I’m surprised there hasn’t been any topic about this already but am in awe of the life and stories told by Britain’s Greatest Pilot, as told at 95 by the man himself on BBC4 (Tuesday 10pm).

Thought you’d like to know about it and enjoy.

Just finished watching this. Brilliant programme about one of my heroes.

What they didn’t mention in the programme is that “Winkle” should have been the first man through the sound barrier in the Miles M52 which was years ahead of the Bell X-1 but some clueless pen pusher in government cancelled the programme.

The Americans weren’t happy about Eric having the world record for carrier landings at over 2400 so they gave a US pilot the job of beating him. Fair play to the guy said Eric he got to about 1500 landings then had a nervous breakdown!

I bumped the original thread earlier on, it’s a couple of threads down. A brilliant story

Brilliant programme

What an amazing life, and seems like such a decent chap