 Cunningham knew the family well and contacted his father, whose other son John had been killed in a collision while flying a Mosquito in 1943.With the agreement of de Havilland senior, Cunningham took the dead pilot's post which earned him £2,000 per year.In March 1948 he set a world flight altitude record of 59,430 feet (18,114 metres) in a Ghost-powered Vampire.