In the wheeltracks of giants I cannot say that ever, in my edge-of-the-envelope aviation fantasies, had I dreamt that I would be where I was now standing. In another time and place I would have been shot on sight. Yet here I was, one hand on a huge pair of aircraft tyres, intimately surrounded by the hydraulics and metal doors of a plane that, when first wheeled out of the plant was covered with muslin (although it is hard to think what it could be mistaken for), test flights were  more...