In part 2- “Black Aeroplane” written by Frederick Forsryth, the student gets to know about a pilot who is on his flight back home to England. The story narrates the incident that happens on the way and how he escapes death miraculously. For a detailed explanation, word meanings, summary and NCERT solutions of CBSE Class 10 First flight book chapter 3 Two stories About Flying part 2 “Black Aeroplane”, 

Black Aeroplane – CBSE Class 10 English Chapter 3 Black Aeroplane Summary, Detailed explanation of the lesson along with meanings of difficult words. Also, the explanation is followed by a Summary of the lesson. All the exercises and Questions Answers given at the back of the lesson have been covered.

The Black Aeroplane Introduction

The lesson “Black Aeroplane” by Frederick Forsyth reflects on how one’s judgement gets distorted due to fantasizing and how it creates problems. In this chapter, the narrator is a pilot who is so eager to meet his family and have a good breakfast that he takes the wrong decision of facing the storm instead of doing the right thing. Miraculously, he somehow manages to escape with the help of a mysterious aeroplane.

Theme of the Lesson

Sometimes, it get tough for us to take decisions and doubt creates a lot of fear. We consider some helpful incidents to be miracles and mysteries. These incidents take us out of trouble and are nothing else but our mind’s courage and strength which takes the form of an external factor and takes us out of the doubtful situation. Such incident happens with the narrator, the pilot of the old Dakota plane who is flown out of the storm by a mysterious “Black Aeroplane”

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The Black Aeroplane Summary

The story “Black Aeroplane” is about a pilot who feels happy and contended to fly over a city that is sleeping (at night time). He is flying from Paris to London. While taking his flight, he dreams about the long holiday with his family. He also fantasizes about the scrumptious breakfast he would have upon landing. As soon as he crosses Paris, he gets a look of the dark clouds that were a sign of the upcoming storm. The right decision would have been to turn back to Paris for the sake of safety. But he is overshadowed by his dreams and not wanting to delay them, risks the life of his passengers and heads straight into the storm. Everything gets dark, he is unable to see, all his direction instruments stopped functioning and he lost control of the plane. When all hope was lost, he saw another plane whose pilot was more than willing to rescue them. The author was panicking as there was very less amount of fuel left. The anonymous pilot guided them out of the storm and disappeared as soon as they saw light.  Upon landing, when he asks the lady in the control room about the other pilot, he is left in shock when she says that his was the only plane in the sky.

KEY POINTS

RTCS

  1. Read the folllowing extract an answer the questions the follow
    Passage-1
    Paris was about 150 kilometers behind me when I saw the clouds. Storm clouds. They were huge. They looked like black mountains standing in front of me across the sky. I knew I could not fly up and over them, and I did not have enough fuel to fly around them to the north or South” I ought to go back to Paris”, I thought, but I wanted to get home I wanted the breakfast,
  2. The pilot of the aeroplane goes through many thoughts. Choose the correct option from the ones given below.
    (a) Regret and remorse
    (b) Joy and excitement
    (c) Doubt and desire
    (d) None of the above
  3. The writer say “But I wanted to go home”. What does he dream of?
  4. The pilot knew that he would not be able to fly over the
  5. clouds. This was a fact. Choose the FACTS From the given options.
  6. (a) The weather was rough
  7. (b) The scene in front of the pilots eyes was beautifull
  8. (c) The scene in front of his eyes was scary
  9. (d) The pilot was having a smooth flight
  10. (e) The pilot was in a state of excitement and joy
  11. (f) The pilot dreaded an adverse situation
  12. (g) He wanted to change his direction.
  13. (1)A,C,F,G
  14. (2) A,C,D,B
  15. (3) B,D,E,F
  16. Where did the pelot want to have his breakfast?
  17. The two options the pilot could not consider were to go in the
    (a) North Or West direction
    (b) North or South direction
    (c) East direction
    (d) West direction

Solutions: 1) (c) 2) he wanted to have breakfast at home
3) (a) 4) with his family 5) (b)

Passage – 2
Suddenly I came out of the clouds and saw two long straight line with his familly of lights in front of me. It was a run way! An airport! I was safe!! turned to look for my friend in theblack aeroplane, but the sky was empty. There was nothing there. The black aeroplane was gone. I could not see it anywhere. I landed and was not sorry to walk away from the old Dakota near the control tower, I went and asked a woman in the control centre where I was and who the other pillot was, I wanted to say Thank you”

to say you

  1. Which word of following best describes the feelings of the speaker?
    (a) Doubtful
    (b) Remorseful
    (c) Relieved
    (d) Tense
  2. From the following options choose the FACTS.
    (a) The speaker could see a Black Aeroplane
    (b) The speaker saw the runway
    (c) He was happy to stay in the Dakota
    (d) His travel had been smooth
    (e) He wanted to have lunch with the pilot of the Black Aeroplane.
    (f) He walked towards the control centre
    (g) He wanted to know about the other pilot
    (1)b,f,g
    (2)a,c,g
    (3) b,d,g
    (4) c,f,g

  1. What did the pilet of Dakota want to know?
  1. When the speaker says that ‘the sky was empty’ he meant that
    (a) The dark clouds had disappeared
    (b) The storm had cleared
    (c) The moon was behind the clouds
    (d) The black aeroplane was gone.
  2. Why did the pilot want to thank the other pilot?

Short Answer type questions (40-50 words)
(3 marks)

  1. What were the feelings of the narrator while he was flying the Dakota?
    Answer: The pilot of Dakota 088 plane was keen to reach his home. When his plane was engulfed in a storm, he felt doubtful. He was in a dilemma.
  2. What risk did the pillot take?
  3. What did the pilot do immediately after landing?
  4. Why did the woman in the control room look at the pillot in a surprised manner?
  5. How much fuel was there in the aeroplane when the writer started flying?

Long Answer Question (10-120 words) (6 marks)

  1. Describe the narrators experience as he flew the aeroplane into the storm.
    Answer: The pilot was frightened as he lost control of the Dakota 008. He felt helpless as the compass and other instruments had stopped working. The weather had worsened and he was low on fuel also. Suddenly he saw an unknown plane and the pilot seemed eager to help him. The situation was challenging. He managed to escape with the help of the unknown pillot but couldn’t thank him.
  1. What did the narrator feel inside the clouds? What did he see there?
  2. Why was the narrator happy when he decided to fly?
  3. The Story “The black aeroplane” raises a curiosity Why? Explain.