SOME OBSERVATIONS ON COLD LAKE 1974.

By Kevin Hutchinson.Armourer.


Early in 1974 I received a telephone call from Leconfield, informing me that I was shortly to go to Cold Lake, in Alberta, Canada, with a small party to carry out the bomb disposal activities on a multiple-drop trial of the BL755 cluster bomb, and what kind of spirits would I like to take? I was confused for a few moments before it was explained that each person was allowed to take a quantity of duty-free spirit; for the expected duration of the trial it was calculated that each of us would be permitted to take ten bottles. Thinking that the booze would be good for bartering with the natives (I had hardly consumed ten bottles in the whole of my life so far) I chose a popular quality scotch. I was to be accompanied on my travels by Sgt Ray Tasker and SACs Higgins and Smiley.

Due to the fuel crisis in 1974, the RAF devoted a great deal of administrative effort in economising on all methods of transport. It was decreed that we were to go by road with our kit to RAF Abingdon, there to meet an Air Support Command Hercules to take us to CFB Cold Lake via Goose Bay, Labrador. We learned that, because of the fuel crisis, the greatest possible use was to be made of the Herc. It wouldn't only be taking us, but also some cinetheodolite (a photographic instrument for collection of trajectory data. Brian.) operators, some other civilians from RAE West Freugh and our kit - demolition explosives plus detonators, and the 24 cluster bombs which were to be expended on the trial. In addition there were six more cluster bombs, which had been given to the Canadians for them to use, and a horse box. The aeroplane was full. Oh, yes, I nearly forgot: an additional flight crew was to be carried, and an aircrew examination team. It was intended that, in addition to its other tasks, the flight was also to be used for the annual qualification tests on the two crews. I believe the organisers of the flight lost sight of its original purpose, as at one stage they decided there was insufficient room for us on the aircraft, and therefore we should find another way of getting to Canada. They were soon told otherwise.

By British standards, the Hercules is not a comfortable aircraft to fly in. Not only is it noisy, but the para-benches are damned uncomfortable, being metal-framed affairs supporting a mesh of webbing straps, stretching along the sides of the fuselage. Our discomfort was compounded in that most of our knee-room was taken up by a seven-foot wall of boxed cluster bombs, and because we were constantly disturbed by the loadmasters climbing like monkeys over our seats to get to various panels, which they would open and peer inside using flashlights. I've no doubt that most of this activity was done to impress the examination team. The heating system went haywire half-way across the Atlantic; my next-door neighbour spilled some milk from his ration-pack (no in-flight catering here!) on the floor and, being a tidy sort of chap, he struggled to wipe it up with a tissue. He needn't have bothered trying because when he got down to it, the milk had frozen solid. The only other occasion of note happened on the other side of the aircraft, which fortunately was out of sight of the folks on my side. One of the West Freugh civvies, who had apparently not flown before, got up off his seat, grabbed hold of his bag, buttoned up his overcoat and made his way to the front passenger door. His colleagues inquired the purpose of his activity, to be told that he was fed up with all this nonsense, and was leaving the aircraft; this at about 30,000 feet. He had to be restrained for the rest of the journey.

Apart from the runways and taxiways, Goose Bay was submerged in snow, but these matters were of no interest to me as my overwhelming need was sleep. We stayed overnight and continued the journey to Cold Lake the following morning. Having crossed the Atlantic one might think that our journey was almost over. It was barely half-way, though, and we soon became aware of the vast size of Canada.

On arrival at Cold Lake we were fortunate in that we did not have to unload the aircraft. Instead, we were driven to our accommodation, and given directions to the various facilities. We were given separate rooms, but SACs Higgins and Smiley were billeted in a different building to Ray Tasker and me. They did, however, comment that their accommodation was a great improvement on those to be found in the UK. I stored the ten bottles of booze under my bed.

The Canadians were fantastic. They were models of hospitality and their community spirit was embarrassing to us staid Brits. We were quickly "adopted" by a great number of families and the odd bottle of scotch seemed totally inadequate. In fact, the Canucks seemed quite indifferent to Scotch, they all seemed to prefer the home-grown variety (Canadian Club).

