LOVELY SPEEDING INCIDENT, APPARENTLY TRUE
Two British traffic patrol officers from North Berwick were involved
in an unusual incident, while checking for speeding motorists on the A-1
Great North Road .
One of the officers (who are not named) used a hand-held radar device
to check the speed of a vehicle approaching over the crest of a hill, and
was surprised when the speed was recorded at over 300mph. The machine
then stopped working and the officers were not able to reset it.
The radar had in fact latched on to a NATO Tornado fighter jet over
the North Sea , which was engaged in a low-flying exercise over the Border
district.
Back at police headquarters the chief constable fired off a stiff
complaint to the RAF Liaison office.
Back came the reply in true laconic RAF style. "Thank you for your
message, which allows us to complete the file on this incident. You
may be interested to know that the tactical computer in the Tornado had
automatically locked on to your 'hostile radar equipment' and sent a
jamming signal back to it. Furthermore, the Sidewinder Air-to-ground
missiles aboard the fully-armed aircraft had also locked on to the
target.
Fortunately the Dutch pilot flying the Tornado responded to
the missile status alert intelligently and was able to override the
automatic protection system before the missile was launched".
