Under-rated ‘Pocket Rocket'

It has an unfortunate reputation but it’s fast, aerobatic and looks like a fighter. It’s time to reconsider the Globe Swift

- Keith Wilson

The Globe Swift has, over the years, earned something of an unfortunate reputation. It has become one of a small but unique club of ‘don’t go near them’ aircraft. It is reputed to be one of the easiest of aircraft to ground-loop, while exhibiting a vicious stall and wing-drop, a sink rate like the proverbial rock and an appalling takeoff performance. That said, I wonder how much of this criticism has been generated by armchair pilots, and in particular whether the complaints are only justified against the early GC-1A and GC-1B versions, which came with just 85hp and 125hp respectively.

Sitting in the air-conditioned offices of Elite Aircraft, at the pleasant if somewhat grandiosely named Raleigh Executive Jetport near Sanford in North Carolina, I am awaiting the arrival of a lovely Globe ‘Super Swift’. Outside, it is a typical North Carolina spring day; clear blue skies and temperatures already climbing into the eighties (Fahrenheit, of course). It is not often I question myself but today I’m thinking am I about to do the right thing? After all, what can possibly go wrong?

When it arrives on the ramp, having made the short journey on the taxiway from another hangar of the airfield, I am a little confused. It has often been said that ‘if it looks right, it will fly right’. Here, there is absolutely no debate: parked on the ramp, the Super Swift is a beautiful looking aircraft. Therefore, it should fly right, shouldn’t it?

Not your standard Swift