One of the couples we spent much time with was Harry Holmes and his wife. Both were originally from St Helens, Lancs. Harry had been an air gunner on heavy bombers at Chedburgh, Suffolk, and after the war had joined the Royal Australian Air Force as a photographer. After his stint there he returned to St Helens, got married and then joined the RCAF, also as a photographer. Harry had an encyclopaedic knowledge of aircraft and a library of photographs that most aviation magazines would kill for. One of the subjects we got talking about was the RAF Memorial Flight. I mentioned that I had seen their Lancaster at Akrotiri, Cyprus, when it was being delivered from the French Air Force in the Pacific. 'No, no' said Harry. 'What you saw was NX611, the RAF's one is PA474'; then he proceeded to tell me the history of both of them.

But to work: first, we had to be kitted out. The clothing stores provided thermal underwear, fur-lined jackets with hoods; ear-muffs, and those magnificent mukluks. These were a form of boot; the first part to be put on was a sort of calf-length sock made from half-inch thick felt, then the outer calf-length lace-up boot made of a thick woven nylon fabric with rubberised soles.

The Canadians were apparently well aware that troops coming from the UK would be totally unprepared for the climate - and we were.

Using the imprest account we were able to hire a crew-cabbed pick-up from down-town Grand Centre, the nearest major habitation. We had been warned of the special running conditions required for any road vehicle in this climate. Oh, I forgot to say that the main characteristic of "this climate" was the temperature - a daytime minus 30° Fahrenheit. Each vehicle had a festoon of electrical cable wound on the front bumper which was to be plugged into a socket whenever the vehicle was parked. Every spot denoted as a parking place had a socket. This was not to heat the car interior. Oh, no. It was to stop the engine oil and water, and particularly the battery from freezing. If you failed to plug in for more than a couple of minutes, the vehicle was guaranteed not to start.

Then we went to look at where the action was to take place. This was the nearby Primrose Lake Evaluation Range. I say nearby; it was only a forty-mile drive over an un-metalled road mainly through forest. Once a year, apparently, they dragged harrows over the roads to level them. We were to use a small part of the lake for the trial. There was plenty of lake left for other activities, however, because PLER is large. It is part of the Cold Lake Air Weapons Range (CLAWR), which I later found to be almost the same size as Norfolk, and Suffolk, and Essex - combined! Only a relatively small part of it is lake, and if one wished, one could conduct a pretty good war there without disturbing the neighbours. The whole area was under the command of a Captain (or Flt Lt if you want to be traditional).

CFB Cold Lake was the Canadian equivalent of the British A&AEE Boscombe Down. The major lodger on the station was AETE, the Aerospace Engineering Trials Establishment, whose purpose is conveniently defined in the name. The nearby presence of CLAWR and PLER neatly served the same function as our Salisbury Plain does for Boscombe. Grand Centre was the local town and was, to British eyes at least, typical of a North American frontier town; wide dirt streets fronted by clapboard buildings. Spoiling the picture, however, was the presence of a large quantity of snow.

Of course we, the bomb disposal team, were only part of the trials complement. As well as the West Freugh cinetheodolite team already mentioned, there was a detachment from 12 Squadron (with a couple of Buccaneers) who were to do the carriage and dropping of the weapons. Hunting Engineering, the design authority for the bomb, also sent a contingent, and one or two people came from the RAF Central Tactics and Trials Organisation, they being interested in the effects of the weapon. There were two Sqn Ldrs, Kevin Dearman from CTTO and R.H. Martin from HQ Strike Command; the latter was in essence our boss. We took our directions from him and he looked after us. It was a very satisfactory arrangement and we were pleased that, in him, we had a kindred spirit who shared our views on most things and had an agreeable sense of humour. In the main, the activities of all but the 12 Sqn people were concentrated at Primrose Lake. With the exception of one brief instance which we will come to later, the Sqn men looked after their aircraft in centrally-heated splendour at Cold Lake.

One aspect which intrigued us was the effect of the recently-introduced amalgamation of the separate elements of the armed forces. In Canadian terms they had "gone Unisex". No longer did the Canadians have a Navy, Army and Air Force. Now they had the Canadian Armed Forces, with one uniform, a unified system of ranks (taken from the Army) and insignia. This had been a politically-inspired measure which, it appeared to us, was universally hated. Certainly it was from the "Air Force's" point of view; they regarded themselves as being culturally superior to the army and navy, and resented having pongoes running around the station wearing the same kind of uniforms as themselves, and competing for the same promotions.

