Original subtitles

This programme contains upsetting scenes and some strong language

This is your one chance to get to the front line and be a pilot.

It's a really big deal.

Here's the keys to an £80 million fighter jet.

I think when people start the course,

they don't know what to expect.

I think they've got an idea of what being a fighter pilot is,

but they've never actually done the job.

They're not the finished article yet.

This is your one chance.

If you get told that you haven't got what it takes,

it's the end of the road.

ELECTRONIC BEEPING

The RAF is on high alert.

We know something is going to happen in the next 24 hours.

Buzzard tower, Typhoon radio check.

There's a potential ISIS safe house.

Everything that's happening,

with Russia and Ukraine, it's like a tinder box.

You're doing an important role protecting from Vladi the Baddie.

Whoa!

ALARM BLARES

Here we go.

Whoa. Holy shit.

With conflict in Europe...

..and the Middle East...

..British war planes are poised to face any threat.

ID Russian aircraft.

You don't want to fire on it and end up starting World War III.

Coningsby tower, 1-0-1-4 knots.

Max crossing 1-6 from the left.

RAF Coningsby is one of the UK's busiest air bases,

and home to every aspiring Typhoon pilot.

How are you doing? You all right?

You really do feel like you are part of a team.

We just don't have to salute anybody, that's all.

DOOR SQUEAKS Anyone in?

Half of the RAF's Typhoon jets are based here,

with many used for training the next generation of pilots.

PHONE RINGS

Good morning. How are you? Awake.

You're awake? Yeah, I'm just about awake as well.

My name is David Mack.

I'm currently training to be a Typhoon pilot

here on 29 Squadron at Coningsby.

As cliche as it sounds, I've wanted to be a pilot since I was,

you know, three, four years old.

And I'm not a huge fan of heights, believe it or not,

which people think is mental because I'm a pilot

and I'm not a big fan of heights.

It's taken 30-year-old Mac six years of training

to get this far.

Only today will he fly a Typhoon jet for the very first time.

This is day one, first flight.

It's been, years in the making, but finally the day is here.

Good. Well, fingers crossed it all goes well.

Thank you very much, I'll give you all call, you and Dad,

when I get back on the ground safely.

OK, love you!

The last few days my mind has being a bit of a maze trying to sort of

keep track of what to think cos

it is, it's an incredibly special moment...

..to go and fly a Typhoon.

This is little David from Glasgow's dream.

In fact, my very first memory was building

a little red Lego aeroplane,

throwing it down the stairs at my family home, at my brother,

who then started crying.

Um, and I got in trouble.

Living up the corridor in the officers' mess

is Mac's best friend and fellow Typhoon trainee.

The nicknames Mac and Cheese

were given to us on our last course at Valley.

My name's Cheese.

I'm 29 years old and on 29 Squadron at Coningsby.

My passion came from my parents.

It's quite a kind of cliche, I guess, but my dad was

an airline pilot and my mum was a stewardess,

so that's a classic one, isn't it?

Morning, Cheese. Here he is. How are you?

Good.

Let's go and fly a Typhoon. Big day, yeah.

Mac and Cheese are trying to join the front line at

a time of increased international tension.

With war raging in Ukraine and the Middle East...

..the RAF is accelerating pilot training

to bolster its ranks.

The next few months will be the most challenging

of Mac and Cheese's careers.

Most importantly, what are you going to do first, Mac?

Fly the aircraft. Exactly.

If I'm at low level, get away from the ground.

And is anything in a Typhoon going to kill you quickly, Cheese?

Er, the ground? Yeah, pretty much

nothing unless you fly into the ground.

The boss of 29 Squadron oversees all Typhoon trainees in the RAF.

Failure on the course means losing

the chance of ever flying Typhoon again.

I'm a Wing Commander Andy Shaw

O/C, 29 Squadron.

When people start the course,

they don't know what to expect.

I think they've got an idea of what being a fighter pilot is,

but they've never actually done the job.

