Charles Copp was a flight commander with No.2 Squadron AFC. He ended the war with four victories and a huge number of flying hours amassed over the front lines. But every ace pilot has to learn first, and Copp learnt from fellow Australian Arthur Conningham.
Conningham was a Brisbane bloke flying with the Royal Flying Corps. He served with No.32 on DH5s and then later commanded No.92 RAF with SE5a aircraft. Copp relates his training experience with Conningham;
After completing the ground course at Reading we were sent to Shawbury for flying instruction. Here after only two or three hours of dual instruction on Maurice-Farmans we were sent up solo. After learning to handle the slower machines, Avros and Sopwith Pups, we were posted to Castle Bromwich and transferred to S.E.5a's, which were very much faster than the above machines. Our instructor was Captain Arthur Conningham, an Australian, who was credited with over 20 enemy machines destroyed during the war. After we had learned to handle the S.E.5a's fairly well, he called us together and said, "Now, I want you to do some fast diving with your engine full on, and diving vertically. You can get up to nearly 300 m.p.h., but I must tell you how to do it without losing your wings. The airspeed indicator only registers up to 180 m.p.h., so after that has been passed, you simply look at the fabric on the lower wing. When you see one buckle appear in it, you are probably doing something like 200 m.p.h.; when there are two buckles, you are probably doing about 250 m.p.h.; but you want to be careful not to get three, because then the wings will undoubtedly fall off. Now, go up and do some real diving." We thought that we were doing very well, but when we landed he stamped his feet, swore at us pretty fluently and stated, "I said dive, not glide." He then took off in his machine and showed us how it should be done. Our hair fairly stood up on end when we saw what he did. He came down vertically at a terrific rate and flattened out about 10 or 15 feet off the ground! However, having seen this demonstration, we all had a go and surprisingly no one was killed. That was one of the ways we learned to dive fast - something that is sometimes necessary for attack in a scrap.
