Brian Lecomber was a professional aerobatic display pilot for 25 years. He has been British Freestyle Aerobatic Champion, a best-selling author, and was recently voted Aviation Journalist of the Year. Brian watches the Bloodhound project from outside the box…
Truth to tell, I have never been much of a – well, fan, I suppose – of fan clubs. Honesty compels me to admit there might be just a touch of sour grapes about this, dating back to my youth.
It is one thing starting something. It can be, sometimes embarrassingly, quite another stopping it. In the case of BLOODHOUND a certain Wing Commander Andrew Green OBE, current Land Speed Record holder, sums it up with his best deadpan expression on his face, which is very deadpan indeed.
On this day the small plaza beside the BLOODHOUND Technical Centre slightly resembles a film set. Well, in fact at the moment it is a film set. A major international TV programme is filming a scientific documentary, and all the usual suspects on such a set are present and correct.
Whenever I walk down Gas Ferry Road in Bristol to the Doghouse – sorry, sorry, the BLOODHOUND Technical Centre – I cannot escape a feeling of walking into history.
There is a science in industry called Just In Time. Which carries the obvious acronym JIT. Or maybe it’s not a science – maybe it’s more exactly a methodology. Or maybe it’s an art-form in the industrial lexicon falling under the letter B – somewhere between Blackmail and Brinkmanship.