Make sure you're ready to go because the world's about to go faster.

It is genuinely like pressing fast forward for

the first time you fly this thing.

So, get yourself ready

cos you will be skidding along behind it for a little bit.

Sweet. Happy days. Sounds good. Thanks, boss.

It is a very cool thing we're going to go and do.

I think it's only now, putting the kit on for the first time.

It's a big deal. It's a big step in a in a pilot's career when they get

into their first big grey, you know, 20 tonne aircraft

and fly it around on their own.

It's starting to feel... A bit more real.

..a bit real, which is awesome.

I think on the first flight,

Mac and Cheese are most worried about making mistakes

and looking stupid.

They probably are more conscious of that than they should be.

But it's healthy to have a little

bit of nervousness in there, isn't it?

Looking handsome.

I guess you could say, I'm Maverick and he's Goose.

It's good we've got each other to keep each other right, isn't it?

Yeah, it's nice to be doing it with your buddy. Yeah.

Mac and Cheese about to hit the Typhoon for the first time.

INDISTINCT RADIO CHATTER

Mac will take off before Cheese,

and together, they'll fly a 50-minute circuit,

getting used to the Typhoon's speed and manoeuvrability.

But with the weather closing in, it won't be an easy first flight.

It's a really big deal.

Here's the keys to an £80 million fighter jet.

Go and have fun.

It does focus the mind, it does get the heart pumping.

There's s a thousand things going through my head.

Oh, my God, this, is it? This is the moment.

It's all leading up to this.

I'm looking down the runway at Coningsby...

Here we go!

..applying the power and feeling the immense kick

from those incredible engines.

It's an amazing feeling.

The G-force. You can feel your whole body pressing into the seat.

HE STRAINS

You've got the mask with a hint of rubber smell.

And you can feel the vibrations in the...in the aircraft.

You can hear and feel the radar clunking.

And you can hear the crackle of the radio.

RADIO CRACKLES

With Mac safely in the air, Cheese is up next.

It is a massive milestone.

You are by yourself, which is definitely quite intimidating.

Anything could go wrong.

ENGINE ROARS

It's a single seat fighter aircraft.

There is no-one with you.

If I was to make a mistake, I would be really upset.

What's the crosswind at the moment?

13 from the left, maximum 20 from the left.

With cloud levels building around Coningsby,

Mac and Cheese are being monitored from Air Traffic Control by Andy,

and senior Typhoon pilot, Mark Long.

309, so that is Rob at 5,000 feet, south of Coningsby.

We're never going to see him in the cloud.

And it's, what, £80-90 million of fighter that's ten times

more powerful than anything they're flown before.

So, it's a massive step.

By flying in rubbish weather like this,

they'll mostly just be trying not to fuck up, but they'll be fine.

RADIO BEEPS

309's got no comms.

Cheese has just lost contact with everyone on the ground.

RADIO BEEPS

The first thing I realise is that I'm trying to tell

air traffic something but they're not hearing what I'm saying.

I'm starting to think like, why? Why is this happening?

Why can't they hear me?

RADIO BEEPS

RADIO BEEPS

If you're transmitting,

you are carrier wave only to Buzzard Tower.

I'm just repeating the same thing over and over again

which is a bit scary, to be fair, on your first flight.

On his first-ever Typhoon flight,

29 Squadron trainee Cheese's radio has failed.

309, Buzzard Tower.

He's lost his comms, so, he can't speak to anyone at the moment.

The reality is this, is dangerous.

RADIO SQUEAKS

The weather is awful.

They can't hear what I'm saying.

Stuff can go wrong really quickly.

There's no-one there to help you out.

With visibility poor and no radio,

he's forced to return to base.

So, there he is, just up here. He's coming back now.

If you want to pull the chute,

you are within crosswind limits if you choose to do so.

Transmitting blind.

When I'm coming down the approach I'm thinking, right, OK.

The weather's not very good.

I'm heavy now because I've had to come back early

because of this comms issue.

This thing lands really quick.

