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Royal Air ForcePhotographers

Association

Edition 66Spring 2017

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CommitteeChairman:John Barry, MBEchairman@rafpa.org.uk01480 456 76310 Church RoadBrampton, PE28 4PW

Membership Secretary& Web Site Manager:Gerry Linsteadsecretary@rafpa.org.uk01366 38014375 Grimshoe RoadDownham MarketPE38 9WF

Treasurer:Paul Niletreasurer@rafpa.org.uk16 Canberra CloseManby, LN11 8TU

Regalia:Dave Derrickregalia@rafpa.org.uk07871 762 6303 Sunningdale DriveThornton-Cleveleys, FY5 5AD

Events Coordinator:Chris Twinerevents@rafpa.org.uk01283 299248

Editor:John Lewiseditor@rafpa.org.uk01263 711 5367 Town CloseHolt, NR25 6JN

Royal Air ForcePhotographers

Association(Formerly RAFBEPA)

www.rafpa.org.uk

THE SMALL PRINT – Flashback is published by theRAFPA and is for the benefit of paid-up members ofthe RAFPA. Accreditation for text, images and logoshas been given where appropriate, however theRAFPA cannot be held liable for any omissions orerrors. If such omissions or errors are notified to theEditor they will be published in the next availableedition of Flashback. If any person responds to anadvertisement or commercial supplier named inFlashback they must satisfy themselves of the au-thenticity and honesty of any such advertiser ortrader and the RAFPA cannot be held liable for anyloss, however incurred. Flashback is copyright andrequests to reproduce text, images or logos must bemade to the Editor.

DEADLINEfor contributions for Edition 67

must be received by:Friday 26th May 2017

Thank you

Edition 66Spring 2017

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From your editors desk

Front Cover - Yes, yes I know itis all in very bad taste. I have toconfess that the original ideawas not mine, blame our ownDave Newham for the inspirationwho also contributed to the cap-tions, to be seen at the tail of theWE 177 article.

But we lived with this during most of our era, the Cold War andthings have not improved recently - you know what I mean, yesthat’s you over in the USA. We managed for all those Cold Waryears not to let one off, even by accident, I don’t know of any in-stance where we lost one, so probably more by luck than judg-ment we got away with it, although recently I read that, “Duringthe Cold War the United States military misplaced at least eightnuclear weapons”!

I was personally disappointed with the last edition of Flashback,short by 4-pages (not my fault chief!) and some last minute ‘crea-tive’ writing to fill another 2-pages. So this is the revenge mag -bigger, better and more controversial - hopefully!

Have you noticed I have reinstated page numbers! I inheritedthem from Chris Pettman but could not get to grips with the con-cept, so opted out. Feeling braver now for another crack! Whatabout ‘tinted pages’? Bit of background colour to what may havebeen less than dynamic pages or with fewer images.

On page 34 you will discover the Minutes from last years AGMand on 35 our 2016 Accounts, any questions or observations toGerry or Paul please, I’m only the Editor.

I’m looking for information/images about the late Doug McHard.RAF Photographer 1946 to 1956, UK, Hong Kong and an Instruc-

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tor at Wellesbourne. His time inthe RAF was interesting but as acivilian he really shone!

It is sad that I have to report thepassing of two of our Members, I am sure that all will join with mein passing on our condolences to their family and friends.

It appears to be some time since Chairman/John has includedany ‘Morgan’ photographs in his Chat.

Time to rectify that, I spiedthis little gem during my re-cent travels! It may just needa bit more than a ‘quick go-ing over with T-Cut’!

Toiling under the RAFPA Freedom of PublicationAct, it would also seem appropriate to include aphotograph of my latest motorbike, although someof you may have had sight of it at the Reunion,although, like me ‘slightly damaged’!

Chairman/John in his Chat mentions ‘mo-torhomes’ yep - did thatlast year, but only for aweek of course!

who started his service life in 1950 atWellesbourne Mountford on Course 122, he was thenposted to CFE West Raynham 51-52, 2 Sqdn Gutersloh1952-53, Station Photo Unit RAF Ahlhorn 1953-54, 26

Sqdn Oldenburg 1954 and 54 Sqdn Wyton 1954-55.Peter now lives in Auckland New Zealand.

