Library Reference Number: 217
Better Than Working - A Life Of Service
Over the long history of the Royal Air Force, perhaps one of the greatest challenges to man and machine has been the transition from piston to jet engine. Coupled with this major change in aeronautical design, there concurrently arose the constant demands of the Cold War. Who better then to describe this period in RAF history than a pilot who flew each of the new jet types as they appeared, and who was also actively engaged in test procedures, and training others during a very difficult time. No sooner did Britain emerge from the Cold War than it became embroiled in a succession of further conflicts where the RAF played a leading role. Experience gained over a period of 37 years service has produced a unique insight into the emergence and development of the jet age.
I was called up for National Service in April 1952 and, having been told that the RAF did not need any more aircrew, I duly reported to the Royal Air Force Recruit Induction Centre at RAF Padgate near Warrington on 24th April 1952 where formalities were completed and uniforms and associated kit were issued. This took some 5 days before I was moved to RAF Wilmslow near Altringham to undergo recruit training (square bashing) for 8 weeks. While there, I was told, probably due to my previous apprenticeship in banking, that I would be posted to RAF Hednesford near Wolverhampton to train as an accounts clerk. I did not fancy that very much so I applied for, and was accepted, for training as an officer in the RAF Regiment. Soon afterwards the RAF began a period of rapid expansion because of the Korean War and the opportunity arose to seek selection for aircrew training. I underwent the selection process at RAF Hornchurch in Essex and was accepted for transfer to aircrew training as a cadet navigator which I began at No 1 Initial Training School at RAF Kirton-in-Lindsey in Lincolnshire in July 1952.
Because aircrew aptitude testing in the RAF at that time was not infallible, all cadets were given 12 hours flying in Tiger Moths in order to assess their aptitude for pilot training: I made the grade and was transferred to pilot training which I began at No.5 Basic Flying Training School at RAF Desford, Leicester in November 1952. My basic training went off without any significant events and after 3 months and 64 hours of Chipmunk flying I was off to join No: 36 Course at No 8 Advanced Flying Training School at RAF Dalcross (Now Inverness Airport) for the next stage.
The unit was equipped with the very elderly Airspeed Oxford Mk 2 (Chief Designer Neville Shute the novelist) powered by two Armstrong Siddeley Cheetah radial engines driving fixed pitch propellers. The aircraft made a very good trainer as it was quite demanding to fly: however, it also had a tendency to yaw which could lead to an embarrassing ground loop on landing. 133 flying hours later on 7th October 1953 I was presented with my “wings” and Queen’s Commission by Air Marshal L F Pendred CB MBE DFC the Air Officer Commanding - in - Chief of Flying Training Command. 36 Course was the last course at RAF Dalcross and, in due course, the Station closed.
The next stage of my training took place at No: 207 Advanced Flying School, RAF Full Sutton, southeast of York where I was introduced to jet power flying the Gloster Meteor single seat Mk 4 and the 2-seat Mk 7 aircraft. The aircraft performance was a dramatic improvement over the Oxford being able to climb to 40000 feet in around 8 minutes and to attain speeds of over 500 knots. However, it could be a bit of a handful when flying on one engine: especially if it was the port engine which had no hydraulic pump and the flaps, airbrakes and undercarriage had to powered by a hand pump in the cockpit. Failure to keep the speed above “critical speed” when flying with a dead engine was the cause of many accidents, many of them fatal: It also introduced the pilots to the problems of transonic aerodynamics where, at around Mach .8 as the airflow over the top of the wings reached the speed of sound, a shock wave formed on the wing causing the flying controls to become immovable until speed was reduced. Although the Mk 7 did not have a pressurised cockpit it was regularly climbed to, and operated at, around 35000 feet where the lack of air density caused all speech on the intercom and radio to sound like “Donald Duck”. All Marks did have one very dangerous characteristic particularly when flown without the ventral external fuel tank. A short note in the Pilot’s Notes stated; “If the aircraft is yawed at speeds below 170 knots with the airbrakes out, the nose may drop suddenly and the elevators become ineffective until the yaw is removed“. What this meant was that, if you were downwind for landing with the airbrakes out to reduce speed to the maximum speed for lowering the undercarriage of 175 knots you had to get the airbrakes in before speed fell to 170 knots or risk making a large hole in the ground! This interesting characteristic became know as the “Phantom Dive”. Overall the Meteor acquired a dismal safety record in RAF service: some 890 Meteors crashed killing 434 pilots and 10 navigators. Nevertheless, provided it was flown within the limitations, the aircraft was easy and pleasant to fly, and although it was quickly outclassed by the Mig-15 and the F-86 Sabre. In its early days it was an effective fighter.
