A FORMER RAF pilot who now flies for British Airways has written a book about one of the county’s “wackiest” planes.

Michael Napier, 56, has just published his fourth book – detailing the history of Britain’s first true all-weather fighter – the tGloster Javelin.

The father-of-two from Great Rollright spent a year, during his spare time, interviewing former pilots of the aircraft and said he found it fascinating.

Known for its unorthodox aerodynamic features, the Javelin was reportedly easy to fly even on one engine and could make rapid descents and heavy braking manoeuvres, enabling equally rapid landings to be performed.

Mr Napier said: “I used to be in the RAF years ago and when I left I took over running the Squadron Association.

“I got to know a lot of guys who had been in the war, and I realised the First World War centenary was coming up. So I got all the history together.

“The result of this was that the editor I was working with said ‘have you thought about doing anything else?’.”

Mr Napier said he chose to write about the Javelin as he thought other books had not quite given enough personal detail.

He added: “You can buy books about the Javelin but they wouldn’t really talk about what people did with the plane.

“So I interviewed people who had flown them. One guy was very old. He was so chatty, but three months after we spoke, he died. I also spoke to one guy who was the squadron leader the year I was born.

“I interviewed some really distinguished and interesting people.

“Hopefully people will now know what the RAF got up to with this strange looking aeroplane.

“It’s really wacky but as I got into it I thought it was fascinating.”

Mr Napier joined the RAF in 1978 and his flying career encompassed both the Cold War and operations over Iraq after the Gulf War.

The Javelin was the RAF’s only delta-winged fighter, and the squadrons formed the front line of Britain’s air defences in the late 1950s and early 1960s. During RAF trials, it proved capable of intercepting jet bombers more than a hundred miles out to sea.

Mr Napier lives with his wife Shani and son Tom, 22, and daughter Sophie, 20.

He is currently in the planning stages of his fifth book, which covers the Gulf War.