Front Cover

A Canberra races across thesky, having delivered its

weapon on to an enemy target.

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We are now well into a New Year and how the world haschanged in such a short time! We do indeed live in interestingtimes, with Brexit on the horizon, subject to the whims of theHouse of Lords etc and a new President now running the US onhis Twitter account each morning, what next?

I know that many of you had a few words to say on both subjectson our Yahoo Group website and I was delighted that commonsense prevailed (why shouldn't it from the RAFPA membership) inthat the many political statements being expressed were soonabated – well done to all concerned.

On a sadder note, I was most surprised, indeed shocked, to learnof the sudden death of Mike Gladwin. Mike was one of our youngermembers who had recently retired from RAF service as a WarrantOfficer and was keen to promote RAF photography be it from anhistoric perspective through the RAF Wyton Heritage Centre orthrough our Association. He was enthusiastic and showed greatpromise at our last meeting in November offering to organise anumber of outside visits. He will be sadly missed and I know thatyou all join me in passing on our condolences to his friends andfamily. More details are included on later pages.

I know that our wandering Editor has been on his travels again, thistime further afield visiting his old haunts in Cyprus, for me I haveagain restricted myself to escape to sunny Spain (or in the case ofthe Spanish winter so far this year – not so sunny). I take mymotor-home each year on the continent in the winter to get my'knees brown' for the coming UK summer.

I know our Secretary Gerry Linstead, and his wife Teresa, alsoenjoy motor-homing in the off season. Just a thought! but I waswondering how many other members of our Association take to theroad, be it in a caravan or camper? If interested, who knows we

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might be able to get a rally going sometimein the near future. After all, camping out isin the blood of most ex RAF Photographersbased on their experience with the MFPUsin RAF Germany – how can we forget theconvoys across Europe and the setting upof camp in the woods mit Harriers and thelike – happy days!

Please let me know if you are interestedand we can arrange a summer gathering.

Disclaimer - Chairman/John and your Editorial Office have beensuffering digital communication issues. At the tail of John’s Chair-man’s Chat was a note about inserting Atrel images - give me achance I was Photo G, we didn’t do camping! Chairman, I hope

this is what you were expecting!

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Mick Gladwin

Mick was born in Chatham, Kent, then lived with his family inStrood until he was seventeen years old. At the age of eight-een he joined the Royal Air Force, Photographic Trade and

served at various stations in the UK. These included RAF Cos-ford, RAF Brampton, RAF Aldergrove, RAF High Wycombe,RAF Wyton and RAF Marham and overseas tours including:

RAF Rheindahlen, RAF Laarbruch, Oman, Turkey, andSardinia.

In 1980, Mick married Carole and went on to have two daugh-ters Laura and Holly. Mick reached the pinnacle of his career

when he was promoted to Warrant Officer. A proud moment forhim. He was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal and the

Pooley Sword in his last year of service.After serving thirty-seven years, Mick retired from the RAF and

became involved with village life as a Parish Councillor forBrampton. He also found new passion, the Wyton Heritage

Centre, in which he immersed himself completely and built him-self a new website ‘airrecce’.

There have been many special memories made along his jour-ney through life, but none more so than meeting new friendsand colleagues with whom he worked and socialised. Mick

spent as much time as possible, with his family and grandson,and on holidays in and outside of the UK

Mick had been a Member of the RAF Photographers Associa-tion for over 10-years and will be sadly missed by many Mem-

bers - RIP

Michael Frank Gladwin1958 - 2017

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Peter Jackson passed away on the 25th December 2016. Hejoined the RAF as a National Serviceman in 1947 at West Kirbyand was then posted to 501 Sqdn at Filton 1947-48, Peter then

went to SOP Wellesbourne Mountford in 1948 on Course 67 andthen No.32 MU St Athen until 1949 until he was demobbed.

He joined the Association in November 2011.

Peter Jackson

MEMBERS NEWS

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Message from Secretary/Gerry - To thosewho have not yet paid your Subs for 2017- you contribution is awaited - Thank you

Help – The Station Heritage Officer, Wg Cdr SteveChappell at RAF Akrotiri is working to improve the

current display in the Station Museum.