Four months and 71 flying hours later saw me off to No: 226 Operational Conversion Unit (OCU) at RAF Stradishall in Suffolk to learn the day fighter trade on Meteor Mk 8s and, because the Meteor 7 did not have a weapons system, Vampire T 11s for the dual weapons training sorties. Both aircraft were fitted with Martin Baker ejection seats and each student was familiarised with the seats by being strapped into a real seat mounted on an inclined ramp and fitted with half the normal explosive charge which, when fired, shot the whole thing up the ramp to a height of around 20 feet where a ratchet mechanism prevented an equally rapid return to earth! Whether the experience did us any good is a moot point as it was later done away with due to the incidence of back injuries which it caused!
I completed the OCU course satisfactorily with the grand total of 335 hours and was posted to No: 66 Squadron at RAF Linton-on-Ouse near York operating in the interceptor day fighter role. Unfortunately, the posting staff seemed to be unaware that the Squadron was one of two in Fighter Command operating F-86 Sabres and not Meteors: consequently I was rapidly despatched to No: 229 OCU at RAF Chivenor to learn to fly the Sabre!
The course included some 12 hours flying the Vampire T 11 and Mk 5 to familiarise students with single engine jet flying before flying around 25 hours in the Sabre. I completed the course in late November 1954 a few days before my 21st birthday.
The RAF version of the Sabre was the F-86 E (US designation) or Mk 4 (Canadian /UK designation) built under licence by Canadair in Montreal, Canada under the US Mutual Defence Aid Programme and remained under American ownership throughout their service with the RAF. Some 430 aircraft were built for the RAF and were ferried across the Atlantic to the UK under Operation “Beechers Brook” between December 1952 and May 1953. The flights were undertaken by RAF pilots of No: 1 Overseas Ferry Unit usually in groups of 30 aircraft and covered the 3100 mile to the first UK landfall at RAF Kinloss staging through Goose Bay, Labrador, Greenland and Iceland. The aircraft were then flown to No: 5 Maintenance Unit (MU) at RAF Kemble where they were camouflaged before being delivered to units: 370 of them went to RAF Germany and 60 to RAF Fighter Command.
In most respects the Sabre was a great improvement on the Vampire and Meteor having fully powered controls, and the ability to attain supersonic speed in a steep dive with no control problems. It was, however, seriously underpowered with its 5000lb thrust engine taking more than twice as long to reach 40000 feet as did the Meteor: a problem aggravated by the design of the engine oil system which had no positive return and which required the aircraft to be levelled every 10000 feet in the climb to allow gravity to return the oil from sumps under each main bearing to the tank! This was a limitation which made it extremely difficult to intercept Bomber Command Canberras flying well above 40000 feet which were the main targets on Fighter Command exercises. The Fighter Command Sabres were fitted initially with wing leading edge slats which had no mechanical lock and which were closed and held in by air pressure as speed was increased. Unfortunately, when “g” was applied at quite moderate speeds, it was not unusual for one slat to come out while the other remained closed resulting in some interesting uncommanded rotational manoeuvres! At the beginning of 1955 the Squadron aircraft were modified by the replacement of the wing slats by an extended “hard” leading edge which had a chord which was 6 inches wider at the root reducing to 3 inches wider at the tip. This modification gave significantly improved handling but had the disadvantage of adding 35 knots to the takeoff and landing speeds!
