Category: Uncategorized

 

 

The case against

By The Aviation Historian’s Nick Stroud

Plane is:

a noun

1) a flat surface on which a straight line joining any two points on it would wholly lie

2) a level of existence or thought

an adjective

1) completely level or flat

a verb

1) to soar without moving the wings (bird or airborne object)

2) skim over the surface of the water

…but it is NOT an aircraft. The correct word is aeroplane, or airplane if you’re an American and absolutely must.

The case for

By Hush-Kit

 

Plane is a simple word that is widely understood.

 

Like most aeronautical words, aeroplane comes from French. Use of the word ‘aeroplane’ in British English predates the actual aeroplane by at least thirty years (and was around even longer in France). I’m not sure why it predates the Wright Brothers, perhaps it was used to describe the aeroplanes that failed to fly in that period, or maybe it was used to describe gliders.

The word ‘level or flat’, is from the Latin platanus and is nothing to do with the word aeroplane.

The ‘plane’ part in aeroplane comes from the Greek ‘planos’ meaning wanderer (I’m not sure if these words are derived from an earlier shared root word perhaps describing a plains wanderer).

 

Aeroplane has been around longer than the concept we use it to describe today (a powered, non-rotary wing, heavier-than-air flying machine). Insisting on an apostrophe before ‘plane’ is as archaic as putting one before bus (from omnibus, originally from the French voiture omnibus) or before car (motor-car). Car is a good example, the word was in popular use since the 14^th Century, it meant cart, carriage or wagon. In 1895 the horseless carriage was called a ‘motor-car’; the very next year many were now simply calling it the car. We drive cars and we fly planes, there’s no need for us to drive ‘cars and ‘planes.

 

 

Plane is universally understood in the English-speaking world, to deny this is perverse and not very useful. The difference in time between the creation of the word aeroplane and airplane is tiny.

The American ‘airplane’ sounds a bit silly to some British English speakers, though many Brits do use it unintentionally. This corruption of aeroplane was used as least as early in 1907 and remains in service with most of the English speaking world today, to ignore that could be seen as arrogant. To be fair, the Americans invented the airplane, so should be allowed to call it what they like.

WE’RE S-P-O-T-T-I-N-G. WE’RE SPOTTING: another song the Pet Shop Boys should have made, but can be forgiven for overlooking. No, ‘plane spotting’ never was and never will be fashionable. It’s only now, decades after I fell under its spell,  that I can dare to share with you some of the strange experiences that my early to mid-teen years chose to absorb.

It’s a hobby almost impossible to justify, and I still don’t know why the others came into it, but I sort of had an excuse. My father was a pilot , so I had early and privileged exposure to that world. As a youth he had taken pictures and notes, most notably of the prototype Spitfire at Southampton Airport. I think it was one day at Cardiff, while waiting alone for him to return from a flight, that I fell in with some older lads who initiated me into the strange world of underlining the registration letters of each aeroplane you saw from a copy of the Aircraft Register, commercially available as ‘ Civil Aircraft Markings’. Could have been worse, I suppose.

Carrots

My main airport was Southampton. I was usually there most weekends, and perhaps one evening. There was a pair of Ians (there always is), myself, and a Peter known as ‘Carrots’. We usually gathered in the car park, in front of a sign which said ‘No Aircraft Spotting’, badly painted by hand, at the instigation of the mean-spirited and penny-pinching airport. Occasionally, the over-zealous chief fireman (a man reminiscent of Mr. McKay in Porridge in the severity with which he sported his peaked hat) would try to move us on. There was an old car abandoned in the car park, and we tried to use it as our base. We even tried to see if there was an empty office or something we could use as a clubroom, but nothing ever came of it.  We called ourselves the ‘Eastleigh Dot Spotters’, because of our skill at identifying the aircraft at 37,000 feet, on the end of vapour trails.

Blackbushe city limits

Apart from this hard-core gang of four, there were some odd characters who passed through. There was Bill, a travelling salesman with a Morris Marina who seemed to spend his working days driving from one airfield to another. He seemed to cover most of Southern England in a week. Carrots went with him sometimes and I was jealous because they went to places like Biggin Hill which I’d only read about. As I was a bit younger, I wasn’t allowed to go off with strange men in Morris Marinas. Later on, two of us went with one bloke who was a regular, but whose name I forget. He was what we then called a ‘Greaser’, a man who retained the 50s rocker look. He had a Robin Reliant, which didn’t really sit that well with his appearance. Can you imagine? We went all the way to Luton (my first visit), then Heathrow, and maybe Blackbushe on the way back in a 3-wheeler.

 Swiss Register

Then there was the ‘Swiss Register’, so named because he claimed to have seen every aircraft on the Swiss aircraft register.  He frowned on our enthusiasm for catching aircraft at 35,000 ft and tracing their registration. For him, he had to see it , in the flesh, as it were. Also he didn’t like ‘Millo’. ‘I don’t do ‘Millo’’, he would say, to emphasise the point. By this, he meant that he had no interest in military aircraft. He would arrive in the morning after working a night-shift somewhere, and had an unfortunate habit of warming his hands within the front of his track-suit bottoms. Then he would say he was off for a nap. I think he lived with his mother.

