Year: 2009

Fate is the Hunter, part one

A theme about flying, pilots and fate.

Many, many pilots whether civil or military or private, have read the book by Ernest K. Gann entitled Fate is the Hunter. Ernest Gann was born a little under a hundred years ago, on October 13th 1910 and died, aged 81, in 1991. He is known, in the main, as an aviation writer and airline pilot pioneer but achieved much more besides.

Fate is the Hunter is a book about the workings of fate. And this Post is more than a reminder of Ernest Gann’s book and the message it carries, it is also about fate, as Part Two published tomorrow reveals.

Fate or serendipity has happened along to cause a number of recent Posts to be about flying. We had the Post about low-level RAF flight training in North Wales – Mach Loop. Then we had three Posts about air carrier operations prompted by the PBS Series, the first one being published on the 2nd October. Today, circumstance brought me to the Blog of another naval aviator, published by Neptunus Lex. More about him and links to the Blog later.

I want to set the scene by using the words of Ernest K Gann as he starts the preface to his book.

Remarkable people: Sir Ranulph Fiennes

Sir Ranulph Fiennes, a British explorer.

How do we complete a journey? The easy answer is one step at a time; it turns out that that is also the hard answer!

The aspect of integrity that is related to “wholeness” is well illustrated by individuals who show a dedication to something over a long period. By continually taking small steps, the contributions of those steps accumulate to create substantial achievements.

Explorers seem to know a lot about this. They perform some extraordinary feats; and among explorers, one of the fiennes most outstanding is Sir Ranulph Fiennes.

When asked about his approach to climbing Everest at the third attempt in May 2009 and, at age 65, the oldest Briton to do so, he captured the full spirit of separating actions from goals when he said:

Plod forever! Don’t expect to get there. Don’t think there is going to be a top to this mountain. Just plod forever!

His record of exploration is quite staggering, and he also the man who ran seven marathons on seven continents in seven days, shortly after having a heart bypass operation!

Oh, and as there is a faint geographical thread on this blog, he lives in the south west of England. [not far from John, Ed]

Integrity: adding up to something

Integrity as an idea that can deliver more than the sum of the parts

People who add up to something are remarkable, while at the same time being more common than we might think.

As I’ve discussed elsewhere, integrity is also about “wholeness”. The “adding up” aspect is relevant, because it links the parts to the whole. Many people achieve extreme and, sometimes, amazing feats; these are typically formed from many steps. But then to do that repeatedly, and continually exceeding one’s earlier achievements, has the effect of generating an overall record of achievement which is much greater than the sum of its parts.

Defence forces and integrity

A personal reflection on the emotions stirred by the PBS series on the USS Nimitz

The last three days have seen Posts on the USS Nimitz. On the 2nd there was the first part of air carrier operations specifically looking at the challenges of a pitching deck. On the 3rd came the second part as the pilots and crew operated into night, still with the deck of the USS Nimitz pitching significantly. Yesterday, the Post carried links to background information including the excellent web site that PBS have on the USS Nimitz series.

So why raise the question of integrity?

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