Features A Yankee in King Arthur’s Test Pilot School By LT Ben “3D” Putbrese, HX-21
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t was August 2020, and I was preparing to make the move from my JO fleet tour at HSM-51 in Atsugi, Japan to my oncoming shore tour at VX-1 in Patuxent River, MD. My household goods had already been picked up, and soon I would be “LFF Complete” and on my way home after nearly three years in the Land of the Rising Sun– when I was suddenly summoned to an urgent meeting with the CO! I walked into CDR Jason Russo’s office, where he was flanked by the XO, both staring at me with incredible seriousness. Those who have met CDR Russo know that he can be an imposing figure even when delivering the best of news, and already on my way to his office I had started mentally replaying my last few flight hours to figure out when and how I had gotten myself into trouble. After an agonizing few seconds waiting for the CO to deliver the blow, he finally said “Congratulations 3D. You’ve been selected for Test Pilot School...” We all started to smile, and before I had even finished processing the outstanding news, the CO added “…in England!”
LT Putbrese flying the Airbus H125 (Squirrel), the primary single-engine trainer at ETPS
England? For test pilot school?? I remember being required to rank my preferences for school location on my TPS application letter (1. Pax River; 2. ETPS, UK; and 3. EPNER, France), but I definitely hadn’t contemplated selection for anything but Pax. Suddenly everything in my life had shifted dramatically, and I immediately began altering all my plans, including arrangements to have my household goods and classic 1995 Suzuki Jimny re-routed from Japan to England. Four ORDMODs later and I was quarantining in an 800-year-old hotel in the medieval cathedral city of Salisbury, UK, and doing everything I could to be physically and mentally ready to start the No. 59 Rotary Wing Course at the Empire Test Pilots’ School, MoD Boscombe Down. The Empire Test Pilots’ School was founded in 1943 and was the first of its kind–following concern over the number of fatalities during the development of aircraft for service in the second World War and out of a desire for standardization of flight test procedures across services and aerial platforms. The school’s mission was to “provide suitably trained pilots for testing duties in aeronautical research and development establishments within the service and the industry,” 1 and the first course graduated 13 students in 1944 at the military airfield at Boscombe Down in southwest England. Notably, the first ETPS class included one American pilot who was previously a volunteer in a British fighter squadron, and of those who attended the No. 1 course, five eventually died while testing aircraft. In 1949 the school was presented with its Armorial Bearings (school crest) and began using the motto of “Learn to Test, Test to Learn.” Recognizing the increasing importance of helicopters in military flight, ETPS added a formal Rotary Wing course in 1963, followed by a formal Flight Test Engineers’ (FTE) course in 1974. To this day, ETPS is considered one of the “Big 4” of global test pilot schools, alongside USNTPS at Pax River, USAFTPS at Edwards AFB, and EPNER in France. The four schools maintain a very close relationship, setting the worldwide standard in military and civilian flight test and regularly exchanging students, instructors, and professional knowledge to further LT Putbrese transitions to forward flight in an ETPS H125 Squirrel advance the flight test profession.1 Rotor Review #156 Spring '22
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