One ridiculous aspect of the new unisex forces was the scandal of the sideburns. The navy, traditionally, wore longer sideburns than the air force would permit, and this led to considerable disciplinary friction. It was then decided that sideburns would be permitted "not lower than the top of the tragus". Up to that time I had never heard of the tragus, but in Canada at that time they talked of little else, it seemed. Later, I looked the word up in a dictionary: "The projection of skin-covered cartilage in front of the external opening of the ear." In other words, the little flap you press in with your finger when you wish to block out loud noises. The ruling was not the end of the matter, however. Grumbles arose that people with large ears had an unfair advantage over the rest. Someone put forward drawings for a cardboard "tragus marker" which could be hooked over the top of the ear and would give a mathematically precise position for the end of the sideburn. The argument was still going on when we left, no doubt as a means to alleviate boredom.

Another bee in the collective bonnet was the business of the two languages. Already, instruction books, notices, etc. were printed in both English and French, but someone high in government had noticed that the higher ranks in the armed forces were predominantly held by English speakers, the "francophones" coming a poor second. They reckoned that a little positive discrimination was called for, and decreed that by nineteen whenever at least "x" percentage of higher ranks were to be occupied by francophones. In the views of many of the folks I spoke to there were now a large number of people being promoted by the fact that they spoke French and not by virtue of any ability. Indeed if we were to believe our colleagues, as a result of this dictum many of the people now in charge were a bunch of "thickos". The politicians had lost sight of the fact that, culturally, the French speakers (mainly from the Province of Quebec) were not of a mind to join the armed forces anyway so their proportion within them was quite small.

There were two fashions making the rounds in Canada in those days. "Streaking" caused much amusement, or rather the reading about it in other places. I dare say that at Cold Lake and its environs such an activity would be not only anti-social, but probably fatal. The other fashion was to say 'No Way!' at every opportunity. Some folks would make the most awful convolutions in a sentence to get the magic words in: 'There's No Way I'm not going to the party tonight'.

At Primrose Lake, disposing of Class B unexploded bomblets (those least dangerous) posed a problem not experienced at West Freugh. We couldn't dig a trench to put them in. Consequently they had to be blown up on the surface. We had plenty of safety distance so I had no worries on that account, not even from the large numbers of bomblets from two "ballistic" rounds. However, when we returned to the camp base for our lunch after the first of these two occasions I was made aware of one other consequence of demolition on the ice: the incompressibility of water, which I confess I had not considered. From our safe distance the air-shock from the explosion seemed benign, but at the camp base - at a far greater distance - the ground-borne shock-wave had shaken the base like a blanket and had startled the wits out of everyone there. There was no reported structural damage but it must have loosened a few nails.

One of the first drops by the Buccaneer was marred by one of the rounds "going ballistic". This term means that the bomb does not discard its child bomblets whilst in flight, but hits the ground intact, whereupon the whole assembly bursts apart in a shower of fragments, among which are complete and broken bomblets. Some of the complete bomblets detonate. All-in-all this results in a very unsatisfactory situation, which complicates the bomb disposal problem enormously. The cause of this "ballistic" was that the bomb on the starboard wing pylon (there were two bombs in the bomb bay and one under each wing) failed to release on the "hot" bombing run. It had already been ruled that "hang-ups" were not to be taken back to Cold Lake, so the crew had no alternative but to jettison the bomb on a second pass. The aircraft circled while the ramifications of this were discussed. There arose an argument between Sqn Ldr Martin and the 12 Sqn armourer, Chf Tech Bill Whittaker. Sqn Ldr Martin steadfastly argued that the bomb could be jettisoned "live" (which meant that the bomb would be unlikely to go ballistic) whereas Bill maintained that it could only be jettisoned "safe" from the wing pylon (which meant that it most certainly would go ballistic). I already suspected which of them was correct, and this was confirmed when at last the bomb was dropped - an almighty mess.

