Book description
Eric Brown was on a University of Edinburgh exchange course in Germany
in 1939, and the first he knew of the war was when the Gestapo came to
arrest him. They released him, not realizing he was a pilot in the RAF
volunteer reserve: and the rest is history. Eric Brown joined the Fleet
Air Arm and went on to be the greatest test pilot in history, flying
more different aircraft types than anyone else. Today, at 87, he is in
great demand for interviews on history TV documentaries (twelve in
2005!). He is the only man alive who has flown every major (and most
minor) combat aircraft of the Second World War as well as all the early
jets. Speaking perfect German, he went to Germany in 1945 to test the
Nazi jets, interviewing (among others) Hermann Goering and Hanna
Reitsch. He flew the suicidally dangerous Me 163 rocket plane, and
tested the first British jets. He would have been the first man to break
the sound barrier, except that the British government cancelled the
programme and gave the technology to America. His naval career continues
to this day, as he advises on the new aircraft carrier design for the
Royal Navy. A living legend among aviation enthusiasts, his amazing life
story deserves to be told in full -- from crashing in front of Winston
Churchill to unmasking a Neo-Nazi ring in the 1950s to his terrifying
flights in primitive jets and rockets. Eric Brown is in the Guinness
Book of Records for having flown more aircraft types (487) than any
other pilot in the world. His record is unlikely to be broken, ever. Now
87, Captain Brown CBE, OBE, MBE, DSC, AFC, KCVSA became a test pilot
during the Second World War and commanded the RAE Aerodynamics Flight at
Farnborough. He played a key role in the design of an entire generation
of aircraft. No other man alive today can claim to have interviewed the
top Nazis, flown their jet aircraft or tested so many experimental
machines.