Steve is interested in any documents or images relevantto RAF Akrotiri, any era, of personal reminiscences of

your time there. He is contactable at:stevechap50@hotmail.com

If you have photographs or documents that requirescanning and you would prefer not to send them

overseas then I am happy to do that.

All material will be returned to you in a card backedenvelope, first class with a DVD of items copied.

Thanks

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MEMBERS NEWS

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2017 Reunion & AGM

13th - 14th - 15th October

Stourport Manor Hotel

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2017 Joe Oliver Photographic Award

This year's theme is BRITISH TRANSPORT.  As long asthe image is shot in these isles it can be bus, car, train,plane, glider, helicopter, paraglider, motorbike, cycle,

shank's pony, skates, boats, ships or even horseback - itdoesn't matter.  It can be taken on all types of camera

including iPod or mobile phone.  Any amount ofPhotoshopping can be employed.  As before, actual

quality will not be the main criteria but the content will bemost important.  Dramatic or amusing - it doesn't matter -

just get out there and start shooting.  Remember, lastyear's winner was shot on a compact camera in the pour-

ing rain and wiped the floor for Chris Pettman.Hope that sets things going! - Stay well - Dave

From:Dave Newham

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I had a memo with some images from IanEvens. 29th/30th – nearly the best! Ian start-ed with one but had a cycling accident theweekend before Finals, so slipped down tothe 30th. He went on to complete 26 yearsuntil he was struck down with redundancywhen the ACF trade closed.

He tells me that 543 Squadron Valiant’s wereon detachment to RAAF Butterworth in 1960and a group of photographers were sent upthere from Tengah to process the F49 film,the 543 task was a survey of Siam (nowa-days Thailand). The Tengah detachmenttravelled up by road in a Type J photo trailer.

He apologises for the image size on the ground to air images butthey were taken on slide film with a Voightlander (how posh!) bor-rowed from Stan Leeds but it probably only had a standard lens.

The air to ground shot is of the bridge on theRiver Kwai. Evidently a challenge was madein the Officers Mess to the aircrew to get thisshot, as it meant going into Burmese airspace. Next day two aircraft took photo's, onefrom high level then this one considerably low-er which sorted out that task!

I had a trawl around the Internet butthis is my best offering. Unable toread the tail number on the Valiantbut that is defiantly an Ozzie Sabre

and it looks like palms in thedistance.

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LACW Edna Birkbeck was a WAAF Air Ambulance Medical Order-ly with 233 Squadron. Edna joined the WAAF as a nursing or-derly "for excitement" in 1943. Shortly afterwards sheresponded to a call for volunteers for air ambulance duties,although she was not entirely sure what was involved. Fol-lowing training at Hendon she was posted to Blakehill Farmin February 1944 to beattached to 233 Squad-ron. During the periodleading up to D-Dayshe and her colleaguesflew on training exer-cises with the Squad-ron. As aircrew theyreceived an extra 8pence a day flyingpay, and on the daysthey flew they wereallowed an orange, twopackets of chewing gumand a barley sugar,all luxuries then.

On 12th June the nurseswere called together to be briefed by an RAF medical officeron the plans for casualty evacuation flights. Cpl Lydia Al-ford, LACW Myra Roberts and LACW Edna Birkbeck were askedto remain behind at the end of the briefing to be told thatthey would be on the first of these flights, the next day.They were issued with parachutes and Mae West life jackets.

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No Red Cross markingswere allowed on the air-craft since they would betransporting militarysupplies, including ammu-nition, on the way out. OnD-Day+7, 13th June 1944,20-year-old Edna becameone of the first threewomen to fly into thecombat zone to evacuatewounded soldiers. Onlanding back at Blakehill Farm a few hours later, the Dako-ta crews were met by 42 press correspondents representingmany British, Canadian and American newspapers. They imme-diately dubbed the WAAFs "the Flying Nightingales", a namethat was to remain with the air ambulance nurses for therest of the campaign.

