAWA), initially produced by Fred T Jane in the early 1900s. He then became sole editor for the publication "Jane=s Military Training Systems", adding civil systems and changing the title to Jane=s Simulation and Training Systems" (JSTS) because, as he pointed oyt to Jane=s management, some civil training systems were more capable than military systems. In this capacity he visited the annual Simulation and Training conferences and exhibitions in Europe (in the Summer) and the USA (in November/December), gathering data and pictures to update his Jane=s book.

After 10 years with Jane=s he became a freelance writer on training subjects for other publications in Europe and the USA, and continued to attend major training events in Europe and the USA. These included those organized by the Royal Aeronautical Society (RAeS) in London, and for two years he was Chairman of the Society=s Flight Simulation Group (FSG).

Gliding activities

He was Chief Flying Instructor (CFI) of two gliding clubs in the UK, at Swanton Morely in Norfolk and Upavon Wiltshire. He also flew in regional and national Competitions in the UK, twice being UK Standard Class Champion.

He was the first glider competition pilot in the UK to advocate the use of small retractable engines to avoid landing in fields if "lift" (rising air) failed to keep the glider airborne. In the SF27M glider which had a small two-stoke engine he was allowed to fly "hors concours" in the 1971 UK Standard Class Nationals, with the engine specially sealed so that it could not be used on the competition flight. However, after landing the seal could be removed and the engine could be used to fly back to base. On his return flights he was able to use the radio to help gliders that had landed away from base to meet up with their retrieve crew. In this competition he flew well and was placed "above first" because as "hors concours" he was scored outside the main competition a unique placing in UK gliding competitions.

Today, the majority of competition gliders have a small engine which is mounted on a pylon and which retracts into the fuselage behind the pilot(s). The number of glider landings in fields is greatly reduced.

International Flight Recorder Committee

In 1995 he became the first chairman of the GNSS Flight Recorder Committee (GFAC) of the International Gliding Commission (IGC) of the Federation Aeronautical Internationale (FAI). The committee produced rules for Flight Recorders (FRs) that still continue today after refinements over time.

Over the years, some 60 different Approval documents have been published after testing of individual FRs both on the ground and in flight tests, mainly from Lasham airfield in the UK.

In 2007 he was awarded the FAI "Lilienthal Medal" for this and other work in sporting aviation. This is the highest FAI annual award for services to world aviation. It was presented to him at the annual FAI conference which that year was held in Santiago, Chile, by the head of the Chilean Air Force, General Sarabia, who was the Guest of Honour at the conference.

In 2023 his long-term gliding colleague Pete Purdie succeeded him as GFAC Chairman, and he started to wind down his activities,

Conclusion

It has been an amazing aviation life that included gaining his first pilot=s certificate while still at school, graduating from the RAF College at Cranwell, flying from the UK to Singapore using only airfields operated by the UK RAF, becoming a Test Pilot, flying to 65,000 feet by day and down to below 300 feet above the ground at night. More detail is in the References that follow.

References:

Royal Aeronautical Society Paper - Strachan paper on Visual and Motion Cues is available on the Web: <https://raes fsg.org.uk/directdocs/Sim%20&%20Real%20World%20Cueing%20 %20Paper_2019 11 21.pdf>

Autobiography. At the end of 2023 a Strachan biography was published by Mereo Books with the title "Flying High" and the sub title "From Air Cadet to Test Pilot and Gliding Champion". This has 280 pages, many pictures and several reviews are on the web.