In early 1956 the Sabres had to be handed over to the USAF and the Squadron began re-equipping with the 8 Hunter Mk 4 and 4 Meteor 8 aircraft because there were insufficient number of the former available. The Sabres were ferried by Squadron pilots to various UK airfields where they were refurbished before being handed over to the USAF which passed them on to the Italian Air force and others for further service. Although the Hunter 4 was a delight to fly and had a better overall performance than the Sabre, it was in some ways a big step back because it was not fit for operational service. It suffered from quite a few major shortcomings such as, the guns could only accept low velocity ammunition with a muzzle velocity of 1900 feet/second and they were not cleared for use because their exhaust gases could cause the engine to flame-out, the engines could surge in high level turns and it was necessary to dive down some thousands of feet to sort out the airflow through the engine before normal progress could be resumed and there was no effective windscreen demisting system and a 15 minute fuel reserve had to be kept at the end of each high level sortie to clear misting sufficiently to land and finally there were numerous problems with the undercarriage failing to lock up properly which caused many abortive sorties. How the aircraft was ever released to service in such a state remains a mystery. Later that year, I was detached to the Fighter Weapons School at RAF Leconfield to do the Pilot Attack Instructor (PAI) Course and 66 Squadron was re-equipped with the Hunter Mk 6 which had a third more power than the Mk 4, was a much improved aircraft and it was cleared to fire its guns! On the PAI Course I flew in the Venom FB 1 on the ground attack sorties of the Course. The Venom was very similar to the Vampire but with a much more powerful engine, better all-round performance and was a delight to fly. In due course I graduated as a PAI and returned to the Squadron which in February 1957 moved to RAF Acklington in Northumberland. One month later the Squadron deployed to RAF Nicosia in Cyprus for 4 months to provide air defence of the island in the event of an attack from Egypt following the Suez debacle. Soon after the return of the Squadron to Acklington I was posted to No: 229 OCU at RAF Chivenor as a tactical and weapons instructor on Hunter Mk 4s. The role of the OCU was to convert pilots to the Hunter and to teach them how to use the aircraft as a fighting machine.
By the time I arrived at Chivenor, most of the problems on the Hunter Mk 4 had been sorted out: improved versions of the Rolls Royce Avon engines had overcome most of the previous problems and we could even fire the guns albeit still with low velocity ammunition! 4 x 30mm Aden guns firing together produced about 4800 lbs of recoil and could knock 60 knots off your airspeed easily! Gunnery practice was carried out usually by 4 aircraft operating in pairs against a 30 x 5 foot fabric banner target towed by a Meteor at around 180 knots; only one gun was used and it was loaded with 60 rounds of ammunition which had been tipped with slow drying coloured paint which left a coloured mark on the target as the rounds, hopefully, passed through thus allowing individual pilots‘ scores to be counted! During my tour, much delayed radar ranging equipment was introduced and provided accurate target range information to the gun sight for the first time. In the middle of 1958 the Mk 7, 2-seat version of the Hunter arrived at the OCU and replaced the Vampire T11 as the weapons trainer. It also introduced for the first time in a British fighter the tail braking parachute which gave a great sense of security on a 2000 yard runway and saved a fortune on brake and tyre wear and unscheduled engagements with the runway arrestor barriers! The airflow around the wider side by side cockpit layout brought back the problem of gun exhaust gases entering the engine; the problem was solved by introducing a very short delay after trigger pull so that the engine fuel supply could be reduced before the gun was allowed to fire. All a bit “Heath Robinson” but it worked!
In 1959 I finished my tour with a total of around 1400 flying hours and I was posted as a flight commander to No: 4 Squadron at RAF Jever near Wilhelmhaven in north-west Germany. The Squadron along with No: 93 Squadron, operating in the day fighter/ground attack role formed No: 122 Wing of the 2nd Allied Tactical Air Force (2ATAF.) Under the terms of the 3 Power Potsdam Agreement at the end of WW2, the German Luftwaffe was disbanded and only aircraft operated by the Allies i.e. America, Britain, and the Soviet Union could police the German airspace and then only in their zone of responsibility. Thus the principal task of the Squadron was to provide, in turn with other 2ATAF squadrons, a quick reaction alert force to police the Federal German airspace over the British Zone of Germany: a situation which continued until the Unification of Germany in 1990.
In 1955 the Federal German Republic joined NATO and, inter alia, the German Air Force was reformed. By 1959 their day fighter squadrons at the base at Oldenburg not far from Jever had been equipped with the Canadair F-86 Mk 6 which, due to its Canadian designed and built Orenda engine had far more power than the RAF Mk 4 version described earlier. We used regularly to take part in mock air combat with them during which the Hunter proved to have almost complete superiority except in longitudinal control at speeds in the transonic region where, because of its all-flying tailplane, the Sabre was markedly superior.
Another notable experience occurred during low level training when we attempted to carry out mock attacks on the Moehne dam: an experience which generated even more respect for the airmanship of the crews who flew on the real thing.