By the end of June 1944, 1,092 stretcher cases and 467 sittingwounded had been evacuated by the 233 Squadron Dakotas.Edna Birkbeck flew a total of 60 casualty evacuation opera-tions from airfields in Belgium, Holland and Germany; shepersonally escorted, by air, 630 casualties from the warfront. Despite the severity of the injuries none of her pa-tients ever died on any of her flights, a fact of which shewas justly proud.

During her time atBlakehill Farm EdnaBirkbeck met FlightSergeant Glyn Morris, awireless operator fly-ing with 233 Squadron.They were married inMarch 1945, and sixmonths later she leftthe WAAF. Edna Morrispassed away in 2004.

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WE.177was the designation of arange of nuclear weapons,available for use by the UKbetween September 1966and August 1998 and it isestimated that we had

between 200 and 250 of them, I hopesomeone had a better grip on thenumbers! There were a number ofversions that could be delivered by fixedwing, rotary wing and missile, all couldbe parachute retarded. The optionsincluded boosted fission orthermonuclear weapons, there is plentyof material on these systems available atyour local library but I would thinkcarefully before Googling the subject!The WE.177 was based on the warheadfitted to the Skybolt cruise missile that wehadplanned

to procure from the Americansin the 1960’s.In modern times I have seentwo examples, at Hack GreenNuclear Bunker and RAFMarham Aviation HeritageCentre. I understand that thereare also examples at Duxford,

RAFMarham

Hack Green

Armingkeys

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- Unable to maintain a serious outlookon life follows some captions for the front cover:

> You’re right boss, if I turn the chart upside-down ourtrack is directly over Brighton!

> Now let’s just run through that again, Armament SafetySwitch to Safe____________

> NO, NO I said Vladivostok not Bloody Lostock!> We’ll meet again, don’t know where _______> That’s a lot louder than a normal 10 lb practice bomb!> Bloody hell!  Bit OTT with the old magnesium in the

photoflash cartridge weren't they!> I did mean to ask but it might have had WE177 on the

Weapons Loading Sheet.> Looks like Black Sabbath are playing at Wembley!

Cosford and Eden Camp but Imust have had my eyes closedwhen I visited those locations.Unsurprisingly there are not a lotof images on the WWW ofWE.177 installed on aircraft! Ifound an in copyright image of aa Harrier Mk 1 - Crown Copyrightbut the Canberra B(i)8 will beover 50-years ago so out of MoDcopyright. Canberra WT308 spentits working life at Farnbrough andwas last seen in 2004 dumped inthe sand dunes at FAA FireSchool, Predannack Airfield,Cornwall. The image of the Arm-ing Key is rather frightening, itseems to be identical to the brakedisk lock on my motorbike!

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,term used for the use of

a nuclear bomb, is afirst-hand insight into

life in the mid-1960s on aRAF Canberra nuclear-armed squadron in West

Germany on the frontlinein the Cold War.

Mike Brooke describes notonly the technical aspectof the aircraft and its

nuclear and conventionalroles and weapons, but also the low-level flying that wentwith the job of being ready to go to war at less than threeminutes notice. Brooke uses many amusing overtones to tell

his story of what was an extremely serious business when theworld was standing on the brink of nuclear conflict.

The English-Electric Canberra was a first generation, jet-powered light bomber manufactured in large numbers in the1950s. The Canberra could fly at a higher altitude than any

other bomber through the 1950s and due to its ability toevade early interceptors was a popular export product and

served with many nations.

Published as a paperback in 2012 it is still available for£12.99 from your local bookshop with new/used copies and

Kindle available from Amazon.

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ISSPhotography

Nikon D4

About £2k a time in the UK with morefeatures than probably could be used

in a lifetime

The International SpaceStation must be a photogra-pher’s paradise, just a totallynew view of life and our planet.From the cupola you get, Iread, an never ending view,

night and day passes by in minutes and the track of the ISS of-fers you a new view every orbit.

On-board there is a commitment to Nikon D4 cameras with arange of lenses, 28, 50-500, 400 and 800 mm being favoured.The life of a camera body in space is limited, without the protec-tion of our Earth’s atmosphere there is the bombardment of pro-tons through the camera body that ‘kills-off’ pixels in the CMOS,slowly degrading the image quality.

