Forty years ago this week on 15 May 1941, a diminutive experimental aircraft took off from Cranwell aerodrome on its maiden flight. It was known simply as the E28/39, and was the first British jet. The engine which had made the flight possible was the result of years of unremitting work, against the background of financial insecurity and a marked lack of official interest, by a dedicated RAF officer - Wing Commander Frank Whittle - the man who invented the jet.
But the road to jet propulsion was to prove stony, and the programme traces Sir Frank Whittle 's hard struggle to get a practical jet engine into the air.
Commentary spoken by RAYMOND BAXTER
Producer BRIAN JOHNSON Brookes on ... page 81