Issue Number 13

November 2007

Around The World In 80 Delays

by Tony Birchenough

In a Whimpering Giant with 4 Protesting Engines.

Part 1

As I said in my previous article [Journal #4 " Illusion or Disillusion?"] my first year on TCMSF was spent in the UK, with detachments to Colerne at the end of 1958 to gain Hastings experience and Abingdon for most of the next summer servicing Beverleys from Aden. A Hastings airframe course at Radlett and a tyre course at Fort Dunlop in B'ham brought a little variety. Finally I was considered ready for my first trip abroad (cos there was no-one else available actually - Thanks Cpl Pete Quinn) and in mid October 1959 boarded Comet T Mk2 XK670 Corvus for a 7 day trip to Tehran supporting a pair of Victors from Honington, which were to participate in a flypast.

It was on the bus from Mehrabad Airport into Tehran that I first experienced the insanity of Middle East driving habits. Speed limits seemed to be for minimum speeds, side of road optional and overtaking on the outside of blind bends compulsory. I also observed THAT part of the World's style of driving, with one hand on the horn button and the other holding the roof on, a state of affairs with which I was to become all too familiar in the years to come.

After a week back home I was off again in the same Comet T Mk2 for a 2 week tour of the USA carrying the Chief of Air Staff, Sir Dermot Boyle. We called at Bermuda, Washington DC, Colorado Springs, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New York and Ottawa, before returning via Montreal and Goose Bay. A most enjoyable experience but unfortunately we were never in one place long enough for me to form any real impressions. I recall Colorado Springs as cold but friendly, Las Vegas as brash as I'd been led to believe, the Hoover Dam most impressive and New York scruffy. I'd been back in the UK only 10 days before being sent to Filton for 6 weeks on a Britannia airframe course, this type providing the bulk of my servicing experience for the next 4 years.

1960

This is where the story really starts. For much of the next 4 years I seldom knew where I was going to be from one day to the next. Unsettling in some ways and it certainly played havoc with my love life, but boy did I think I'd fallen on my feet!

Early March saw us off to El Adem for a month to service the recently introduced Britannias on Exercise Starlight, to test our new acquisition's trooping capabilities. That month was cold and it rained a lot, not what I had expected of North Africa, The mess food in El Adem was not good and we were living in tents. Someone in my tent, let's call him Geordie, reckoned that we should dig a trench round the tent to channel the water away. He'd obviously been in the wrong Boy Scout troop, because the next morning we were awash, Safari beds soaked. It was some time before we could see the funny side, even though his pit seemed to be on a slightly lower level than the rest. We did not take kindly to the Pongoes boarding our shiny new aeroplanes with their muddy kicking boots, and when one particular lot were ordered to mark time in step in the cabin as they boarded, the aircrew went pear-shaped in a big way, the poor Brit bouncing up and down on her oleos like a mad thing. These practices were banned forthwith, it remaining only to stop the idiots from poking their rifle barrels through the ceiling trim as they prepared to deplane, from which point their thundersticks were carried in the hold.

Somehow it came as no great surprise to us to find that the powers-that-be had failed to realise that the Beverleys' frequent landings up-country on rough strips were going to use up a lot of tyres and that the El Adem tyre bay wouldn't be able to cope. No available Abingdon detachment personnel could be spared (now there's a surprise) so we TCMSF guys had to fill in between our 12 hours on - 24 off shifts. A couple of us also got roped in to change an engine on an AVM's Devon that had been attacked by a Landrover driven by a Libyan driver. As we worked, the AVM sat atop a set of steps by the wingtip, smoking and watching our progress. Around midday he sent his pilot to the transit bar for a case of beer. He then joined us as we sat up against the outside of the hangar door enjoying a cool can and a fag. It was that this point that an Admin Flt Sgt, all starched KD and no brain arrived and started giving us a right bollocking. The AVM said nothing, just shrugged his shoulders to bring his shoulder rank boards forward into view, at which point "Shiny" SNCO threw up a snappy salute and marched off somewhat sharply. It really made our day, AVM included.