It was agreed that the RAF EOD team would deal with the Canadians' bombs after dropping, but the Canadian EOD technicians would observe the activities. To this end we gave their teams instruction on the bomb and its bomblets, and the finer points of EOD methods to deal with them. One problem which arose took place well before any EOD work: The CF104 Starfighter did not have any facility to operate one of the fuzing interrupts on the bomb. Whether it was an ad-hoc decision or part of the plan I have no idea, but it was decided to operate the interrupt electrically before the Canadian bombs were loaded onto the aircraft. It would seem that no American-designed aircraft had that facility. It was later - a few years later - that this discrepancy caused some embarrassment to the USAF, to my benefit. However, that was in the future. One of the Canadian bombs also went ballistic; the UK Government sportingly let the Canadians have one of ours so that they could have another go.

One of the sticks having a ballistic round happened quite late in the day, as a consequence of which we could not finish clearance and demolition before dark. So, following a discussion, it was agreed that we would make an early start the following morning, getting to the range at about half past five. We went straight out onto the ice. The captain in charge of PLER came out with us and before we started work he gave us a lecture on the dangers of frostbite and the necessity of observing our buddies closely for the signs. Although we were by now used to being on the ice he had good reason this particular morning. There was quite a breeze blowing and he reckoned that with the wind-chill factor the effective temperature was 55 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. It certainly felt cold.

The 12 Sqn engineering officer had heard about the extra work which would be needed on this particular morning and had graciously volunteered his men to come out and help. They arrived on a coach which drove immediately on to the ice. I briefed them on the work needed to be done: no EOD activity, of course, but they would be handy for locating and marking out the impact positions, a CTTO requirement. The first part of their work occupied about ten minutes only, whereupon I sent them back to the coach to get warm (all vehicles ran their engines continuously when away from a power point). The rest of us then carried on for a half-hour or so. Then we were ready for 12 Sqn's help once more. I went to the coach to get them out but nobody moved. They made it plain to me that they were not leaving the coach for me or anyone else. They were totally unprepared for this, probably the coldest day of the year. So the job was done without them, and in truth not much time was lost. One consolation was that they were bound to think of us EOD men as hard (or maybe stupid) buggers.

Perhaps a word on the marking and registration of bomblet impact points might not come amiss here. At "The Freugh" it was usual to insert a stake into the sand at each point of impact. It was impossible to drive stakes into the ice, though, so someone had thoughtfully provided aerosol cans of paint so that marking could take place. But the cans immediately froze up so it was back to the drawing board. The scheme which was adopted, and which worked satisfactorily, was to spot two theodolites onto the area and use two tape measures. Two teams would then determine and record the distance and bearing of each impact point from the team's theodolite. As the tape measure was swept in a clockwise arc there was no likelihood of an impact point being missed or counted twice. The position of each theodolite was determined accurately by triangulation from two of the range's fixed theodolites.

A couple of characteristics of the ice might be interesting to the reader: After the snow was cleared (before we could start operations) I was surprised to observe that the surface of the ice was quite flat, to the extent that it was like walking on a very thick pane of glass - several feet thick. I was told that the mechanics of freezing in that part of the world, because of the constant, unvarying downward path of the temperature, the ice on the lakes would form as a single crystal. There were vertical hairline cracks in two planes, at right angles to each other, dividing the ice into large rectangles, the cracks being visible down to the limit of transparency. Bomblet debris lying on the surface would very slowly sink through the ice, but before it got below the surface would cut through any tyre that was driven over it. Punctures were an everyday hazard on the ice. Also sinking inexorably would be detonators from disrupted UXBs, quite visible from above, but totally beyond any recovery due to the danger in doing so. The Canadians were quite worried about this latter phenomenon: they feared that the detonators might be swallowed by fish once they had fallen out the bottom of the ice, then caught by anglers, then possibly put into the frying-pan. Honestly . . . ! At the end of the trial there were 18 detonators unaccounted for.

Out on the ice one day, the gearbox (or probably the torque converter) on our pick-up broke down, in a condition which prevented the engine from being used. It was decided that we would tow it back to Grand Centre. Ray Tasker did the driving and I was the sole passenger. As the engine would not run, there was no power steering, no power brakes, and no heating! I was given a gallon can of methylated spirits and a rag. This was to wipe over the inside of the windscreen to keep it clear of ice caused by condensed breath. It needed constant work to keep the screen clear and my glove was very quickly soaked in the cold meths. Hard work for me, but doubly so for Ray, keeping the bucking pickup on the road behind a short tow driven at what I considered to be a near-suicidal speed. There was absolutely no opportunity to get the towing vehicle to slow down, but we got there without mishap.

