What it Takes to Fly Canada's Legendary CT-114 Tutor Jet
Video from the channel On The Move about Canadair CT-114 Tutor, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 22:08. Language: English. Video type: Documentary.
What it's about
Episode of the TV series Air Dogs in which its two hosts, air force test pilot Robert "Rooster" Riker, with about 10,000 flight hours, and nature documentary maker Mark Miller, with about 300, leave propeller aircraft behind to fly the Canadair CT-114 Tutor. Riker flew for five years with the Snowbirds, the Royal Canadian Air Force's aerobatic team, as lead solo, and gets the team to train Miller until he flies in formation.
Preparation begins on the ground, in Toronto, with a sustained-acceleration course. The instructors explain the anti-G straining manoeuvre, which keeps blood from leaving the brain, and both go into the centrifuge: Riker withstands several 5 G runs without a G-suit, and Miller gets through a gradual climb to 5 G for 10 seconds and a longer one. Afterwards, Miller passes ground evacuation and ejection-seat training, essential because in the single-engine Tutor the rule after an engine failure is to eject.
Historical context
The filming takes place at Moose Jaw base (Saskatchewan), home of 15 Wing and 431 Squadron, to which the Snowbirds belong, presented as the only jet team in North America that flies with nine aircraft in formation. The instructors recall that the Tutor is a trainer with dual controls, and that students who arrived with barely 20 hours learned to fly in it.
Highlights
On the first sortie, a little over an hour with Captain Ian James as instructor, Miller practises general handling, simple aerobatics and landing, his first in a jet. He stalls at high speed halfway through a loop and suffers a pilot-induced oscillation, which the instructor helps him correct. James insists that the Tutor is not flared before touchdown like a light aircraft, but flown straight onto the runway.
On the second sortie he flies about 35 minutes of straight-and-level formation alongside another Tutor, using the leader's wingtip as a reference. At first he tends to drift away from the lead aircraft, but ends up holding position even through turns. In total, Miller logs about two and a half hours at the controls of the Snowbirds' jet.