secrets

David Baerwald holds up his most precious possession so that it’s visible on our video conference: a very old violin in a very old, battered case.

Baerwald, an award-winning musician, film composer and songwriter who called Los Angeles home for nearly four decades, doesn’t play the violin. During his years with the Tuesday Music Club (immortalized in the Sheryl Crow album “Tuesday Night Music Club”), he played guitar. But the violin belonged to his grandfather Ernst Baerwald — and it plays an important role in his recently published debut novel, “The Fire Agent.”

Not every successful artist turns to a new medium at age 65 or moves to the opposite coast (Baerwald now lives in Kingston, N.Y.). Then again, not every artist has a family history quite like Baerwald’s, one that includes Germany and Japan, two world wars, a 1920s throuple and Beethoven’s Ninth.

The violin in Baerwald’s hands was the one his German-Jewish grandfather played as a Japanese prisoner of war in the Bandō camp at Tokushima during World War I. “It’s a very serviceable violin,” Baerwald notes. “A friend of mine played it for some years in the Long Beach Symphony. When my grandfather was older and wealthy, he bought a better violin, which was lost in a fire. But this is the one that matters.”

It matters because Ernst Baerwald was a founding member of a German POW orchestra that chose Beethoven’s great symphony as their premiere work — a performance so moving that it began a Japanese tradition marking the December holidays that persist to this day. Baerwald’s grandfather not only kept his violin throughout the war in which he fought; when he defected from the Third Reich in 1941, he placed it in an oiled bag and brought it with him via an oceanic escape.

Ernst Baerwald’s odyssey from a cushy childhood in Frankfurt to his final days in a beautiful Berkeley mansion, with a long sojourn in Tokyo along the way, reads like, well, a novel. Sent to an elite boys’ prep school in Germany, then on to a seriously disciplined Milanese dojo where he was trained by a Japanese sensei, Ernst was a prisoner in Japan for four years during World War I.

Those details might have been easy to find, but it wasn’t until David Baerwald went to clear out his parents’ house in Brentwood that he discovered papers showing that his grandfather had not only been the head of the Tokyo office of I.G. Farben, but that he had given a major speech to the nascent Office of Strategic Services (precursor to the Central Intelligence Agency) in 1943 that laid out the plan for the firebombing of Japan.

He also urged them not to allow partnerships between large corporations and the military, the way the German scientific community and government did with I.G. Farben and Krupp Armaments and Steel. “Any business that makes peace with Fascism will become Fascist,” he said. “And once Fascism captures economic control, then a Fascist coup will inevitably follow to seize political power. Germany, Italy, Rumania, Japan, Spain the story is the same. We cannot allow it to become the story of America.”

When Baerwald read that, “I was really alarmed, in the moment,” he says, realizing how closely tied his grandfather had been to the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. “But it gave me a plan.” He wanted to show how deeply his grandfather had become integrated into Japanese culture.

“One of my characters tells Ernst that he has ‘yuyo,’ which might best be described as grace,” says Baerwald. “Its Japanese meaning is closer to the state of a river rock that has been washed over and tumbled thousands of times, so that it’s both distinct, and a meaningful part of its environment.” To some extent, the author understands “yuyo” personally, having lived in Japan and been educated at its International School until age 12, when his family moved back to California, “although I wouldn’t claim it for myself,” he says.

That move, in the early 1970s, may have led to his career in music. “When we got back to the States, I was extremely troubled. Call me a fish out of water, I guess. I went through a period of voluntary mutism — I think they call it selective communication. I didn’t talk to anyone, especially not to my family. My hearing would sort of come and go at will, too.” His mother understood he seemed to like his sister’s acoustic guitar, so she suggested he take some lessons. “At the time, it wasn’t at all a career path, it was a way of reassembling my brain so that I could cope with the reality I was experiencing, finding a way to communicate again.”

Part of what he was experiencing, which he knows a great deal more about now, was feeling “the secrets that were the engine propelling my family.” After Ernst’s long career of service and deception, David Baerwald’s father, Kurt, entered the U.S. Army during WWII and later became a professor of Japanese studies at both in Japan and at UCLA. The effects on their family of five still reverberate. Baerwald’s mother eventually became a clinical psychologist who specializes in trauma. “I had to separate myself completely from my family in order to survive,” he says.