Although Southampton Airport didn’t have an  ‘Inclusive Tour’ flights, Court Line had its own sexy little biz-jet (a HS125) for the executives. There was a slightly sinister character who occasionally joined us: car coat and possibly trilby, as I recall. He claimed to be the pilot of this HS125, presumably for carrying the executives and not the hoi-polloi. He seemed unlikely pilot material, somehow, and this was confirmed one day as we were all writing in our little notebooks. He asked me gingerly if I could write them in his book for him, and after some prompting, admitted he could not write.

Welly Boot and the heavy mob

We were sometimes joined by a chap who worked on the fish counter at Carrefour, and he always smelt of the fish and wore Wellington boots. Nickname ‘Welly Boot’.

There were some other, less comical groups who passed by. A group of serious Military Enthusiasts (nemeses of ‘The Swiss Register’) who hailed from Suffolk and, specifically the USAF base at Mildenhall. I was very impressed by their knowledge of all things military-they seemed more serious than even us and more knowledgeable. If ever a group of  small boys with an ‘I-Spy Civil Aircraft’, or similar, passed by, I’d announce ‘Here’s the Mildenhall Heavy Mob’. You had to be there to appreciate the bite of my cruel humour.

Away from the airport, there was the real ‘Dot-spotting’-identifying aircraft at the end of Vapour trails, usually on Trans-Atlantic, or Trans-European trips. Once we’d got the flight number, from our AirBand radio, we still had to get the registration letters. A bit of research found me the telephone numbers of the Operations Department of various international airlines, so that Helsinki ,Oslo, Jersey and several US military bases were on my speed-dial,or would have been if such a thing existed. I can still remember the ‘phone number of Air Anglia in Norwich. I wonder what would happen if I rang it now….

My father was slightly nervous about the price of international phone calls, and perhaps the idea that we might be under surveillance for trying to get sensitive military information. As if. So I traipsed off to the nearest telephone box…which meant walking alone across the woods to the ‘phone box. Yes, I could walk through the woods on my own, but I couldn’t go with the man in the Marina. As well as the economics of the trip, I imagine it gave my mother welcome respite from listening to Air Traffic Control radio during her lunch and dinner.

Elvis Costello

As I moved into my later teens, this became a hobby you could talk about even less than before. It was distinctly ‘Uncool’ and the newsletters of LAAS (London Amateur Aviation Society) did not sit well beside the album covers of Patti Smith and Elvis Costello. (Although in later years we paid tribute to said organisation in our version of Gary Numan: We are LAAS). Once again, humour with a limited audience.

There was only one way to convert the knowledge of these uncool years into something useful and not laughable: make a career out of it! Thus it was that I became an Air Traffic Controller, and have continued to be for most of my working life. Strangely, within a year or so of embarking on this, the urge to record and research every aircraft I saw waned, it being a major part of the job. I still retain an instinctive enthusiasm for all flying machines and their history, and enjoying flying them when I can, and now the numbers and the collecting don’t matter, but I probably wouldn’t be where I am without that bit of my history. And I know the capital of Surinam…

Dorian Crook is an air traffic controller, stand-up comedian and pilot. He doesn’t do millo. 

Thank you for reading Hush-Kit. Our site is absolutely free and we have no advertisements. If you’ve enjoyed an article you can donate with the button above– it doesn’t have to be a large amount, every pound is gratefully received. Suggested donation £10. 

At the moment our contributors do not receive any payment but we’re hoping to reward them for their fascinating stories in the future.

Latest analysis of the F-35 here

Follow my vapour trail on Twitter: @Hush_kit

You may also enjoy 11 Cancelled French aircraft or the 10 worst British military aircraft, Su-35 versusTyphoon, 10 Best fighters of World War II , Su-35 versus Typhoon, top WVR and BVR fighters of today, an interview with a Super Hornet pilot and a Pacifist’s Guide to Warplanes. Flying and fighting in the Tornado. Was the Spitfire overrated? Want something more bizarre? Try Sigmund Freud’s Guide to Spyplanes. The Top Ten fictional aircraft is a fascinating read, as is The Strange Story and The Planet Satellite. The Fashion Versus Aircraft Camo is also a real cracker. Those interested in the Cold Way should read A pilot’s guide to flying and fighting in the Lightning. Those feeling less belligerent may enjoy A pilot’s farewell to the Airbus A340. Looking for something more humorous? Have a look at this F-35 satire and ‘Werner Herzog’s Guide to pusher bi-planes or the Ten most boring aircraft. In the mood for something more offensive? Try the NSFW 10 best looking American airplanes, or the same but for Canadians. 10 great aircraft stymied by the US. 

You may also enjoy top WVR and BVR fighters of today, an interview with a Super Hornet pilot and a Pacifist’s Guide to Warplanes. Want something more bizarre? The Top Ten fictional aircraft is a fascinating read, as is The Strange Story of The Planet Satellite. Fashion Versus Aircraft Camo is also a real cracker.