Tim Peake’s superbly illustrated book – Hello, is this planetEarth, with a fantastic ‘selfie’ on the front cover is available on-line and from most book shops, I got my copy from Waterstonesfor only £10. 240 pages, of mainly ‘air-to-Earth’ images withmaps and location details. Liverpool on a sunny day, Mount Etnahaving a ‘smoke’ or just looking out of the window at your ‘life-boat’ all brilliant.

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It was intended to withstand the blast of a Soviet nuclearattack. Now, a quarter of a century after the end of the ColdWar a bunker dug 6ft beneath a Norwich back garden has beengiven listed status.

The structure, whichhas just been given agrade II listing, wasbuilt in the early1980s by NoelBarrett, who stilllives at the property– though aboveground in a rathermore orthodox house.He worked as adriver at RAFSculthorpe at thetime, a role whichgave him heightened concerns about the possibility of anuclear war.

He said he did not build it out of fear, but was simplyfollowing government advice, and enjoyed the project. Thebunker, built from bricks, concrete and polythene, is coveredby about 8ft of soil, is about 30ft long and 9ft wide.The structure has an electricity generator, water supply andwaste disposal. While it has remained thankfully untested asa nuclear bunker, it has faced numerous other challengesover the years. From an initial attempt by the council to

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block it being built, to a recent encounter with two tons offallen oak tree, Mr Barrett’s building has stood strong.

“I am actually really proud of the listing,” said the 76-year-old, who before retirement ran a local fish and chip shop.“It’s an achievement that not many people acquire through

their owninitiative.Grade IIlisting meansthat it willremain as asort ofmonument. It’snot on a parwithStonehenge,but it can’tjust be pulleddown withoutconsent.”

Ministry of Defence papers from 1967 show that Sovietnuclear missiles aimed at East Anglia would have wiped outthe region. RAF and USAF bases at Coltishall, Neatishead,West Raynham, Sculthorpe, Lakenheath and Mildenhall becametargets for a threatened Soviet assault. The governmentestimated that 80pc of the population would have died. Asingle one-megaton bomb falling on Coltishall would havevaporised everything within a five-mile radius, startedfires in Norwich and created a deadly 50-mile smoke plume.

© Eastern Daily Press - 2016

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Once upon a time, verymany years ago, well in1964 a bunch of lads be-came famous and possiblemodestly rich by just vis-iting the NAAFI at RAFWyton. There was slightlymore to it than that butthe night the Hedgehop-pers played on-stage forthe Friday evening socialcould have been the startof their rise to fame. TheStation EntertainmentFund did not pay well forlive acts so the boys offered to play Wyton on the Fridayevening and then just move a few miles up the road to playat the Corn Exchange in Cambridge on the Saturday. It is notknown if they took advantage of Wyton’s overnight TransitAccommodation! The line-up that weekend consisted of: MikeTinsley, John Stewart, Alan Laud, Ray Honeybull and LesDash

The Hedgehoppers a fivepiece pop-band, part of the

(if it passedyou by, don’t write to theFlashback editor to com-plain!) of the 60’s werefour junior ranks from RAFWittering and the fifth acivilian local lad. Theirnight-out in Cambridge may

NAAFIWyton

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just have been another bash, only during the evening theymet Jonathan King, something of an aspiring impresario and‘posh-boy’ up at Cambridge. King took an interest in thegroup, added to their name and with his recordproduction skills, the following year gave HedgehoppersAnonymous their first hit - Good News Week (still availableas a download for 79p on Amazon) which reached number fivein the UK singles chart and it was good news for this famousfive, bringing them fame and a modest financial windfall,well at least enough to ‘buy yourself out’ - if allowed!.

With the demise of the Vickers Valiant postings followed anda change of line-up then gradually to being civilians. Thegroup only released five singles and Good News Week theironly hit, but that one song continued to be played as thetheme music for Good News Week, a satirical news-basedcomedy quiz television show which ran from 1996 to 2000,revived for two years from 2007.

Mike tells me that that since the break-up of the band muchhas happened in his life but he has always remained in themusic industry. His early career was spent writing songs withPeter Yellowstone for Joe Dolan and Kelly Marie, with somesuccess with "Butterfly", released on AMI. He is still writingmusic which is handled byEliot Cohen of AMI/SONYMusic based in London.