One day we were waiting for the Buccaneer to come over when there was a loud explosion followed by a pillar of black smoke a couple of miles away. At first we thought it might be the Bucc but we were soon told that a CF104 Starfighter (#104895?) had crashed while doing a weapons trial elsewhere. This was the third aircraft crash from Cold Lake while we were there. The first was a T33 trainer which had crashed in white-out conditions, killing both crew. The second was a CF104 (#104872?) which had stalled in the undershoot area of the runway, with the pilot safely ejecting, and now this one, which was again fatal. The Canadians were especially aggrieved about this one not only because of the loss of a popular test pilot, but because it was the only CF104 to have been fitted with the on-board Gatling Gun, which made it a very expensive accident indeed. We were told that proportionally, the Canadians had lost more F104s than the Germans, but fortunately for the Canadians the Germans had many more aircraft so their larger numerical losses got all the bad publicity. I was later to read that the Germans had lost "only" 14% of their fleet whereas the Canadians had lost 22%.

One day we gave a couple of CAF fellows a lift to the range. This was good value to us because they gave us a commentary on the places we were passing, and some of the history. One crossroads in the forest, the only one that I recall, was named Elephant Crossing. They couldn't give an explanation for this, but they did tell us that about a mile or so up to the right, was a cottage where one could buy the best honey in all Canada. 'Good,' I said, 'We'll stop off on the way back and buy some'. 'Oh,' said the Canuck, 'I'm afraid you'll be unlucky. Normally you have to wait months: you see, he's only got one bee'.

On one occasion, for reasons long forgotten, it was decided that the EOD team and Sqn Ldr Martin would be taken from Cold Lake to the range in a Kiowa helicopter. We sat in the back, of course, while up front, sitting in the left-hand seat, was the pilot (a captain) and in the right-hand seat a corporal crewman. Seeing the landscape from the air was an enjoyable and interesting experience for me, especially when we stopped and hovered for a while to let us see a brown bear on the edge of a clearing. No doubt the bear would have liked to have a closer look at us, too. Eventually we got to the lake side and were unloaded. Sqn Ldr Martin was fulsome in his praise of the skills of the pilot. 'You don't know the half of it,' I said, 'It was the corporal who was doing the driving'. And so he was, but from where Sqn Ldr Martin was sitting, he could not see what I could.

The 1st of April 1974 was the fiftieth birthday of the Royal Canadian Air Force and we were privileged to be present at Cold Lake for the occasion. The first inkling I had that there was something special about the day was when passing the Base Headquarters building. I noticed the RCAF ensign and not the CAF ensign was flying from the masthead. Similarly, the base commander's car was flying a small RCAF flag. Also, many of the airmen (perhaps I shouldn't say "airmen" in relation to the new CAF) wore their old RCAF uniforms. The ultimate tribute to the old RCAF that I saw was when I called in at the bomb dump office. We had nearly expended all the explosives we had brought with us from the UK because for convenience we had used ours for the Canadian weapons, too. Because of this, or perhaps because of sheer generosity, Captain Fraser, the officer in charge of the Cold Lake bomb dump, said that we could use as much as we wanted from his stock. I sought to redeem this agreement from the NCO in charge there, stating that 'Capt. Fraser said it was O.K.' 'Who?' said the sergeant. 'Capt. Fraser' said I, thinking he didn't know his own boss. 'Who?' repeated the sergeant. 'Capt. Fraser' repeated I, puzzled. 'Couldn't we call him Flt Lt Fraser. Just for today?' said the NCO with a sigh. The birthday party in the mess that night was notable in that the majority of the members wore RCAF blue. No less than eight men wore wartime aircrew badges, all ex-6 Group Bomber Command, flying from Yorkshire in WW2. There were also a number of wives wearing their wartime WAAF uniforms, no doubt proud that they still fitted. The Station Commander at Cold Lake was Colonel (n%eacute; Group Captain) Dunlop. It was apparent in that place of already strong community spirit, that the men and women loved him dearly. He was a wartime bomber pilot (Halifaxes and Lancasters) flying from 6 Group in Yorkshire, had survived and his career had gone on from there. Now it was close to his retirement and the Warrant Officers' and Sergeants' Mess had arranged a dining-in night for him. Ray Tasker and I had been invited and luckily we had brought along our "best blues" with white shirt and bow tie.