At around 10am on the morning of 26th April I was called into the office by our boss, Flt Lt Coleman, who asked how I felt about changing a couple of fuel tanks on a Brit. Fresh from the course at Filton, I said it was no problem, expecting to be sent to a team in hangar J1 or J2. So I asked where and was told - Gan - and to pack my bags immediately because myself and 2 of my colleagues were due to take off at 13.00. We actually left at 15.10, arriving at Khormaksar 11 hours later, where I first experienced the suffocatingly humid heat, and this at only about 7am local time. Within the hour the replacement tanks had been transferred to another Brit which was waiting for us and we were off for a further 6 hour flight to Gan, but only after a couple of cool beers in Neddy's Bar. We soon found that far more of the bag tanks were damaged than we'd been told, so we sent for more from the UK while we got on with it. When the Brit bringing these arrived it too suffered the same combination of siphoning and venting that caused the original problem. More tanks were brought in and when we'd finished with Brit No1 off it went to Oz while we set about the other. Ready to return to Blighty, we heard that the 1st kite was u/s with more of the same at Edinburgh Field. My companions were dispatched to fix it whilst I returned home, for some reason not having the necessary security clearance for Australia, arriving back at Lyneham late evening 12th May. I think a fuel system mod was introduced as a result of these incidents. It was at this time that I was left without a toolkit for a while. Air Movements, despite assuring me that they would offload it, left it aboard and it was a few weeks before that particular Brit returned to Lyneham and I was able to reclaim my toolbox from under the jump seat by the cargo door where I had left it. It was not for nothing that we frequent travellers from Lyneham called them "Air Amusements"!

Next up was a routine Comet Continuation Training session for a week at Akrotiri, the first of many such deployments I was to experience during my time at Lyneham, with Brits and Comet 2 and 4C, usually at Nicosia. This trip got off to a shaky start when the u/c failed to retract and we had to return to Lyneham after dumping a lot of fuel. Rect. Flt had it in the hangar for the afternoon and off we went again, only for the same thing to happen again, so back we went, but only after crop spraying half of Wiltshire with another Comet-load of AVTUR. Next morning off we went again and it was a case of 3rd time lucky and 5 hours later landed at Nicosia to offload passengers and freight before a short hop to Akrotiri, the rest of the detachment passing off without further incidents.

I then became involved with World events when I flew on a Brit, taking off at 23.10 on 17th July and flying with no lights showing, to Accra, where we landed 11 hours 30 mins later. So hush-hush was this operation that we passengers had no idea of our destination until the pilot informed us on the PA system when we were half way there. The Congo trouble was on and we were involved. We worked solidly for 4 days, sending our 2 Brits to Leopoldville full of Ghanaian troops, bringing back refugees to Accra on most flights. It was decided that the RAF would fly the ill-fated President Lumumba to the UN in New York in a Brit or a Comet 2 that we had on the strip at Accra at the time, but this was cancelled at the last minute, but only after I had got a crew together in the middle of the night to see the aircraft off and a couple of Mobile Servicing Flight chaps to go with it. In the event I think the Yanks took him. As was common at that time, trouble was brewing in many parts of Africa, so our merry band piled aboard our 2 Brits and headed off to Nairobi, where we were joined by a further 5 Brits and a load more groundcrew, taking up much-needed room at the then new Embakasi airport. In the event nothing happened that affected us and we sent off 1 Brit per day just to keep the crew flying hours up. I took the opportunity at this time to take a flight round the summit of Kilimanjaro, a most impressive sight. We also managed to fit in a day trip around the Nairobi game park, which was most enjoyable, especially as we got fairly close to a pride of lions soon after they had fed. Unfortunately we had left the UK at such short notice that I didn't have my camera with me. On the evening of 20th August the detachment commander called us all together and told us that, if we were lucky, some of us just might be home for Xmas. I duly sent off a letter to my folks giving them the glad tidings, and guess what? 24 hours later we were all on our way back to the UK and I got home before my letter. Such was life in the armed services.

My final trip for the year started on 25th Sept, when I left Lyneham at 14.15 in Britannia XM496 to collect Bomber Command groundcrew from Wittering accompanying a trio of Valiants to Lagos for the Nigerian Independence Day of 1st Oct. Our skipper was easily persuaded to take part in the celebratory flypast. The local press referred to "The 3 Violent Bombers of the Royal Air Force", which we and their groundcrew found highly whimsical, though their aircrews were a bit po-faced about it.

1960 was rounded off with a 6 week course at Hatfield on the Comet 2 airframe, finishing around Xmas. All in all it had been an eventful year for yours truly.