Death at Farnborough

Four years ago, Test Pilot John Derry became the first Briton to pass the speed of sound and live to tell about it (TIME, Sept. 20, 1948).* Last week, at Britain's annual Farnborough Air Show, Derry was flying a De Havilland DH-110, a twinjet, all-weather fighter. Before 120,000 spectators, including his young wife, Pilot Derry climbed to more than eight miles and dived, jets screaming, straight toward the crowd. Down he flashed at more than 700 m.p.h. When he leveled off, the double thunderclap of his shock waves—palpable as ocean breakers—crashed against the crowd's bodies and ears. Derry turned again to make a low pass. Then the crowd saw disaster: in eerie, total silence, the DH-110 disintegrated.

The fighter floated apart leisurely, as in a slow-motion movie. Light pieces fluttered to earth. The nose and part of the fuselage skidded through a wire fence lined with spectators. The two jet engines, weighing a ton each, curved across the field in an awesome arc. Tumbling over & over and whistling faintly, they headed for a little hill packed with picnicking families. The great crowd stood in stunned silence, watching the hurtling engines. Over the public-address system, the announcer shouted: "Look out!"

The engines soared for about a mile. One of them missed the hill, tore through a radio truck and smashed two motorcycles. The other engine, flying lower, broke in two and plowed two bloody furrows through the churning crowd. Besides Pilot Derry and his observer, Tony Richards, 28 people were killed, 63 injured.

Air Fair. In spite of this spectacular human tragedy, the show was an aeronautical and military success. Distinguished foreigners from 94 countries, including top aviation men of the Western world, swarmed out of London with hordes of eager Britons. Farnborough turned into a gigantic county fair as families picnicked on the grass or watched from the tops of cars.

The watchers got their money's worth as Britain's flyers showed their new wares with superb and sometimes reckless showmanship. The Supermarine Swift and the Hawker Hunter, R.A.F. interceptors, flashed past the stands 100 ft. off the ground at an official 715 m.p.h., only a shade below the speed of sound. Pilot Derry in his DH-110, which was later to crash, zoomed to 17,000 ft. in a vertical, barrel-rolling climb. All three planes dived at the field, bombarding the stands with shock waves that sounded like cannon fire.

Then came airliners and bombers. A Vickers Viscount liner swooped over the field with three of its four turboprop engines feathered, and did a climbing turn. A Canberra jet bomber whirled in acrobatics as if it were a carnival stunt plane. A Comet jet liner lumbered down the runway, then jumped steeply into the air, pushed by rocket boosters.