However, what stalled the writing of this first novel were the two decades he initially left out, which included Ernst, Lina and their lover Chizuko being a ménage à trois in a 1923 Tokyo dealing with the aftermath of an earthquake and wildfires.

Although “The Fire Agent” is based on Ernst’s history, not all of the facts are congruent. The wrestling coach at the American school in Tokyo, Ernst’s glamorous courtesan Chizuko, and many of the characters are composites. Speaking of that courtesan, Baerwald says it’s true that his grandfather and grandmother cohabited with a Japanese woman for many years, even after Lina and Ernst had a child together. “I found so many letters between my grandfather and my grandmother and I think they truly loved each other, and I think they truly loved that woman, too.”

That didn’t make it easy for Baerwald to write about that love. “My German grandmother, on whom Lina is partly based, was terrifying,” he says. “It was easier to write about her sex life with my grandfather and their Japanese lover by creating composite characters.”

He didn’t want to leave out their sex life, though, or that of others.

“Every generation of young people thinks they invented sex, right? But nothing is new — and it never gets old. Here’s an example. One of my godfathers, Sam Jameson, was the L.A. Times bureau chief in Tokyo for decades. He was also the doyenne, if you will, of the cross-dressing community in that city. It was this rich world he was a part of that nobody knew anything about. I based the character I call Bünheimer on him.”

Some of the worlds Baerwald has uncovered through his family’s papers are rich and sensual; others, like the POW camp where Ernst was held and the speech he gave to the OSS analysts at the Presidio in the 1940s, are stark and terrible. While he renders all appropriately, he’s aware that his perspective remains that of a white Western man. How did he gain the courage to write about people of other races, cultures and genders? He says it comes from something he did when he was on a swim team in high school. “The psychological trick I would play on myself at each meet was to imagine the water I’d dive into was freezing cold,” he says. “And of course it wasn’t. Which was such a relief and kept me going.”

Like his grandfather’s beloved violin, Baerwald has taken a deep dive into previously unknown waters — and survived. As he works on his second novel, he’s better prepared for airing family secrets and the publishing world. Ever the musician, he likens his first round with it to a Shepard tone, the auditory illusion that can make listeners feel like two notes one octave apart are constantly ascending or descending in pitch (Baerwald has worked with famed composer Hans Zimmer, who used the tone in, for example, “The Dark Knight”).

“A Shepard tone can make you feel like you’re flying. Or sinking,” he says. “At this point in my life and art, I prefer to have my feet firmly on the ground.”

NOT everyone sees their childhood dream become a reality, but Sian Welby is one of the lucky ones. 

The This Morning and Capital radio presenter has wanted to be in Toy Story since she was ten. 

And Sian says she was so surprised to get the call asking her to be in the new movie that she thought she was being pranked by one of her co-hosts.

In an exclusive interview, the 39-year-old, who voices the Inflatable Flamingo, says: “If you’d told me as a nine or ten-year-old when the very first Toy Story movie came out, that one day I’d have a role in one of the sequels and that I’d be laughing and joking with Tom Hanks, I’d have never believed you.

“If a clairvoyant had predicted it, I’d have said, ‘No way, what a con’.

“I’m from a village in the Midlands with no showbiz connections, without a hope or a prayer of making it in the TV industry so what’s happened to me is just magical.”

Sian and her radio co-host, I’m A Celeb star Jordan North, 36, were talent-spotted by the Disney UK team, who were looking for people to do regional voice cameos.

Jordan plays a Garden Gnome in the film, which will be released in cinemas on Friday.

Sian says: “I honestly thought it was a Capital Radio prank by Jordan and Chris Stark, because we always begin the year telling each other what’s on our bucket list.

“Jordan said he wanted to interview Barack Obama, Chris said he wanted a barbecue with David Beckham and I said I wanted to be a little voice in a Pixar movie.

“Then, in March, I got the call. I was actually a bit angry as I thought, ‘That’s really mean to pretend I’ve got a role in Toy Story as they know it’s my dream’.

“I told my agent the email must be a con but she came back and said, ‘I have double-checked and triple-checked and it’s definitely from Disney’.”

Weeks later Sian, who has presented the flagship breakfast show since 2020 and been a main studio co- host on This Morning since 2024, recorded her voice role.