If you've got extra fuel on, you're landing even faster,

so in order to slow down in time,

one option that you have is the parachute.

Typhoon 309, Buzzard Tower. Transmitting blind.

Good job, mate. So, if you taxi to the end and taxi off the runway.

When stuff goes wrong, you learn a huge amount.

I don't think you actually really have the chance

to be like, "Oh, this is... this is terrifying."

Hey, boss. All right, guys, how are you doing? I'm good.

How, was it? Slightly eventful.

Yeah, obviously I was up in the tower with air traffic

and it seemed like you did everything right.

Cool, thanks boss. Yeah, hopefully the next flight

goes a bit smoother to this one.

Yeah, you'd have to be unlucky, wouldn't you? Yeah.

It's not common to have a comms failure on your first flight.

His first clue that his radio wasn't working probably was when he tried

to speak to someone else and then he realised that no-one else

was responding to him.

What actually failed was his microphone,

so the aircraft was working fine,

it was actually his kit that was broken.

And there's no way you can really have redundancy for that.

New headsets, brilliant.

I mean, they're fucking useless, they're falling out already.

I don't like this.

Coningsby Tower. Surface wind at 160, ten knots.

Four cleared to land. Cleared to land.

Do you want lights? Yeah, please.

My eyes are starting to water.

My name's Sergeant Darryl Pettit, I'm from Air Traffic Control.

We monitor the skies, look after the pilots

when they leave the airfield, make them safe.

Federal one Coningsby Tower. Report runway vacated.

When I was younger, I really wanted to be a pilot

and then went away on holiday.

On the way back, we had some turbulence in the plane

and I remember looking up at my grandma saying,

"I never want to be a pilot",

but I knew that I still wanted to work at an airfield.

Tower?

Currently at 5,000 ft.

090, I'm heading with inflation code alpha.

I very much like my feet on the ground,

sat in a nice warm tower,

telling the pilots what they can and can't do.

Having completed three years of training,

Darryl is Coningsby's newest air traffic controller.

Hopefully, we can get the typhoons gone

because then we've not got a delay.

All the hawks are planning to be ahead of the typhoons.

Yeah.

He's just been called in to speak to his boss about playing

a crucial role in a national celebration.

Come in, take a seat.

Right, the reason I want to speak to you, the King's Birthday Flypast.

I'd like you to take on the role of tower control

if you're happy with that. OK, yeah.

There's going to be a few different challenges that's

going to present themselves, and I think you're probably

in the right position now to take on that, if you're happy to do that.

Yeah, that's no problem. Have you got any questions?

Not that I can really think of. No? Thanks, sir. Thanks.

Darryl will be in charge of launching 14 planes

from RAF Coningsby.

Timing will be crucial.

The jets must rendezvouz with other aircraft,

before flying over Buckingham Palace at noon

to celebrate the King's Birthday.

Made you a cake. Yeah?

Yeah. Fresh cream.

Oh, baby!

Favourite duck, innit?

Darryl's orders are big news in the Pettit household.

How are you feeling?

Yeah, nervous, but looking forward to it.

I don't really know what to expect, to be honest,

because I've never done a King or Queen's flypast before.

No. I bet they'll brief you before, won't they?

Yeah, and then I'll just deal with it as and when

it happens and go from there.

Proud of him, aren't you, Mum?

I'm very proud of him, yeah.

Number one boy, isn't he? Yep.

A lot of people in the RAF come from different backgrounds.

Starving.

Some people come from silver spoon backgrounds.

I don't think I can say that, can I?

I've been up in Tower all day today.

In the tower? Yeah. Have you? Mm.

Bloomin' heck. Was it manic?

Manic, absolutely. Was it? Yeah, nonstop.

A lot of people have gone through private education,

a lot of people have got degrees.

Whereas that's my not case.

It's what you've always wanted to do.

Yeah, true.

I said to him, I think you might be setting your targets

a bit high here, Darryl.

THEY LAUGH

What? When he said he wanted to do air traffic?