Mike was an Air Radar Fit-ter, working on navigationand bombing systems on theflight-line. After training,initially he worked on Val-iant’s at Wittering latermoving to Waddington onVulcans.

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Gatwick Aviation Museumis literally at the western end of

Gatwick’s runway and with commercialflights arriving and departing every

couple of minutes you have a realisticbackground noise to view the aircraft.

Most aircraft are housed in a shinynew building and in addition to

complete aircraft you can also see‘work in progress’ by the volunteers.

Apart from the aircraft on display youcan discover the fascinating history of

Gatwick Airport, the Worlds busiestsingle runway airport and the airlines

that defined a generation of travel pluslearn the role Gatwick played in the

second world war

Varied opening times/dates

Check before you travel

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Address: Vallance By-Ways,Lowfield Heath Road,

Charlwood, Surrey, RH6 0BT

01293 862417 or 01293 862915

eMail: office@gatwick-aviation-museum.co.ukWeb site: www.gatwick-aviation-museum.co.uk

Gatwick Aviation Museumhas a unique collection of Britishaircraft from the "golden age" of

British aircraft manufacture. Fromthe end of WWII until the 1970's

British aircraft designers producedsome of the most innovative and

advanced aircraft of the day. Frompost war to cold war the museum

clearly displays that timeline inaviation terms, In the Museum

there are examples from the majormanufacturers of this period.

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In your Canberra days doyou remember crawling downthat tunnel to access the F95in the nose, would you still fit?

For those of you who indulge incaravan/motorhome travel the

Gatwick camp site is even nearerthe runway than the Museum!

Highlight of my visit was the Mk 3Shack, complete with conductedtour but I’m saving all the excite-

ment of that for the next edition ofFlashback!

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Marshall Aerospace and Defence Group based in Cambridge iscelebrating 50 years of supporting the Royal Air Force’s fleet of24 C-130Js to meet the RAF’s immediate and long-term opera-tional capabilities, through maintenance and upgrades to improvefront line availability. The latest RAF version, C-130J is plannedto stay in-service until 2035. The C130 has been the mainstay ofthe RAF’s air transport fleet for five decades, the first aircraft en-tering service with 242 OCU at Thorney Island in August 1967.

Marshall Aerospace and Defence Group’s engineering and fleetmanagement roles have been fundamental in helping the RAFdeliver this important air transport capability. Marshalls have en-sured that the RAF’s C130 Hercules aircraft remain at the centreof the service’s global air transport capability. During the last fivedecades, Marshalls have worked on more than 90 C-130s for theRAF, performing both standard and deep maintenance, as wellas special mission modifications.

The C-130 Hercules is truly an unmatched global asset for mili-tary and commercial operators alike. As such, it requires a world-wide network of trusted partners to deliver proven fleet support.For 50 years, Marshall has been the very definition of such atrusted partner — for the Royal Air Force.

With thanks to: Oliver Drury, Director of External Communications, Marshalls.Image: Copyright – Air Team Images.com

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John you asked me about flying boats and seaplanes, somethingI have a particular interest in because my Grandfather spent mostof his working life involved with them, from 1911 right up until hisdeath in 1932 plus I was named after him.

Harry Usher started as an apprentice shipwright at the Royal Na-val Dockyard at Felixstowe in 1896, but took the option of com-pleting his apprenticeship with the Royal Navy, where he went onto join the Royal Naval Air Service, as a carpenter working on thehulls and floats of seaplanes.

He rose through the non-commissioned ranks and served aboardHMS Campania, aformer Cunard shipconverted for use as an“aircraft carrier”. Carry-ing 14 float planes,they were launchedfrom a 220 foot flightdeck with the aircrafthoisted out of the water by a crane at the end of their sortie.Campania sank in November 1918 after colliding with HMS RoyalOak and HMS Glorious during a storm in the Firth of Forth, sothat’s where all my Grandfather’s medals and woodworking toolslie to this day.

In 1918 of course the RNAS merged with the Royal Air Force andmy grandfather found himself having to wear a new coloured uni-form. Commissioned he was posted as a Flying Officer to the Ma-rine Aircraft Experimental Establishment at Felixstowe. As part ofhis duties from 1924 to 1927 he was seconded to the RAF’s HighSpeed Flight in support of the Schneider Trophy races.