Then she was given the job of interviewing Tom Hanks, who plays cowboy doll Woody, and Tim Allen — Buzz Lightyear himself — before the film’s premiere last month.

Sian has spoken to many A-list celebrities but giggles as she says: “I grew up watching Tom Hanks in Big and I loved Tim Allen in The Santa Claus.

“These guys are absolute legends and there I was, meeting my heroes.

“I’ve interviewed huge stars like Harrison Ford, and they make you feel on edge the entire time, but Tom and Tim were so nice and warm and giving. They were brilliant.”

And when the duo took to the red carpet, Sian says Oscar-winner Tom treated her like a “full-on co-star”.

She says: “I had chronic imposter syndrome, but he was such a decent man and included us in all the cast photos. He was so welcoming.

“I was in disbelief the whole time and literally felt like a competition winner, but I rem- ember Tom saying to me, ‘You’re in good company, co-star’. We had such a laugh.

“I have to pinch myself most days at the moment. Every week, something else happens where I think, ‘Is this my actual life?’.”

In 2010, Sian, who hails from Newark in Nottinghamshire, would record videos from the New Look store where she worked as a shop assistant to try to get on TV.

One, filmed in the fitting room, was spotted by former Channel 5 boss Richard Desmond and Sian became the station’s lead weather presenter, despite having no experience.

She went on to present Channel 5’s Formula E: Street Racers show about electric car racing before landing a hosting role on Heart FM in 2017.

Instead of feeling over- whelmed when meeting and interviewing high-profile celebrities, Sian has ended up becoming friends with many of them.

Kylie Minogue stayed in touch after they chatted and American actor Chris Pratt even forgave her for giving him an electric shock with a cattle prod.

Sian recalls: “I got on famously with Chris Pratt. There was a scene in the Jurassic Park movie where they use electric shocks on dinosaurs, so we found these mini electric shock things and did a quiz where if you got an answer wrong, you electrocuted each other.

“Chris was like, ‘Sian, I can’t electrocute you’, but I said, ‘You can, because I’m going to get you’, then I gave him a proper zap like you’d feel from a TENS machine when you’re giving birth, and he said, ‘I kind of liked that’, so we carried on.”

Another famous name who got on board with Sian’s sense of mischief was Mariah Carey, who she interviewed a year ago.

Sian says: “I bonded with her and we talked about the fact that she gets followed around with this Mariah Carey lighting rig and gets a lot of jip for it.

“She has this special Mariah Carey light — like a floor light, that lights upwards.

“I said to her, ‘You get a lot of heat for being a diva, but I bet you carry these lights because you’ve had some interviews where you were lit so badly and you felt gross’, and she was, like, ‘I’ve had hundreds’. She was basically saying that she did so many interviews where she felt like she looked awful because of the lighting that she was, like, ‘I’m solving this problem and I’m bringing my own’, and I really applauded it.

“I thought she was actually a very nice person — very sweet. And I don’t know how to phrase this without swearing, but I think that she is just a diva, not a d*ck.

“She’s not awful for the sake of it or difficult for the sake of it, but she’s definitely got high standards.”

The one celebrity who almost made unflappable Sian lose her cool was Bridgerton, Wicked and Jurassic World Rebirth actor Jonathan Bailey, who was voted People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive last year.

Sian says: “Whether you’re boy, girl or beast, there is something about that man. He’s gay, but absolutely everyone fancied him and he’s got the most charming charisma you could ever ask for.

“I was interviewing him for Capital last summer and when he entered the room, I just got lost. I was hanging off every word he said.

“And what was really lovely, too, was that even though he’s been in these massive movies and might have gone all Hollywood, he was just really nice and down to earth.”

Sian has presented at both the Baftas and Brits. Last weekend, she hosted the Capital’s Summertime Ball at Wembley Stadium, which was headlined by acts including Fatboy Slim, Calvin Harris, Raye and former One Direction singer Niall Horan.

But she says her biggest challenge to date is juggling her career with being a mum to her two-year-old daughter, Ruby.

Sian is also planning her wedding to Heart Breakfast producer Jake Beckett, 33.

She says: “I try not to think too much about how I do it, or I’ll have a nervous breakdown.

“There have been moments when I have been physically and emotionally exhausted, and I’ve burst out crying.

“I’ve literally been running from a Timothee Chalamet interview to sort out an explosive nappy at home.”