Mm.

Well, I mean, he didn't come out with

a lot of qualifications or owt, did he? No.

I just have my five GCSEs behind me and just some determination in

the background to get me to where I am.

Just got to get on with it, haven't you? Yeah!

You've worked hard for it, duck, haven't you? Mm.

Hey, good morning. Hiya, boss. Fellas, how you doing?

All right, fellas, so we will talk about the King's Birthday Flypast.

With just days to go until the flypast event,

29 Squadron pilot Mark Long has also been enlisted to help.

Time on target of 1300 local,

15th of June with no change to that or slip,

I think that's about right, isn't it?

Schlongy, you're going to be flying your Hurricane? Spitfire?

Yes, yeah. One or the other.

Schlongy's job is to plan the route itself.

So, he's planning all of those waypoints,

timings for the for the execution of the flypast.

I suppose the concept is to try and then get the slower players

to split away from the faster players,

and allow the faster assets to drive through,

split, because we've got a point for the combat air,

and then ultimately through Heathrow.

Schlongy's an annoyingly good pilot.

You know, he's instructed pretty much every Typhoon pilot

on the force.

He taught me when I arrived on Typhoon back in 2015.

So, he's a figure that's well known and well-loved across the force.

We've actually got seven flypasts, post-Palace to achieve.

So, we're quite busy in and around London.

But the rest of the mass of the flypast should have climbed,

accelerated, and be out of our way.

Cool. Mate, that's good.

The last thing we want is something unsafe happening,

trying to get a flypast done, which fundamentally -

it's important, but it's not important enough

to break any rules for.

Cool. Thank you, Sir. Cheers.

Schlongy is flying on Typhoon and he's finding time

to do this on top of his primary job,

which is very busy at the moment.

So, it's going to be a challenging day.

Alongside planning the flypast,

Mark must help the latest batch of Typhoon trainees up their game.

I'm feeling apprehensive.

You're a student, they expect you to make mistakes.

But obviously you have a bit of pride,

and reputation's important.

Cheese, welcome.

So today, real radar, real environments.

Big thing today - maintaining visual and then being lethal at the merge.

Mark's challenging Cheese to a dogfight,

a one-on-one contest of high-speed aircraft handling,

high above the North Sea.

The fight will tighten up

because you are kind of going down the plug hole.

If you're here, when I turn,

just absolutely lag that turn.

It's almost, you're going to see from your cockpit,

sight line rate increasing.

Then start your turn, you can full back stick if required

because we've got a bit of time to regain our energy.

But I want you in that position there.

Cheese has two minutes to lock his weapons on Mark Long's aircraft,

with his instructor flying evasively to avoid Cheese's aim.

My job is to try to get behind Mark's aircraft

and use the Typhoon's missiles to lock onto his jet.

He'll be trying all sorts of manoeuvres to stop me.

There's definitely a bit of that in the Top Gun 2 film.

It's a really important skill set to have.

Schlongy is a really, really good instructor.

He's super experienced.

He's flown Harrier and Typhoon.

Of all the pilots on 29, Mark would be the one that

you'd want to aspire to be like.

Requesting STUD three on the runway.

You kind of don't want to let him down.

You want to put up a good fight, impress him and do well,

not let the side down.

This is it now - the pressure's on.

It's me against him. It's time to show him what I'm made of.

Let me know when you're ready.

Off the coast of the UK,

Typhoon trainee Cheese has two minutes to get

a missile lock on his instructor Mark Long's jet.

All that's going round in my head is 'don't mess this up.

But at the same time, I'm about to have a dogfight with one of

the RAF's best instructors.

So, the pressure is definitely on.

There's like so many different things that you've got

to think about at once.

So, you've just got to focus on the techniques that we're taught.

It's really dynamic. You're pulling 9G.

You're trying to shoot the hostile in front of you.

HE STRAINS

Argh...

The first thing I want to do is get closer to Mark.

He's too far away at the moment,

and I want to make it easy to get a good missile lock on him.

