"Flyboy, medal at 92 years young"
From the Melbourne Herald Sun, Monday 22 July 2002

Harold Shelton may be Australia's oldest pilot and yesterday he finally got the medal his flying mates think he deserved for risking his life over Melbourne six decades ago. A Beaufighter warplane adorns the silver medal friends presented yesterday to Mr Shelton, 92, who had nothing more than a thank-you note for his civilian service as a World War II test pilot.

"Slim" Shelton, an oldtime barnstormer and the last survivor of Ansett's 1930s airline pioneers, broke into a grin at the decoration. He is still an occasional gliding club flier at Benalla, annoyed that doctors have banned him flying solo. From 1942 to 1947, as chief test pilot for the Department of Aircraft Production, it was his lone job to try out warplanes straight off the production line, before delivery to the RAAF.

His pilot's skill and a little luck helped him through 2000 flights and many scrapes with new Beaufighters and Beauforts he christened and brought back to earth with a list of faults to be rectified by the maker. More than once Mr Shelton nearly met his maker over the Fishermens Bend factory airstrip.

"There were propellers out of balance, hydraulic failures, engines catching fire, faulty instruments, all sorts of problems," he said. Initially he got a bad name with aeronautical inspectors for coming back with a "snag sheet" full of problems. "They said I was impeding the war effort, until the chief inspector came up with me - wearing a parachute - and saw the troubles," he said. Once he had to land a Beaufort bomber on engine power only after a wooden block from the factory was left on the wing and fell into the its apex, jamming the elevator control.

He had the production manager on board too, who he stopped from sacking two factory workers. Another time he reckons he nearly broke the sound barrier when he lost control of a Beaufort bomber from 7300 metres (24,000ft) in a steep dive. "The engines just ran away, the propellers went into full fine pitch. You couldn't believe the noise," Mr Shelton said. "It must have been going about 600mph (960km/h). The airspeed clock went around a second time.
"I managed to pull her out using all my strength at about 7000ft (2100 metres) but when I got down, the engine cowls, the oil cooler fairings, the wing fairings and tailplane fairings had all torn off. "It looked like a plucked duck."

He later test flew giant four-engine Lincoln bombers at Fishermens Bend, but it was decided in 1947 the RAAF should do all test flying and Mr Shelton's time was up.
All he had to show for his service were some letters from grateful managers and his pay packet. In the 1930s Mr Shelton was a daredevil, once swooping 100 metres over city streets with giant speakers strapped to his plane's wings, blasting the fearful crowds with advertisements.

"When I flew over the law courts they were in session - a judge stopped proceedings and next thing I was answering to the federal police," Mr Shelton said. In 1937 he was one of Reg Ansett's first pilots for his new airline, consisting of an Airspeed Envoy and Fokker Universal."I made two trips a day from Melbourne to Hamilton and you'd often have to make a forced landing in a paddock on the way and wait for a mechanic," he said. "Reg had no money for spares, the engines were worn out, you'd take off from Essendon with a pall of black smoke."

Mr Shelton later joined Australian National Airlines when Ansett tried to charge he and his wife for a flying trip to Melbourne, then flew with Guinea Airlines in 1941-42. He remembers trying to land at the blacked out Darwin airport three times after the first 1942 bombing, finally touching down between craters.
After the war he was a DC-3 test pilot with ANA but left in acrimony after a crash landing on a stormy night at Mangalore due to a faulty altimeter.

Since 1966 he has been a Gliding Club of Victoria enthusiast, his medal inscribed "to an outstanding Australian aviator".
"I've always felt confident in my ability to pull myself out of trouble," he said.

"I've never had any insurance crisis - I don't believe in it," he said, not for his planes, his house or his life.