The “closest” you can get to a person is when you are exchanging seats in a small cockpit. During the Aero-India show in February 2019, I was offered a ride on the Airbus C-295 which had come in for displays during the air show. As I stepped into the briefing room in the Airbus chalet, I was pleasantly surprised to see Ratan Tata, who was to be part of the same sortie, attending the brief.
After takeoff, I occupied the right seat in the cockpit of the aircraft with Mr Tata in the jump seat. Having got a feel of the aircraft, it was time to swap positions. Now, the cockpit isn’t exactly designed for easy movement once inside and it required both of us to contort ourselves to squeeze into our new exchanged positions! The best memory I have of that sortie is being real up and close with the legend.
A little over two years ago, I met an aviation enthusiast and we got into a discussion about the realism afforded by modern flight simulators. During one conversation, he mentioned that he was sitting with Ratan Tata, who would like to speak with me.
Mr Tata came on the line and expressed his desire to fly a sortie in a fighter simulator. It was decided that the very next day, which was a Saturday, would be best suited. The next morning, he landed at AFS Lohegaon and was received by the Air Officer Commanding (AOC) and the CO of the resident Su-30MKI squadron. He was given a short tour of the airbase, followed by a detailed briefing on the sortie profile that was planned. The excitement to fly the Sukhoi simulator was as much as would have been on his first flight in an airplane!
The Su-30 MKI simulator is fully mission capable, which means that every profile that can be done on the aircraft can be flown on the simulator. The guest was familiarised with the cockpit layout, consoles and the features of the displays. He was to get into the front cockpit and that involved climbing seven-eight steps on a ladder. With all his energy and determination, he made attempts to ascend the steps, but could not muster enough strength to do so. He was assisted by many young officers, but found it difficult to pull himself up. He realised himself that while he may still get into the cockpit, getting out may be very difficult. The AOC and his team even tried to provide a chair lift, but those attempts also failed. The disappointment was writ large on all faces.
The large-hearted gentleman that he was, Mr Tata convinced everyone not to feel bad about it and that he would very much enjoy watching someone else go through the manoeuvres. He sat on a chair inside the simulator dome and watched the take-off, turns, rolls, loops and the air-to-air refuelling. Sitting inside the dome of a simulator can be very disorientating even to a young person, but he enjoyed every second thoroughly.
The Air Force officers then “walked” him through the debrief session and, with keen interest, he observed the play back of the mission, asking questions that impressed everyone with both his breadth and depth of knowledge. He was then shown the squadron albums with photographs of fighters against the background of the Air India building in Mumbai and also escorting an Air India B-747. With a heavy heart, the station bid him farewell as he boarded his jet to fly back to Mumbai.
The magnanimous Mr Tata, wrote a letter to the AOC a few days later, saying, “One of the greatest pleasures I have had in the past few years was the day we spent together at the air base”. He further said that it was his greatest disappointment to not be able to fly in the simulator itself, but it would be a day he will always remember. In Air Force parlance, such a sortie would have been recorded as DPCO (Duty Partially Carried Out) in the log books. How one wished that it had been DCO — Duty Carried Out!
As he spreads his wings to soar into eternity, we bid farewell to a keen and passionate aviator. Fly well and godspeed, Ratan Tata, you will be missed.
The writer is a retired Air Chief Marshal