HE STRAINS

RADIO BEEPS

Cheese has closed the gap to his instructor's jet.

But Mark spots the move and turns tightly.

Mark's going much slower than me now,

so he can turn really tightly.

I'm going too fast, so I'm going to need to quickly slow down.

The problem now is he's out-turning me,

and he's effectively starting to get away.

I'm about to lose my attacking opportunity.

To turn quicker and follow Mark, Cheese slows down even more.

Flying at this speed puts Cheese at risk of stalling

and falling out of the sky.

With time running out, Mark calls a halt to the challenge.

Obviously, it's frustrating when things don't go the way you want.

I think most of us are perfectionists,

like we try to do as best as we can.

Cheese's performance is assessed in a formal debrief.

Can you remember where the bogey contact was,

can you remember where we actioned our geometry

and any kind of highlights from that flow?

I was behind you and then on the turn in,

I really didn't have quite the performance I was expecting.

So I ended up getting quite a bit closer to you than I thought.

Yeah, sure.

That's the first time you've performed in a Typhoon

at 36,000 feet whilst fighting 1v1 BFM. Yeah.

It's different, it's massively different.

There's always room for improvement and I think a lot of people

associate this job with like, Top Gun and big egos

and personalities like that.

But that couldn't be further from the case.

Air combat manoeuvring is not new to him.

What is new is the performance of the Typhoon.

Now his threat, the hostile, is going to fight harder

and the performance he has is a lot more intense

so you can find yourself in really tough situations

really, really quickly.

I'll hammer myself for making a mistake,

but I can move on from it pretty quick.

It's all part of just rolling with the punches.

Typhoon trainees face being kicked off the course

if they struggle to make the grade.

If Cheese can't perform to the minimum standard,

his days in the cockpit could be numbered.

NEWSREEL: An RAF pilot has died in Lincolnshire.

The aircraft came down a field near RAF Coningsby on Saturday.

It is with great sorrow that I must confirm

the death of Squadron Leader Mark Long.

Just days after flying with Cheese, on Saturday 25th May,

whilst flying a World War II Spitfire,

Squadron Leader Mark Long dies in a plane crash.

He is survived by his wife and two children.

Mark touched so many lives, especially those who had

the honour of working closely with him on 29 Squadron.

Mark set an example to us all.

Always putting others before himself,

he personified the very best of the Royal Air Force.

Words cannot adequately convey the loss of such a dear friend.

You all right? Hi, boss, how are you doing?

Yeah. Grab a seat.

29 Squadron boss Andy Shaw has called a meeting

to check in on Mac and Cheese,

who were both being trained by Mark.

I think the most important thing to say is that emotion is OK.

And it's OK to be sad.

You know, I've been very sad over the last few days.

I've definitely, you know, had...had cries, you know,

thinking about everything that's going on.

I found out about the crash via a text message from a friend...

..who let me know that he had passed,

which was devastating.

So I...I stopped and I had a good old ugly cry for a little bit.

It was obviously a massive shock.

Kind of, people like that you almost feel like they are

a bit untouchable,

so it really brings it home for people like us.

If someone's got that much experience

and they can be that good at flying,

these things can still happen and it's a really dangerous job.

Yeah, and I think the important thing to recognise is that

this is part of the job and it's a horrible,

horrible part of the job.

And if you're not in a place to go flying, mentally,

if you're distracted in any way then...

..then, obviously, then don't.

You know, and that's absolutely fine.

Yeah. Fucking rubbish.

I flew with him enough times to kind of have

a relationship with him.

I will remember those flights that I had with him

for the rest of my career and do my best to live up to him

because he was just an awesome instructor,

awesome pilot, and an awesome guy.

Yeah, he was...he was great.

I don't think it has fully sunk in yet.

We're all finding it tough.

I feel incredibly privileged to have been able

to meet someone like Mark.

I've learned so much from him.

Not just, not just from flying, but how you,

how you...how you behave as a human.

He was just such a decent human.

