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The ATA was a civilian organization that, during World War II, ferried planes, pilots, and other people around England and, eventually, to mainland Europe.
Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) Quotes in Code Name Verity
The Code Name Verity quotes below are all either spoken by Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) or refer to Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA). For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Part 1: Ormaie 8.XI.43 JB-S
Quotes
The words rattled around in Maddie’s head all the way to the telephone. Not “She’ll need to go to hospital if she’s been injured, but, “She’ll need to go to hospital if she’s been flying an airplane.”
A flying girl! thought Maddie. A girl flying an airplane!
No, she corrected herself; a girl /not/ flying a plane. A girl tipping up a plane in a sheep field.
But she flew it first. She had to be able to fly it in order to land it (or crash it).
The leap seemed logical to Maddie.
I’ve never crashed my motorbike, she thought. I could fly an airplane.
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Part 1: Ormaie 9.XI.43 JB-S
Quotes
“I won’t be flying again, will I? […]”
Dympna stood smoking calmly in the evening sunlight and watched Maddie for a while. Then she said, “There’s going to be air work for girls in this war. You wait. They’re going to need all the pilots they can get fighting for the Royal Air Force. That’ll be the young men, some of them with less training than you’ve got now, Maddie. And that’ll leave the old men, and the women, to deliver new aircraft and carry their messages and taxi their pilots. That’ll be us.”
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Part 1: Ormaie 17.XI.43 JB-S
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The ground crew was aghast at the idea of a girl flying the broken Lysander.
“She won’t be strong enough. With the tail set for takeoff yon slip of a lass won’t be able to hold the stick hard for’ard enough for landing. Don’t know if anyone could.”
“Someone landed it here,” Maddie pointed out.
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Part 2, Section 6
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“I know what they’ll say. Silly girl, no brains, too soft, can’t trust a woman to do a man’s work. They only let us fly operational aircraft when they get desperate. And they’re always harder on us when we botch something.” All true, and what I said next was true too, but a bit petty—“You even get to keep your BOOTS and mine are BURNT.”
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Part 2, Section 7
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Etienne’s written out a list of local birds on the first three pages. For a week in 1928 Etienne Thibaut decided he was going to be a nature enthusiast. Sort of thing you do when you’re ten, about the age I took Gran’s gramophone to bits.
The list of birds makes me sad. What changes a small boy from a bird-watcher into a Gestapo inquisitor?
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Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) Term Timeline in Code Name Verity
The timeline below shows where the term Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) appears in Code Name Verity. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Part 1: Ormaie 8.XI.43 JB-S
...using. She knows nothing about aircraft types; if she did, she’d be flying for the Air Transport Auxiliary like Maddie, who is the pilot who dropped the narrator in France. On second thought,...
(full context)
Part 1: Ormaie 9.XI.43 JB-S
...was going to need girls—they’d run out of men eventually. They were already forming the Air Transport Auxiliary , a civilian unit that took men and women. Dympna’s name was already in, and...
(full context)
Part 1: Ormaie 16.XI.43 JB-S
Air Taxi with the ATA. The British, the narrator explains, use the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) to ferry planes and...
(full context)
The narrator apologizes; none of that had to do with the ATA, but that flight got Maddie into the ATA. With Dympna’s prodding, the WAAF released Maddie...
(full context)
Part 1: Ormaie 17.XI.43 JB-S
...Pilot. Back in Maddie’s story, Maddie was back at Oakway. She was now a civilian (ATA is a civilian organization), so she could live at home. She loved getting to fly,...
(full context)
Part 1: Ormaie 18.XI.43 JB-S
...Jamie said he’d like to fly again and he should be able to join the ATA. Jamie noted that he’s flown mostly at night.
(full context)