At the end of 1960, further defence cuts reduced the 2ATAF day fighter force to one squadron based at RAF Gutersloh near Bielefeld, all the other squadrons were disbanded and RAF Jever was subsequently handed back to the German Air Force in 1962. I was posted to the Central Fighter Establishment at RAF West Raynham in Norfolk to attend No: 10 Course at the Day Fighter Combat School (DFCS) flying Hunters Mk 6. DFCS was the direct descendant of the Day Fighter Leaders’ School (DFLS) and its role was to train potential leaders for the RAF day fighter force worldwide. I completed the Course successfully and was selected to remain on the staff as a tactical and weapons instructor.
Around this time the English Electric Lightning was being introduced to Fighter Command as an all-weather replacement for the Javelin and Hunter in the air defence role. However, the overseas Hunter squadrons remained in the day fighter role but with an increasing involvement in air to ground operations. As a consequence DFCS developed a similar involvement with air to ground gunnery, 3 inch rocket firing and dive bombing at dive angles of 15 to 60 degrees.
Sometime later DFCS was charged with evolving a Canberra Weapons Instructor Course to train Canberra pilots operating the B8 version in the ground attack role. This provided the opportunity to fly the Canberra T Mk4 to give us the necessary experience to devise Hunter weapons sorties compatible with the capabilities of the Canberra. The Canberra did not have power controls and at the higher indicated airspeeds could be hard work to manoeuvre. We tried to simulate the heaviness of the controls by flying the Hunters in manual controls without the benefit of hydraulic assistance and found it to be roughly similar! Our Hunters Mk 7 were fitted with 2 inch rocket pods in lieu of the inboard drop tanks for these courses and we were all impressed by the improvement in their performance compared with the standard WW2 3 inch rockets used on the Hunter.
In addition to running courses, DFCS was charged with visiting all the Hunter squadrons to assess their performances and to disseminate the latest tactical and weapons doctrine. One such visit is described in Aden Adventure elsewhere on the website.
After almost 3 years, it was time to move on, and I was posted to No: 28 Squadron at RAF Kai Tak in Hong Kong. I left Stanstead Airport in a chartered Bristol Britannia trooper and after staging through Ankara and Bombay arrived in Kai Tak 26 hours later. We were allowed only to fly in Hong Kong airspace or out at sea in international airspace; Chinese airspace was very strictly forbidden to us. Consequently, the role of the Squadron was mostly one of flag waving in the Colony and it was established with only 6 pilots, a Hunter Mk7 and 2 Hunter Mk 9 aircraft. The Mk 9 was a souped up version of the Mk 6 with better navigation equipment, larger fuel drop tanks of 230 gallon capacity each, and a tail braking parachute and a hook under the rear fuselage to allow the aircraft to tow air to air gunnery targets.
A couple of high points in the tour are worthy of mention. On one occasion I was scrambled in a Mk 9 by the RAF air defence radar station on Tai Mo Shan mountain to investigate a slow moving target some 60 miles east of the Colony. When, under radar direction I reach the target area I searched everywhere but there was no sign of any aircraft. There was, however, a large nuclear submarine part submerged heading away from the Colony at high speed and producing a considerable bow wave which probably was what caused the radar response! The second concerns a 2 aircraft deployment which I led to Borneo to gain some experience on operations during the Indonesian Confrontation on the Island. We flew to RAF Kuching in Sarawak staging through the large USAF base at Clark in the Philippines and RAF Labuan in Sabah. The total flying time was about 4 hours. Although some of the slower RAF aircraft flying in theatre had collected the odd hole from small arms fire, no Hunter did and our flying was uneventful. It was quite amazing to fly for over an hour at 420 knots at 250 feet and see nothing but tree tops and the very occasional river. The trees were on average about 200 feet tall and we carried “Treescape” equipment containing 250 feet of rope which, in the event of your parachute being caught up in the treetops after an ejection, was supposed to allow you to reach the ground safely: what you did then was the next problem!
All too quickly the tour came to an end with some 2750 flying hours behind me and I was posted to the Officer Cadet Training Unit at RAF Henlow near Bedford as a flight commander where, in the course of the next 2½ years, over 100 young men passed through my hands most of whom made the grade and earned the Queen’s Commission in ground branches of the RAF. My sole flying on this tour was a trip in an Air Training Corps (ATC) glider and a few hours Chipmunk flying with an ATC air experience flight at RAF Upwood.