When she and Jake get married next year, little Ruby will play a key part in the ceremony.

Sian says: “It’s great Ruby will be old enough to be involved. Jake is my biggest fan and I’m his, and we make such a good team. He’s definitely the groomzilla — he’s a man that plans an outfit three months in advance.

“But because my job is so stressful, I’m way more relaxed. I’ve learned to just go with the flow.”

First though, Sian will be celebrating her 40th birthday this September.

Laughing, she says: “It feels like being a proper grown-up and I feel like I have been masquerading as an adult for years. When I look back at my sliding doors moments in my career, it was probably a bit of skill versus luck versus chance versus opportunity.

“As for the future, I still want to be doing radio.

“I’d love to do a big Saturday night TV show and maybe I could co-star in a comedy movie with Tom Hanks.

“We could be the new comedy double act no one saw coming.”

EXCLUSIVE: A new book charts the extraordinary history of British Airways, inclduing its unusual first passenger flight, its unique link to Marmite, royal fans, and some questionable fashion

British Airways has been flying for 107 years, connecting Britain to the world across more than a century of aviation history.

From a single biplane lifting off from a grass field in west London to a fleet serving destinations across the globe, the story of the world’s favourite airline is told in a new history by Captain Al Bridger – taking the story of BA in 100 objects, which encompass everything from Neville Chamberlain to Marmite.

British Airways traces its roots to 1919, when Aircraft Transport and Travel (AT&T) launched the world’s first international scheduled passenger service from Hounslow Heath to Paris.

This pioneering line later fed into Imperial Airways, which became BOAC in 1939 for long-haul routes, while BEA was formed in 1946 for European services; the two finally merged in 1974 to create modern British Airways.

But it began on August 25 1919 when a modest biplane was prepared on the grass at Hounslow Heath, a few miles from what is now Heathrow Airport. Captain Al said: “The world’s first international scheduled passenger was piloted by Lieutenant Bill Lawford.

“It carried one passenger, some newspapers, fresh grouse bound for the British Ambassador to France and Devonshire clotted cream. In challenging weather, Lawford skilfully completed the trip in 2 hours and 30 minutes.”

Five years later, in March 1924, the British government formed Imperial Airways, at the futuristic Croydon Airport. The art deco structure had a first-class restaurant, canteen for staff and a viewing gallery. The network expanded and flights could reach Delhi in seven-and-a-half days.

The Argosy aircraft, which first flew a passenger service on July 16 1926, gave early travellers a taste of luxury that would define the airline’s ambitions for decades to come. Captain Al said: “A white-coated steward served twenty passengers incredible four-course meals with drinks, providing true luxury for those lucky enough to afford it.

“The aircraft were also used for very popular weekend ‘Tea Flights’, offering afternoon tea while enjoying fabulous views over the capital.”

Among the collection’s most striking objects is a signed photograph of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, stepping from a British Airways Lockheed 10A after his famous Munich meetings and the declaration of “peace in our time”.

The 1950s brought a fresh start. “The Jet Age was officially launched with the introduction of the Comet in 1952, placing the UK at the very forefront of aviation,” said Captain Al, “The Rolls-Royce-powered Boeing 707 was a truly iconic symbol of the 1960s, and Sydney in Australia was now within reach in just 33 hours with four stops on the way. A true symbol of the iconic 1960s, the Boeing 707 was a triumph, shrinking the world overnight.”

The collection’s menu cards speak to a more glamorous age of flying. A BEA Silver Wing menu signed by Sir Winston Churchill on 26 April 1955 sits alongside one signed by Muhammad Ali on 10 May 1979

The 1960s brought experimentation of a more flamboyant kind. BOAC introduced cabin crew uniforms that became one of aviation’s most memorable fashion footnotes.

“While famously described as paper dresses, they were in fact sensibly made of a fireproof fabric that resembled paper and could be cut to the required length,” said Captain Al. “Incredibly, they were discarded after each flight.” They lasted a year.

The airline was also reaching out to its youngest passengers. On 26 March 1957, BOAC launched the Junior Jet Club, and Captain Al said: “The club was a huge success and had over 2 million members in its twenty-seven years of existence. Cabin crew would hand young travellers an envelope containing a registration form, a logbook and a Junior Jet Club badge.”