When you find out that one of your friends has died,

it's devastating.

Not only because you feel for them, the person who's died,

but you're thinking about their family,

about their wife and children.

That's the bit where it really hits home,

is when you're thinking about those that are left behind.

All flying at Coningsby is suspended for 24 hours,

out of respect for Mark and his family.

Mark was a humble kind, generous, family man,

as well as an outstanding fighter pilot,

instructor and display pilot.

It's the most serious thing that I've been around

in my entire career.

Mark touched the hearts of everyone that met him,

always prioritising the needs of others before himself.

It has very much become more of a sentimental day.

Not only is it the King's Birthday Flypast

but also have the poignancy of Squadron Leader Long.

It's a very fitting tribute.

It's the morning of the Kings Birthday Flypast

above Buckingham Palace.

Darryl must launch 14 planes from RAF Coningsby in quick succession.

The brief for today's flypast,

Coningsby's aircraft that are taking part.

We've got ten Typhoons and four Hawks leaving us today.

Daryl, you're going to be the tower controller.

What's the plan for if they are coming in to land

and then they miss their approach?

If they miss their approach climb them to 3,000ft

and back to approach STUD four. OK.

Thank you, good luck. Cheers.

Good luck, God bless.

Roger.

Runway is mine.

Darryl must now co-ordinate more jets than he's ever handled

and get them airborne on time,

or they'll miss the flyover in London.

14 aircraft, all leaving and within 11 minutes.

Let's see if we can do it.

No pressure.

It's only the King that's waiting....!

Hold position.

Tower request release Vermin one, flight.

Vermin one flight released. Roger, Tower.

Vermin one flight.

Just to confirm you're looking for a minute zero take off?

Cleared for take-off, surface wind 200, 12 knots.

With four Hawks quickly in the air...

Tower, request release Memorial flight.

..the Typhoons are up next.

Memorial flight release. Roger, Tower.

Memorial two, cleared for take-off surface wind 200.

Memorial one, Tower. Pass message.

With the window closing to launch the jets,

the lead Typhoon has radioed with a problem.

Memorial one currently has a snag and is waiting on a fuel issue.

However, at this moment in time, he's due to be the one

that's leading his Memorial flight.

Good man.

News from the jet that the issue has been quickly resolved

means Darryl can resume releasing the Typhoons.

Memorial one's finally got airborne,

after quite a few minutes.

There's a lot of aircraft in a small bit of airspace,

so it'll be very crowded to make the perfect flypast for the King.

Feeling good. Good. Yep. Good. Final hurdle.

Yeah. Nervous, excited. Kind of a mix of both,

but it's going to be good fun, I think. Yeah.

And it's good we're flying together.

On 29 Squadron,

Mac and Cheese's final test flight is about to begin.

Pass, and they become fully qualified Typhoon pilots.

Fail, and this could be their last time in a Typhoon cockpit.

This is your one chance to pass this course.

If you get told that you haven't got what it takes

to fly the Typhoon and pass,

there's no go back and have another go.

That's the end of the road, basically.

Brief the rules.

Everyone BFM'd within the last six months?

Yes.

Each trainee must demonstrate their ability

to expertly hunt down a group of opposing aircraft.

No changes to the weather, blue light.

And lock on with their weapons,

under the watchful eye of squadron boss, Andy Shaw.

Have a good sortie. Cool. Cheers.

Thanks.

All good.

Our entire course comes down to this flight.

The aim of the game is to shoot our missiles at

the hostile aircraft flying against us.

The training wheels are coming off,

and they've got to make split second decisions.

And if you make the wrong one,

you'll end up getting shot by the baddie.

This is a really complicated thing to do, and it's really hard.

It's actually quite a difficult thing to go and do.

Everything's leading up to this.

50 miles off the coast of the UK,

Mac and Cheese's final test is about to begin.

Being assessed is their ability to target

and lock missiles onto opposing jets,

known as Drakens.