I was astonished, however, when I received a three-page set of instructions on how a dining-in night is conducted. In my RAF service I had never received anything like this, so I put it down to the efficient way the Canucks did things, but it did raise some suspicions in my mind. These were reinforced on the night when we all gathered in the mess ante-room for a warmer. The Base Warrant Officer, WO Stranks (who also, incredibly, was well-loved) stilled the chatter and harangued us for ten minutes on the schedule which was to be followed and woe betide anyone who in any way transgressed on the standards of behaviour which were expected of us. This was not at all what I expected.

However, I relaxed as the evening wore on. The Guest of Honour (apart from Colonel Dunlop) was Lieut. General Reg Lane, who had flown all the way from his post as Deputy Commander NORAD, based deep inside a mountain in Colorado, USA, just for this occasion. Inevitably, he too was well-loved. (What goes on over there?) He was a hero and a pillar of the Air Force. Also a wartime bomber pilot, he had been chosen to make the first flight of the first Lancaster bomber built in Canada, and to bring it to England (It was named Ruhr Express and had the Serial No. KB700. It was ignominiously destroyed when it caught fire after a collision on the ground). Lt Gen. Lane was scheduled to speak for twenty minutes. He spoke for over an hour and twenty minutes and we were spellbound. WO Stranks seemed not too bothered at this gross disregard of his instructions.

After the ceremonial, we made our way back to the ante-room and a memorable party ensued. When we were all nicely mellowed, one of the mess characters, a sergeant from Texas - but Royal Canadian Air Force to the core - presented a "skit" on the departing base commander. He had done his research well and had us all rolling on the floor. One priceless tit-bit he had unearthed was that, as a schoolboy, the young Dunlop had frequently been 'chastised by his mother with a broom'. 'That just shows me why Colonel Dunlop is an officer and I'm only a sergeant', he said. 'My mother never chastised me with a broom . . . she beat the s**t out of me with a broom!' Whenever I hear liberal socialists condemning the smacking of children I am reminded of this.

After such a magnificent dining-in night and party, I was still puzzled at the reasons for WO Strank's earlier pathological worry over its conduct. 'Ah, well,' said one of my new friends, 'The last dining-in night we had was spoiled by a couple of pongoes who misbehaved the whole way through and barracked the guest of honour'. 'Mind you, WO Stranks posted the pair of them up to Churchill the very next morning'. Churchill was described to us to be a small outpost about a thousand miles north, within a stone's throw of the North Pole, and with no civilised facilities to speak of.

And so the party continued. I managed to last until breakfast time, when a bundle of us took a couple of bottles of champagne up into the dining room to accompany the bacon and eggs. For some reason there was a shortage of glasses. However, there was a vase of flowers on the table so I made do with that (after removing the flowers of course!) Luckily, there was no work that day, so I was able to snooze.

The West Freugh staff were billeted in the same building as Ray and I, and most nights we were reminded of it. Each evening, it seemed, they got stuck in to their duty-free, and for most of the rest of the night the corridors rang with the sounds of running, laughter, swearing and fights. Inevitably, they ran out of duty free after an impressively short time, and they then had the cheek to ask me if they could buy mine. No Way! So they were faced with having to pay commercial prices for "local" whisky. Real Scotch at their rate of consumption would have bankrupted them. After tasting the Bourbon, most of them confessed that they preferred it to Scotch. Rabbie Burns would be turning in his grave!

One of the traditions at Cold Lake was a Polar Carnival. Parties were the vogue, as were winter sports. Many and varied were the ice sculptures, and the motto 'Don't eat yellow snow' was heard at every corner. One magnificent party was held in one of the hangars, and there was much boozing and dancing and it seemed that the entire population for miles around were in attendance. A casino raked in money for local charities. The station Girl Guides ran an efficient pizza emporium and in the writer's opinion they were the finest pizzas he had ever tasted. Another late night!