In early 1969, I escaped from my ground tour and went off to the School of Refresher Flying at RAF Manby in Lincolnshire. Ground school brought us up to date on air traffic rules and about the systems on the Jet Provost Mk 4 . a nice enough, but rather unexciting, little aircraft on which we were to regain our former skills. On the early sorties we found that 2½ years on the ground resulted in a problem where it was possible to fly the aircraft or listen to the radio but not both together! Thankfully the problem was soon overcome and I went on to complete the course flying some 26 flying hours and I went off to join No: 79 Squadron at No 229 OCU at RAF Chivenor as a weapons instructor on the Hunter Mk 6. The role of the Squadron was the training of PAIs for the Hunter Force however, we did provide some weapons and tactical familiarisation to some pilots destined for the first RAF Buccaneer squadron. My tour only lasted for 4 months as I was promoted to squadron leader and posted to a staff appointment at Headquarters No: 11 Group at RAF Bentley Priory the old home of RAF Fighter Command in Stanmore Middlesex. On this tour I managed to get a few hours on the Meteor and an air experience trip in a Vulcan but was otherwise deskbound.
All good things must come to an end, and, towards the end of 1971 I received a posting to be OC B Flight on No: 11 Squadron which was equipped with Lightnings. With a total of fewer than 50 hours night flying, I was a confirmed day fighter pilot and my immediate reaction was that they had got the wrong Thornton as Lightnings flew at night! The posters were right and I was wrong and early in 1972 I returned to the School of Refresher Flying for a further retread on the Jet Provost Mk 4 for 25 hours before going back to RAF Chivenor for 20 hours of Hunter flying to prepare me for No: 69 Lightning Course at No: 226 OCU at RAF Coltishall. Coltishall airfield was closed for runway resurfacing so, after ground school and simulator, we moved to RAF Binbrook in Lincolnshire for the flying phases of the course.
The course was conducted on the 2 seat Lightning T Mk 5 and the single seat F Mk 3 and provided some 55 flying hours. At the end of the Course I moved one hangar to the south to join No: 11 Squadron equipped with Lightnings Mks 3,5 and 6 and took up the post of OC B Flight in charge of Squadron operations.
The Squadron operated 12 aircraft in the all-weather fighter role providing defence of the United Kingdom and the 14 pilots usually worked a 2 shift 16 hour day with each flight alternating on a weekly basis between day and night shifts. The 100 or so ground crew worked a similar pattern and almost invariably provided us with excellent serviceability. Each shift would fly around 14 sorties which varied in length from 40 minutes to 1 hour 15 minutes; if a flight refuelling tanker was available a sortie could last a number of hours. A great deal has been written about the Lightning and it requires no rehearsing here. Suffice it to say that it was a delight to fly and its performance was amazing. Perhaps one example will suffice: in the 1970s a major airway which had an upper height limit of 25000 feet lay 12 miles north of Binbrook and it was no problem to take off from the northerly runway, climb in reheat power and be well above 25000 feet before crossing over the airway!
My Lightning flying totalled 460 hours when it came to an end in 1974 with my posting to the staff of the Joint Maritime Operational Training Staff (JMOTS) at RAF Turnhouse. (Now Edinburgh Airport). The role of JMOTS was to provide training to both Royal Navy and RAF units in the procedures for the provision of naval support air operations from shore bases following the demise of the Royal Navy’s fixed wing aircraft carriers. The unit planned and conducted Joint Maritime Courses each of which lasted about 2 weeks and took place in the sea areas to the northwest of the UK. On one such exercise I was able to join HMS Kent, a County Class air defence destroyer for the whole duration which provided a very valuable insight into naval operations. My tour came to an abrupt end a year later when I was given the opportunity to join the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) Team in Saudi Arabia with the acting rank of Wing Commander. I duly accepted and went off to Riyadh in the late summer of 1975.