No history of British Airways would be complete without Concorde. The aircraft first flew on 2 March 1969 and entered service with British Airways on 21 January 1976. Captain Al said: “Concorde was to become the flagship of the fleet, bringing supersonic travel to everyone for the first time. Able to carry 100 customers in total luxury at speeds in excess of Mach 2 (more than 1,300 mph) the aircraft could cross the Atlantic in under 3 hours, with the record set on 7 February 1996 at 2 hours and 52 minutes.” The aircraft operated its last service on 24 October 2003.

While Concorde was redefining long-haul travel, the airline was also transforming life on board for ordinary passengers. A BOAC packing checklist pamphlet from the 1960s shows the formality of travel at the time. “For gentlemen, the list mentions the necessity of a dinner jacket, shirt collars and hair tonic,” said Captain Al. “For ladies, a bed jacket, hat and stole were essentials when travelling abroad.”

A photograph of the Beatles from the same era shows the Fab Four carrying BEA travel bags. Captain Al said: “Note how the Beatles are carrying BEA(TLES) travel bags, much like the more common BOAC bags. Clearly the band were travelling light.”

The 1980s brought fresh challenges and fresh ambition. In 1995, as part of a £500 million investment, the airline introduced the world’s first fully flat bed seat in First Class. Captain Al said: “Scientifically proven to give a much better night of sleep, it represented a huge leap forward in airline comfort.”

The airline’s inflight magazine, High Life, had been charting the journey since 1973. Captain Al said: “It truly is BA’s wingman. Through the years there have been some amazing contributors, from Jilly Cooper to Morecambe and Wise.”

Smoking had been part of airline life since the very beginning, but by March 1998 it was over. “When BEA was formed in 1946 over half of the British public smoked, with two-thirds of adult males recorded as smokers,” said Captain Al. “It wasn’t until 1998 that British Airways introduced a complete smoking ban on all flights.”

The modern era brought its own landmark moments. On 18 May 2012, a gold-liveried Airbus A319 named Firefly carried the Olympic flame into Culdrose Naval Airbase in Cornwall. Captain Al said: “Safely contained in four miner’s lamps, the flame was taken from the aircraft by Anne, the Princess Royal, accompanied by Lord Coe, the chairman of the London Olympics Organising Committee and football superstar David Beckham.”

The airline’s centenary in 2019 produced one of the collection’s most unlikely objects. “To celebrate the airline’s centenary, British Airways and Marmite teamed up and created a limited-edition jar that could be purchased on board,” said Captain Al.

“Apparently Marmite is the most confiscated brand at airport security, so the centenary jar was made to be just 70 grams, conveniently sized to fit within the liquid allowance to get it safely through airport security.”

Few objects in the collection carry more weight than the Royal Flights book, its pages bearing the signatures of those who have trusted the airline across the decades. The first entry dates from November 1983.

Captain Al said: “The book was beautifully inscribed with superb calligraphy and the signatures of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and His Late Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh. Fittingly, the final signature is again that of Her Late Majesty after her visit to the British Airways Headquarters on 23 May 2019 to celebrate the airline’s centenary year.”

From a grass field in Hounslow to the signature of a queen, British Airways has carried the nation and the world for 107 years.

As Captain Al writes of the airline he has served and loves: “It has seen great highs and led the world through some very challenging times, and I know it will continue to give the best it can in the coming years, generating many more wonderful objects along the way.”

British Airways in 100 Objects by Al Bridger is published by Amberley, £17.99

BA in numbers

46.3 million passengers carried in 2025.

Fleet of 254 aircraft serving 215 destinations across six continents.

40,000 employees worldwide.

Revenue of £14.6 billion in 2024.

FOR many of us, the idea of being a pilot is about as glamorous as it gets – but what is it actually like? Is all that globe-hopping as magical as it seems?

We spoke to two of BA’s most experienced pilots, to find out what really goes on behind the closed cockpit door when the planes are in the sky.

It is no easy feat becoming a pilot but for British Airways‘ Training Standard Captain Andy Godwin and Senior Flight Training Manager Mark Dorman, flying feels like second nature.

The duo – who are training up wannabe pilots in the British Airways’ Speedbird Pilot Academy (applications currently open) – have answered some of the most common questions people have about flying a British Airways plane…

What’s something people always get wrong about BA planes?

“Everyone things you’d start a plane just like you would a car,” Mark told us. “But in reality, it doesn’t even have a set of keys – either to start it or even get inside.”