Flying to represent an enemy force,

they'll try to evade Mac and Cheese's weapons

by manoeuvring erratically.

Failure today could end Mac and Cheese's future as fighter pilots.

It's the hardest fight in the course.

So the idea is that you face up to a threat.

We have to kill them as quickly as possible.

The Drakens are small, fast and they're got plenty

of tricks they can play on us.

So, it's max effort from this point on.

You're constantly moving your head around the sky.

Mac is up first, trying to get close enough

and steady enough to two of the Drakens,

so his weapons can lock on.

The training is coming to an end soon.

And I have to kill a hostile who is ultimately trying

to kill me, trying to kill my mum's little boy.

I'm going to be giving it every ounce of energy I've got,

and I won't hesitate.

BEEPING

Mac's first attempt is successful.

Up next, is Cheese.

You've got like seven aircraft in the air doing stuff

we've only actually done in the SIM before.

It's really, really hard.

I was focusing so much on the Drakens,

I actually found myself looking at the wrong part of the map,

which isn't a good start.

Cheese immediately accelerates towards one of the opposing jets

to get it in range.

Think of it as like a really difficult video game

where you can end up going supersonic.

Transonic.

In the back of my mind was the dogfight I had with Mark

where I made a mistake.

I'm thinking, I'm not going to make that mistake again.

So, this time, my speed is a lot more considered.

I'm trying to lock my missiles onto one the Drakens

and it just feels like the jet is taking an eternity to do it.

I can hear the boss on the radio asking for an update...

..but all my focus is on getting these missiles away.

BEEPING

Cheese's success marks the end of the flying test.

Ultimately, getting the job done was a really good feeling.

It's good to have performed in front of the boss, too.

Mac and Cheese will find out on the ground

if they've done enough to pass.

Just...well done. That felt OK.

Yeah. Nice. We're fine, we're fine.

Welcome everyone on 29 Squadron.

Obviously, it's been a really weird couple of weeks

and really horrible with Schlongy's death.

I know that it's been felt in lots of different areas,

not just the pilots, you know, across everyone on the squadron.

However, today's all about Mac and Cheese.

So, I can safely say...

..congratulations. Well done. You've passed.

APPLAUSE

What excites me is it's now the real job.

So, it's been training for several years

but it's now going to be for real.

Thank you.

Yeah, I'm just really looking forward to travel the world,

go on operations and do some really cool flying.

APPLAUSE

Of course, Mark is in our thoughts.

Everyone who knew him at Coningsby misses him a great deal.

I know that he would have proud to see us finish the course today,

so it's definitely mixed emotions.

There we are.

COMMENTARY ON TV: Here come the King and the Queen

and the other members of the royal family onto the balcony.

CHEERS AND APPLAUSE

So they can raise their eyes to the skies.

In London, spectators have gathered to watch 34 aircraft

celebrate the King's birthday -

a display planned by RAF pilot Mark Long.

This year's King's birthday flyover is a little different

to any others.

Definitely it'll be something that I'll remember

for the rest of my life.

COMMENTARY ON TV: 15 squadrons represented were involved in D-Day.

And in wave one, we have three Typhoons from number 29 Squadron

from RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire.

Oh, look at that one go.

Behind the Typhoons is the Rivet Joint from RAF Waddington

with two Typhoons from RAF Coningsby.

Knowing that he planned today and how successful it was,

hopefully, everybody involved made him proud.

Now this wave would have been a Lancaster,

a Spitfire and a Hurricane.

But the tragic death of Squadron Leader Mark Long

just a few weeks ago means there is understandably a change,

and the formation is using the callsign of Memorial Flight,

in his honour.

It was a very fitting tribute for Squadron Leader Long's name

to be mentioned, and I think it was just nice to see and hear

what we can do as an Air Force when we all come together.

We train to be able to fly low, below enemy radar.

Pilots from 3-squadron prepare for the front line.

There's not a lot of room for error when you're travelling

7-8 miles a minute.

And a junior pilot has a close encounter over Syria.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media