Brian Lecomber was a professional aerobatic display pilot for 25 years. He has been British Freestyle Aerobatic Champion, a best-selling author, and was recently voted Aviation Journalist of the Year. Brian watches the Bloodhound project from outside the box…
If you seriously intend to propel a car – such a crudity as an actual four-wheeled car – to Mach 1.4, whilst also wishing it to remain in contact with the surface of the planet at all times… why, guess what?
You are not a normal person.
There taketh place, from time to time, a phenomenon in the BLOODHOUND Project which I can only describe as Noble-ing. Not nobbling – very much the contrary – but Noble-ing.
Let me tell you an uncomfortable truth about HPs – HP meaning Heroic Projects. Such as BLOODHOUND. Indeed, especially BLOODHOUND.
So everything in the BLOODHOUND garden is rosy. Yes?
Well, of course, yes. A new sense of urgency. A hard-eyed re-evaluation of all the different design elements in progress. Budgets pinned down, critical paths decided upon, tasks and time-scales allotted to team members who mostly look only slightly stunned. Everyone completely focused on their targets. Everything rosy, hunky-dory, oojah-cum-spiff. Yes?
All iconic projects are led by visionaries.
And all iconic projects much resemble a large central cogwheel – called The Project – with other various-sized cogwheels engaging around its circumference. Some of these act as drivers, some of them act as brakes. And they vary. Some cogs can be brakes one week and drivers the next. Which can frequently become exasperating for those mortals faced with the nigh-impossible task of making everything rotate in harmony.