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“We walk down the jetty, there’s a procedure to open the door, and you just knock – there’s no ignition either.”

What do the pilots eat during a flight?

Mark told us: “We eat very similar food as passengers but we have our own crew meals loaded.

“They’re cooked in the same way, they’ll quite often look quite similar but because of what we’ve potentially done before or what we’re potentially doing after [the flight] – the amount and the timings of food can vary.”

How do you stay alert with such antisocial schedules?

Andy said: “It’s all about planning ahead. You might have a run of early trips, where you don’t even necessarily have a risk of jet lag, but you’re always thinking about your next sleep to keep your energy up.

“Because short haul can be tough on the body too – you’re working really hard with short sectors, bouncing around doing lots of briefings and lots of talking to the crew as well as passengers, so it’s important to care of little things like staying hydrated.”

What was your most memorable flight?

Mark said: “I once flew an empty plane back from the Arctic, overthe Northern Lights.

“Because there were no passengers on board we were able to switch all of the lights off.

“It meant for the flight crew and the cabin crew, the aircraft was only lit by the Northern Lights for about 20 minutes – there was a really cool, weird green glow in the plane. It was a quite surreal experience.”

He added: “One of my other favourite moments is when I realised I was flying an aeroplane – I was still a co-pilot at the time – and my friend was the captain.”

“We sort of looked at each other like we couldn’t quite believe that we’d been allowed to go flying an aeroplane together, with 140 passengers behind us.

“You sort of pinch yourself a little bit.”

What’s your favourite airport to fly into?

Andy said: “Heathrow is always pretty cool.

“You’re coming home, you get incredible views, there’s a familiarity to it, it’s busy, it’s quite challenging at times but it’s nice.”

But for overseas, both pilots agreed on one particularly special destination – if a little scary at times – is Innsbruck in Austria.

Innsbruck Airport is in a valley, with such steep mountains either side that it’s a ‘Category C’ airport, which means it requires special training.

Despite it perhaps being a more technical airport to land at, the mountains either side lend themselves to a spectacular landing and taking off experience with amazing views.

Mark said: “I feel very lucky to have been able to go and fly there.

“I guess the other places that I like, again it sounds a bit silly but places with nice views, I really like flying into Nice because it’s a really interesting approach and you get the most amazing view of the Cap d’Antibes coast around to Cannes.

“Again it’s one of those moments where you’re like, we’re actually doing this.”

What is one of the biggest misconceptions about being a BA pilot?

Andy said: “A question that we’ll quite often get is about what aeroplane we fly and why don’t we just switch to another, almost as if you’re switching between car manufacturers.

“Pilots are only licensed to fly one aircraft at a time so we couldn’t just go and fly another aircraft even though it’s broadly similar.”

“Most pilots are proud of the plane they fly and love being asked about it, the routes it does or anything that allows them to show off their knowledge.”

How can you train to be a British Airways pilot?

Currently, British Airways’ Speedbird Pilot Academy applications are open – an opportunity for wannabe pilots to join a fully-funded programme to train as a BA pilot.

With 160 places available, the scheme is in its fourth year and covers the entire £100,000 cost of pilot training, over two years.

Trainees start on the ground for six months before taking the controls of a tiny four-seater plane and eventually moving up to a two-engine aircraft.

Andy said: “In a matter of months, you’re flying something lighter than a family car.

“Within a year, you’re in something 100 times heavier…”

One of the final hurdles after training on a simulator and in smaller planes, is taking off and landing a plane with zero passengers on board.

“It’s a once-in-a-career moment,” Andy said. “You do about six take-offs and landings to get your eye in before we let you fly the real thing with passengers.

“[This is] a very significant milestone in a pilot’s career.”

All trainees who complete the scheme are guaranteed a flying role with BA upon completion.

To apply to the Speedbird Academy you need to be 18-years-old or over at the start of training, have six GCSEs grade A-C or 4-9, including Maths, English Language and a Science, be fluent in English, have a valid passport and be between 1.52metres and 1.9metres tall.

Applications to the programme close on April 23.

In other flight news, a major airline is set to axe 20,000 flights this summer amid soaring fuel costs due to Iran war.

Plus, here’s the secret tool British Airways uses to launch new airline routes – and the little-known months they announce them.