The UK Government, under a Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Saudi Arabia, was required to provide operational flying training and engineering support for the Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) Lightning force, flying training and engineering support at the King Faisal Air Academy in Riyadh, operation of the RSAF Aviation Medicine Centre, and technical training for RSAF aircraft technicians. The UK Government’s contractor for the execution of these responsibilities was the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) (now BAe Systems) and the role of the UK MOD Team was to monitor the execution of the contract. The contract was defined by ”Statements of Work” and that for which I was responsible covered flying training at the Lightning Operational Conversion Unit, the Aviation Medicine Centre at RSAF Dhahran and the King Faisal Air Academy at RSAF Riyadh, unfortunately, the contract did not authorise any flying for the MOD Team. The appointment provided me with frequent opportunities to visit the Defensive Operations Division of the Saudi Ministry of Defence and the RSAF airfields at Dhahran, Kamis Mushayt and Tabuk where BAC had responsibilities. In early 1977 my promotion was made substantive and in the autumn of that year my tour came to an end and I returned to the UK.
At the beginning of 1978 I was posted to the RAF College at Cranwell to undertake No: 35 Course in the Department of Air Warfare. The Course covered all aspects of air warfare, provided the opportunity to visit NATO air establishments in central Europe and aircraft manufacturers in the UK and lasted for 5 months.
Before leaving Saudi Arabia I had been told that I was to take up an appointment as Officer Commanding Operations Wing (OC Ops Wg) at RAF Wattisham in Suffolk in February 1979 and that, as it was a flying appointment, I had to return to refresher flying once again. I began the process with the Refresher Flying Squadron at 3 Flying Training School which had moved to RAF Leeming and after 28 hours of Jet Provost flying I went off to No: 79 Sqn at RAF Brawdy in Pembrokeshire in August to refresh on the Hunter.
Despite the fact that all the aircraft were very long in the tooth, the Hunter was still a delight to fly and operate and I was very sad to reach the end of my fast jet refresher with some 25 hours under my belt and a total of 1933 Hunter hours. My next move was across country to RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire to join No:15 Phantom Short Course at 228 OCU.
After the usual ground school and 7 “sorties” in the flight simulator, it was time for my first trip in a Phantom FGR2 with a staff pilot in the back seat to show me the ropes. We got the thing started and began to taxi out to the runway and I thought that there must be something badly wrong with the aircraft as there was so much noise and vibration compared with the aircraft which I had flown before. However, a voice from behind assured me that all was well and that the aircraft was perfectly serviceable and off we went. As well as learning a new aircraft, I also had to get used for the first time to having a navigator with me; an experience with its pros and cons! One of the early cons was when on a sortie I mentioned to my experienced OCU staff navigator that we appeared, under his instructions, to be heading into the Wainfleet weapons range, I was advised just to fly the aircraft and to leave the navigation to him: we duly infringed the danger area and the experience confirmed my view that pound for pound I preferred the fuel! I completed the course successfully with 30 hours on the Phantom in January 1979 and, after a spell of leave, went off to take up my new appointment at RAF Wattisham at the end of February.
Wattisham at that time had 2 Phantom FGR2 squadrons, Nos: 23 and 56, operating in the all-weather interceptor role and each equipped with 12 aircraft. The FGR2 was the British version of the Phantom fitted with Rolls Royce Spey engines and a Westinghouse pulse doppler radar for which the Ferranti Company in Edinburgh was the delegated UK design authority. As OC Ops Wg I was authorised only to fly 10 hours a month and had overall responsibility for the airfield, wing operations, air traffic control, the fire service, the meteorological service and the flight simulator. I flew regularly with 56 Squadron and occasionally with 23 Squadron and achieved 245 Phantom hours before my tour was cut short by a posting to the staff at Headquarters (HQ) No. 11 Group at RAF Bentley Priory in October 1980.
My new appointment was as Wing Commander Operations (Wg Cdr Ops) responsible for all operational flying and Surface to Air Missile (SAM) operations in the Group which in turn was the air defence authority responsible for the huge area of the United Kingdom Air Defence Region. The highlight of the tour came in early April 1982 when I was detached to HQ 18 Group as Air Defence Commander (designate) RAF Ascension Island to plan the air defence of an island which was vital to all the British operations in the South Atlantic following the Argentinean invasion of the Falkland Islands. With the planning completed, I soon after found myself as the sole passenger on an RAF VC10 loaded with 1000lb bombs en route from RAF Brize Norton to Wideawake Airfield on Ascension Island. The scene at Ascension was dramatic: the hard standings were full of Nimrods and Victor tankers and as there is no port or harbour on the island, helicopters were busily engaged from dawn to dusk flying equipment and personnel out to task force ships either heading south or standing off the island.
