A scientist has been claiming that certain parts of a new aircraft called a Reindeer will develop metal fatigue sooner than officially estimated, but nobody takes him seriously.

While flying to the site of an air crash that killed a Soviet ambassador, he discovers that his own plane is a Reindeer which has already flown twice its permitted number of hours.

The plot weaves together many themes, such as attitudes to safety, conflicts of interest between management and professionals, Cold War diplomacy, single parenthood and clairvoyance, before the scientist's theory is finally vindicated.

Honey is nervous and distrusting of the 'new broom', is unimpressive in appearance and is so intensely focused on his work that his relations with the outside world – never that good to begin with – suffer badly.

Honey is sent to Canada to examine the debris of the crash, travelling on board a Reindeer aircraft on which he meets the two heroines of the novel, Corder and Teasdale.

During the flight, Honey discovers from the cockpit crew that the flying hours of this aircraft are twice those of any other Reindeer in service, and are close to his predicted failure time.

During a heated discussion during a stopover at Gander International Airport, Honey realises that he has failed to persuade anyone to declare the Reindeer unfit for service, and in desperation, he disables it by raising its undercarriage while it is standing on the tarmac, leaving the aircraft damaged and unable to move.

Teasdale visits Dr Scott at Farnborough and relates her story of events to the Director of the RAE before offering Elspeth some feminine care and affection.

On reaching the crash site he discovers that the parts of the aircraft adjacent to where the tailplane separated have been removed by the Soviet party who came to recover the body of their Ambassador.

The Soviet authorities suspect that the crash was part of a plot to assassinate the ambassador, and are wholly unhelpful when approached for information about the missing tailplane root.

This parallels the late development of the Gloster Meteor, whose later versions featured powerful engines providing more thrust than the airframe was designed to accommodate.

Management at the Royal Aircraft Establishment consider the RAF obliged to accept the risk of carrying a potentially unhinged person as part of their regular flying duties.

[4][5] The title is taken from The Wanderer by John Masefield which Shute quotes at the start of the book: The initial US publication took place at the end of August 1948.

[6] The film adaptation of the novel was released in 1951, starring James Stewart as Honey, Jack Hawkins as Scott, and Marlene Dietrich as Teasdale.

[8] An earlier BBC Radio 4 Classic Serial, dramatised by Brian Gear in three episodes, and broadcast weekly from 11 May 1986, starred John Clegg as Theodore Honey, Norman Bowler as Scott, and Margaret Robertson as Monica Teasdale.