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03

Nov 2021

Last Updated: 03/11/2021
Community
Community

Meet the Starbeck thrill-seeker, 86, who loves to fly Spitfires

by Thomas Barrett

| 03 Nov, 2021
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Fearless octogenarian Roy Slim talks about fulfilling a lifetime ambition by flying a Spitfire in his 80s and how being in the sky keeps him feeling young.

screenshot-2021-11-03-at-10-27-10

Starbeck thrill-seeker Roy Slim, 86, says flying 4,000 feet in the sky in World War Two Spitfires makes him feel young again.

The fearless octogenarian fulfilled a lifetime ambition to fly one of the planes for the first time well into his 80s and hopes to go again in early 2022. Spitfires were used by the RAF throughout the war, most famously in the Battle of Britain against the Luftwaffe.

Mr Slim has lived in Harrogate for over 60 years after working as a radio engineer at RAF Dishforth in the 1950s. However, his love of the Spitfire was forged as a boy, as he was brought up a stone's throw from where they were built at Castle Bromwich in the Midlands.

He said:

"I used to dream that one day I'll fly one of those things."


When he flew the Spitfire, he had full control of the plane and even performed barrel rolls. He followed the same route pilots took during the war down the English Channel and over the white cliffs of Dover.






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Mr Slim said he has a deep respect for the brave men who flew the planes during the war.

"I am thinking, somebody has sat in this seat coming back from France having shot down a German plane, and I'm sitting in that seat!"


He said the experience is "tremendous".

"I felt like my lifetime ambition was coming true."


Mr Slim turned 86 today and has no intention of slowing down. As well as Spitfires, he's learned to fly helicopters, Tiger Moths and performed skydives — all after he turned 80.