My first task was to oversee the installation by Chinook of an air portable radar convoy on the top of Green Mountain the highest point of the island. The equipment was soon up and operating an, for the first time we had some radar cover around the island. Soon after, a flight of ground attack Harriers from No: 1 Squadron arrived; the pilots were briefed and co-opted into the air defence role despite their lack of night or bad weather capability. In due course the Harriers went south and were replaced by Phantom FGR2s from 29 Sqn at RAF Coningsby giving a proper air defence capability which was maintained until the end of the war: however the Argentineans kept well clear and it was never used. In due course I returned to staff duties at HQ 11 Group until my tour ended at the end of May 1983 and I went off to do the Bloodhound SAM course.
My next appointment in July of the same year was as Officer Commanding 85 Squadron with its HQ and 2 Flights at RAF West Raynham in Norfolk and with 2 further detached Flights, one at RAF North Coates near Grimsby and the other at RAF Bawdsey in Suffolk where radar had been developed in the 1930s. The Sqn operated the Bristol Bloodhound SAM system to provide low level air defence in a large area over the North Sea and coastal areas stretching from North Yorkshire down to Kent. Individual SAM sections could also operate at medium and high levels but, because the system lacked a target identification system, such operations had to be carried out under discrete control from the controlling radar station at RAF Neatishead in Norfolk. One incident is worthy of comment: the Sqn was tasked to carry out mock engagements of a USAF Blackbird flying over the North Sea. All the SAM sections were keen to get a “kill” but none saw any trace of the target. It later transpired that the target was flying at well above the Bloodhound maximum speed capability of around 1800 knots and could not be seen by the radar which worked on the continuous wave system to measure Doppler speed! My very interesting and different tour came to an end in November 1985 when I was posted to the Falkland Islands.
I arrived in the Islands on 8 December landing on the new runway at RAF Mount Pleasant which had just been commissioned although a great deal of construction and commissioning was still going on elsewhere on the new base to bring it up to full operational status. I was met by my predecessor and whisked off by helicopter to HQ British Forces Falkland Islands in Port Stanley some 35 miles away; the road to Port Stanley being still a work in progress! At the HQ I was briefed on my new appointment which involved responsibility for the operations of all 3 Services and sharing the duty of Air Defence Commander with 2 other senior RAF officers who were based at the airfield at RAF Port Stanley. My chain of command in the HQ was an RAF air vice marshal, an Army brigadier and a Royal Navy captain.
The RAF forces consisted of Phantom FGR2s, a C130 Hercules fitted out in the air refuelling role (AAR) and Chinooks for heavy lifting of kit to inaccessible sites such as the 3 remote air defence radar stations.The aircraft were all based at RAF Stanley which had reinforced aluminium planking laid across the full width and length of its short runway to make it capable of bearing the weight of the C130 and Phantom: the runway was so short that the Phantoms had to use the cable arrester gear on every landing which, over time, caused the whole of the planked surface to move in the direction of the prevailing wind due to the aircraft braking on the landing run. During my time it became necessary to reinstate the whole of the planking to its original position: the job was taken on by a Ghurkha engineering squadron which accomplished the task in 48 hours!
It was not possible for me to re-qualify to fly the Phantom so I had to make do with passenger flights on the Chinook and C-130: typical sorties were a supply drop by parachute to the garrison on South Georgia, flight refuelling of the Phantoms and low level surveillance of the many vessels involved with fishing in the surrounding waters. I also had the opportunity to spend a very interesting 5 days at sea on board HMS Liverpool, a Type 42 air defence destroyer.
Towards the end of my tour of duty RAF Mount Pleasant became fully operational and the transfer of all the RAF units from Port Stanley began with the move of the Phantom Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) force to the new facility there.
I returned to the UK in April 1986 and, after a period of leave, set off to take up my last appointment as Chief of Fighter Branch in the NATO HQ of Allied Air Forces Central Europe at Ramstein in south west Germany. The post involved responsibility for all air defence fighter operations in central Europe and provided occasional opportunities to fly in the back seat of USAF F-15s.
All good things must come to an end and in September 1988, I returned to the UK prior to retiring from the RAF at the end of November. Truly, after 3750 flying hours and nearly 37 years of a wonderful life it was most certainly better than working!