I was quite surprised to find that drinking held such an attraction to me. Each day, as soon as I had finished my evening meal, I would hasten to the bar, and would stay there until late at night. The company was good, of course, but I would still consume far more beer than I was used to in the UK. One other thing I found was that after several of these evenings I had still not visited the mess "gents". I remarked on this and one of my colleagues stated that there was the most logical of reasons: Because the weather was so cold, there was no moisture in the atmosphere. Consequently our bodies were losing a colossal amount of water through our lungs. The air was literally dehydrating us, and it all had to be replaced. Apart from the need for bodily chemical balance, there was no liquid to spare for gratuitous peeing.

Ray Tasker, too, was affected by the dryness of the air, and thought it a good idea to take some cans of fruit-juice back to the billet with him, for consumption when he felt parched. He stored the cans on his window-sill, and to keep them cool he cracked open the sash window about a quarter of an inch. Shortly after he got to bed he was startled by a fusillade of what he thought to be rifle fire. The slight draught through the gap in his window had frozen the cans and had burst them. In the mess bar was the head of a moose mounted on one wall. I had not realised until that time how large a moose really was. Ray Tasker was impressed, too, as he continued staring at it for quite a time. But he was fishing for a dupe. At last, one of the bar regulars came up to him and was about to tell him, no doubt, the history of the trophy, when Ray pre-empted him: 'God,' he said, 'He must have been going at a hell of a speed to get through that wall!'

One other consequence of the dry atmosphere was the ready generation of static electricity. Electric shocks from door handles, clothing and other materials soon became unworthy of comment, but I was always amused when taking newly laundered clothes out of the tumble-dryer: it was a struggle to remove them, and as soon as a shirt was pulled from the machine the arms would fly outwards and the garment would be quite rigid for a while.

Although not seen around the camp, in Grand Centre and other communities in the neighbourhood, there were a number of Native Canadians - the Red Indians. These folks were not held in any great esteem by the forces people. In essence, their sole visible means of support (at least for those who congregated around the centres of population) seemed to be the monthly government hand-outs. These, we were told, were eagerly awaited, and were promptly spent on booze, which resulted in a period of obnoxious behaviour, much to the annoyance of everyone else. One of the pubs in Grand Centre, a large, three-storey building some distance from other buildings, was used exclusively by the Indians, and the regular fights which occurred there led to the place being named "Moccasin Square Garden". Certainly the natives evident around Grand Centre were not the proud people of past times.

As April wore on, the temperature started to rise rapidly as the climate raced towards spring. I remember feeling distinctly sweaty and uncomfortable and was surprised to note that the temperature had rocketed to minus 20 degrees Fahrenheit. So still some way to go. There was something of a catastrophe in the wings, however, or at least there would be if it was the UK. All that snow. It was expected that within the space of a few days the air temperature would go from below freezing to above. Not tentatively but exuberantly, leading to a very rapid melt with the consequent certainty of flooding. The Canadians were prepared for this, though, and did not consider it to be a great problem provided it was tackled with determination. The main risk was to the cellars of unoccupied houses as many of the service folk were away doing duties elsewhere. But this would be looked after by their friends. No problem, they said.

It was fortuitous that we completed the trial before the ice started to melt. We packed up our stuff, handed in our cold-weather clothing (except vests and long-johns) and said farewell to our many friends on the base, and left.

The aircraft allocated to us for our return journey was a Belfast. In contrast to the multi-purpose nature of our outward journey, this Belfast was empty apart from about a dozen of us. Sufficient standard RAF passenger seats had been secured on the tail ramp, leaving the remainder of the cavernous hold totally bare. We had a few hours stopover at Montreal, caused by the need to refuel and to examine a cracked window. I can't remember if the window was replaced but I doubt if there was time available to do so in the time we were on the ground. After a night-stop at Gander it was a boring trip over the Atlantic, giving rise to an experience which must be almost unique: One of our number had brought a ball, so we were treated to the spectacle of a game of football played at 20-odd thousand feet over the Atlantic. So far as I'm aware there were no more windows cracked.