Acme Professor Retired

“What’s this new launching drone like, what is it Mk 3 now?”, – asked the Prof.

“Aye, Mk 3 now, the first ones were really underpowered, and it hampered the smooth orderly launching we had always hoped for, with this new launching method”.

“Aye, you had a few, let’s say “Moments”, with those test flights, I heard?”

Bert was reminded by an involuntary spasm of his sphincter, well it could have just been his age, and he had been eating soup! But he was instantly taken back to those almost trouser fouling moments of terror those experimental test flights had produced.

Yes, it would have been easy to have a radio controlled AI assisted glider used for those first test launches, and indeed they had just taken up and dropped weighted parachute deployable boxes at first, and all was well.
Then small but heavy RC models were taken up vertically above the field to higher and higher heights, until the power limits of the drones props spinning in thinner altitude air, and the drain on the batteries limited further testing.

All was well, but a manned glider was the ultimate test.

Eventually the “CAA”( Civil Aviation Authority) analysed all the data and said if a certain power reserve could be matched, then manned “Drone Lifting” could be attempted with all the aircraft parachutes and pilot parachutes and experienced test gliding pilots could be allowed.

Thus, when Mk 2 came out, it had just the power required to get a manned glider up.

As Bert was a fully qualified test pilot and was the head instructor and had been giving input into the systems, he was the obvious choice.
The first attempt was a complete cock up.

Bert: “Yes, we had our moments… it was the prick from the CAA they sent out to “oversee” what turned into a farce, it took lets say a lot of polite and not so polite correspondence to eventually get the CAA head office to admit they “sent the wrong guy!” or in their “Speak” they admitted “His experience was not commensurate with the tasks ultimately expected of a CAA inspector in that situational environment”. Ha, what a crock of shit, that little weasel of political correctness, hiding behind every conceivable rule and regulation, and looking out for his own ass first to hell with actually progressing the gliding to a fantastic new level of safety and efficiency. He was scared stiff that something would happen to blot his copybook, and risk his career of mediocrity and blandness. What a complete little jerk he was. He basically just wanted to write the test off, and hope he didn’t get sent back, as the responsibility scared the shit out of him…. But, it’s a HUGE BUT! I probably wouldn’t be here without that little prick’s final actions on that day!”.

Prof: “So, what happened, I know you would have been prepped to the Nth degree?”
“Of course we had gone through all the possible scenarios, but my little, lets say “turn”, was not factored in, scared the shit out of all of us, and that little weasel, after wasting most of our time, looking for excuses not to do anything, wasted the best of the days flying conditions, so by 4pm we had only an hour or so left before the clouds were due in and the wind was to pick up. I swear he was stalling just to get the job postponed.”

“But we persevered, and put every little pissy issue he could come up with to bed, but of course my blood pressure was up due to that little jobsworth pissing us about!”

“So he’s not on your Christmas card list?”

“No, he most definitely isn’t, that little shit, but, anyway, we had everything “In the Green” and we are ready for flying, and he wasn’t happy about that, the squirming little shit!”