Draft:James Holt Phillips (Test Pilot)



James Holt Phillips (13 March 1930 – 16 May 2013) was a well known test pilot firstly with de Havillands and latterly with Airbus, and made his name with the pioneering work on the Trident Autoland program in the 1960s. Affectionately known as "Jimmy" or "Jim" by his colleagues, friends and family, he was a respected test pilot in the exciting world of the early commercial jets.

Phillips was born in London, and at an early age was inspired by the aviation battles waged overhead in the Battle of Britain and through the course of the Second World War. In 1948 he entered National Service with the firm intention of joining the Royal Airforce during which he learned to fly. Having signed on initially for 5 years, with the plan to continue in the Airforce after completion of the National Service, he found himself unexpectedly out of work in the early 1950's when the British Government changed their defense policies and reduced the national need for air force pilots. Not to be thwarted from his passion, Phillips promptly joined the Royal Auxiliary Air Force 604 Squadron based at North Weald and happily resumed his flying career.

During this time in the Auxiliary Air Force, Phillips caught the eye of Group Captain John Cunningham, who was Chief Test Pilot de Havillands and was offered a position in the flight test team. He joined de Havillands as Production Pilot on Vampires, Venoms, and other de Havilland's light aircraft. A personal highlight was regularly going up to fly the two English Electric Lightning fighters based and maintained at the Warton facility, and indeed there was a job offer from Ferranti Electronics in 1960 to fly Lightnings full time on R&D work in Edinburgh. This exciting offer was turned down at the last moment, when John Cunningham offered an even better opportunity to join Hawker Siddeley Aviation (by this time de Havillands had been absorbed by Hawker Siddeley) to fly the Comet 4 and later the Trident aircraft.

A curious side project in Autumn 1961 engaged Phillips with the human powered HMPAC Puffin aircraft - his light frame and flying experience made him ideal for testing the design proposals in the Sept-Oct 1961 time-frame. Indeed, it could be claimed on an unofficial basis that Phillips may have been amongst the first to experience man-powered flight with the Puffin.

In late 1961, in a trip which spanned the Cuban Missile Crisis, Phillips took a Comet and 20 crew to the US Air Force Flight Test Centre at Edwards Air Force Base in California to participate in the 1st Joint UK/US Infra Red Airborne Trials. This research concerned the detection and measurement of infrared radiation signals from the front leading edge of supersonic aircraft, and therefore included working with the Convair B-58 Hustler bomber and Lockheed F-104 Starfighter. In early 1962 he returned to the UK and joined the Trident and HS 125 flight test teams at the Hatfield Aerodrome. Shortly afterwards he was appointed Project Test Pilot for the Trident Autoland program, and played an instrumental role in the successful completion of this pioneering work on the Trident 1C. Demonstration landings for interested journalists were a common occurence using the Trident G-ARPB. As a direct result of his dedicated efforts, Phillips was awarded the 1966/67 Brackley Trophy by the Guild of Air Pilots and Air Navigators (GAPAN) for his contribution to the development and flight testing of Autoland systems on the Trident.

Phillips was instrumental in the Trident test flights of performing takeoffs with simulated engine failure on the quite short Hatfield runway, and had his share of hairy moments, when things didn't always go quite to plan; fortunately without any catastrophic results! Other Trident flight test activities included high altitude and hot and humid weather trialling, which took place respectively in Nairobi, Kenya and Darwin, Northern Australia.

In 1970 he was further recognized for his outstanding contributions and was awarded the Queens Commendation for Valuable Services in the Air.

The early 1970s saw several changes in his personal and professional life which culminated in 1973 with Phillips being seconded to Airbus Industrie in Toulouse, France, as the Hawker Siddeley representative test pilot for the A300 programme development.

The A300 was demonstrated at Farnborough, UK for the first time in September 1974 with Phillips accompanied by other Airbus test pilots Lars Heise-Laursen and Bernard Ziegler. This particular airshow offered a unique opportunity for Phillips and Heise-Lausen to visit and inspect the Lockheed Tristar L-1011 flight deck, and the compact neatness with illuminated push button switches made a deep impression on the men. Indeed the summer of 1975 provided an opportune moment for Phillips and Heise-Laursen to digest those impressions and make a "redesign" proposal for the A300 cockpit. With an innovative colour coding idea and basic operational philosophy in place, the two men proposed a dramatic improvement to the Electrical, Hydraulic and Air-Conditioning panels in the A300. This proposal was packaged together as a report and presented to Bernard Ziegler, who took it further with the Airbus and Aerospatiale technical management and ultimately became deeply associated with modern cockpit design. This cockpit design was one part of the many design advantages of the Airbus aircraft which assisted in the move to 2-crew civil widebody aircraft certification.

Phillips remained at Airbus Industrie flying the A300/A310 and A320 family of aircraft, moving on to become Chief Pilot. In his final decade at Airbus, Phillips moved to Aeroformation (Airbus Training) as Chief Training Captain following a personal invitation from Jean Pinet, President of Aeroformation. This was an important time in aircraft flight training with the move to "Fly by Wire", pioneered by the A320. It was a busy time with Phillips being the technical liaison between flight test and the A320 pilot training on simulators, which had to take into account the new experience of glass cockpits, interfacing with flight control computers and understanding the flight envelope protection.

In 1993 having reached the age of 63, Jim was well aware of his good fortune in having successfully negotiated an exciting and fulfilling career, with the knowledge that many good and close friends and colleagues had met untimely deaths through aircraft crashes and dangerous mishaps. Following 4000 hours of line and base flying as well as 10,500 hours test flying it was time to retire and explore what else life had to offer.

His final years were spent at his property, "Lieu dit Croze", in the countryside surrounding Toulouse, with many contented hours improving his handicap on the many local golf courses. He also remained an active member of various flying and retired veterans clubs, and maintained his extensive network of flying contacts.

He died on May 16 2013 in the Clinique des Cèdres, Cornebarrieu after several years of ill health.