How a pilot’s sickness gave Roy the opportunity To fly the royal flight around the United States

CAPTAIN Roy Withey, 76, was never supposed to crew the royal flights around America in 1991, writes Sam Brett.

If one of Concorde’s original crew had not fallen sick, his day training at Filton headquarters would have continued like any other.

He would not have received a phone call asking him to join the royal party in Tampa, Florida. He would not have dropped everything and flown out from London immediately.

And, in the pointed cockpit of Concorde G-BOAB, he would not have met Prince Philip. Roy grew up in Fishponds, attending Dr Bell’s Primary Boys School before starting at Speedwell Comprehensive in 1956.

“Going to school in Bristol pointed me towards aviation,” he said.

“I used to see Vampires flying out of Filton and doing aerobatics out of my back garden.

“Watching them doing loops and barrel rolls I thought, ‘Blimey that’s a nice way to earn a living’.”

After leaving school, Roy joined the Royal Navy and learned to fly in Dartmouth.

After seven years of service, he joined British Airways in 1973.

He said becoming a Concorde pilot was very much down to chance as many eager pilots bid for vacancies.

“A new aeroplane, a real challenge to fly – I thought that was a challenge I wanted,” he said.

Becoming the most junior pilot to earn a place, Roy learned to fly Concorde in the £3 million state-of-theart aircraft simulator at the Filton headquarters.

The same simulator would cost £30 million today.

“It took a bit of getting used to; the drag the wings create is enormous – you burn as much fuel coming into land as when you’re supersonic doing 23 miles per minute,” he said. “At high speeds it was superb.”

Roy qualified as a Concorde pilot in 1978 and spent 11 years on and off as a co-pilot before leaving to become a captain in a conventional 767 in 1993.

“I never got the chance to get back to Concorde as captain,” he said.

In his time as senior first officer on Concorde, Roy flew countless famous people, including Liza

Minelli, Muhammed Ali, Paul McCartney and The Beatles.

“After their meal they’d often wander into the cockpit and say hello.

“It was very nice meeting those people and being able to have a quick word with them.”

In 1991, Roy crewed Concorde for the 13-day royal visit to America after another pilot became sick.

On one internal flight during the trip, Roy was visited in the cockpit by Prince Philip himself.

“I was surprised when he came up. He popped his head round and wanted to watch the landing.

“He was his usual taciturn self – I had to jump out my seat to let him get strapped in and get the headset on.”

The Duke of Edinburgh was an experienced pilot and logged 5,986 hours flying 59 types of aircraft. In January 1972, Prince Philip even flew Concorde himself.

“He didn’t need any instructing on what to do and what not to do.”

Roy now lives in Portishead in North Somerset with his wife Marilyn, whom he married in 1967 two years after meeting her in Pembrokeshire.

> Former Concorde pilot Roy Withey in the cockpit