From:

Stu Usher

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In late 1929, having worked on testingof the Saunders Roe and Shorts flyingboats he was head-hunted by ImperialAirways, and left the RAF. Immediatelyposted to Salonika in Greece where helooked after the engineering require-ments of transiting aircraft, later he was

posted to Alexandria in Egypt, with some time also spent at LakeGalilee, another Imperial Airways staging post.

In 1932 a Short Calcutta had to force-land off Mersa Matruh inEgypt and struck a submerged object. The pilot managed to get itashore and beach the aircraft. My grandfather headed the recov-ery team that went out from Alexandria to dorepairs on the hull, sufficient to get it back toAlex. However, it proved much more difficultthan expected and it took almost threeweeks working with his team up to theirwaists in seawater, to get the thing fixed.Sadly, during that time he contracted a liverproblem which killed him some months laterand was buried in Alexandria.

During my time in FEAF we had a visit fromthree visiting 5 Squadron Sunderland’s fromthe RNZAF in 1964 or ‘65. I was supposed tobe aboard one of the these aircraft as theydid a formation flypast along the Singapore waterfront, but I wasoff-loaded by our illustrious leader Sqdn Ldr WHP Brown, be-cause he insisted that I’d be better placed in a 66 Squadron

Belvedere, so I couldget all three Sunder-land’s in the picture.Great in theory, but wefailed to rendezvouswith them, and I neversaw them airborne! Wegot back just in time to

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see the aircraft taxying in justafter it had landed plus thereis the well-publicised photo-graph of the same aircraft‘beating-up’ Seleter runway.

During the late 70s early 80s,as part of my business trav-els I used to visit Egypt quite regularly and I was able to get up toAlexandria to find his grave, that would have probably been in1980. No-one from the family had ever been back there since hisdeath in 1932. With the assistance of the British Consul in Alex-andria, I was able to travel to the Camp Caesar English Ceme-tery, I found the grave and it was just as it had been created bymy grandmother in 1932.

20 plus years later when Erica and I returned to Alexandria byship, I again contacted the Consul and arrangements were madeto meet and travel to the Cemetery. We were collected by theConsul in his dark green Range Rover, complete with the UnionJack fluttering from the front wing and whisked through the hub-bub of Alexandria to Camp Caesar.

He had briefed me by email earlier - that the grave was now dam-aged, but the sight that greeted me was upsetting. The originalmarble scrolled moulding was gone, pinched for reuse some-

where by the locals,many graves had beensimilarly invaded.

The Consul advised thatthey had only recentlycome to know that Britainhad neverresigned responsibilityfor that cemetery, butwith the passage of theyears, they'd simply let it

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go, and only now were they trying to redress this, hence the rath-er grand welcome at the dock!

Consul couldn't have been more helpful and it was with hishelp and encouragement that I was able to have the grave re-in-stated, although not quite as grandly as the original. Mygrandmother's wording I simply carried forward from the oldheadstone and I added my personal tribute at the base.

Editor’s note: Stu Usher’s grandfather perhaps luckily, missedthe Battle of Jutland by two hours and fifteen minutes! When thesignal was sent out to deploy the Grand Fleet on the 30th May1916 for some reason it was not received by the Campania.When she eventually got to sea she was that far behind butwould have had no difficulty in closing on the Fleet. Soon afterher launch in 1892 she won the prestigious Blue Riband forcrossing the Atlantic in under 6-days, so had the speed but onher own and with the risk of U-Boats patrolling in the North Seashe was ordered to return to port.

Stu, many thanks for your input, but I have a contribution of myown - My own interest in flyingboats started when I was about 10on a school trip to Southampton, we went to see the QueenMary, which was absent, but that’s another story! We had a triparound Southampton Waterand on one of the slipwayswas a Saunders-Roe Prin-cess, the most magnificentthing I had ever seen. Moth-balled by then with enginesremoved, but a fantasticlooking craft. Fast forward35 years and a visit to Long Island to see, yes you guessed – theQueen Mary. While there a visit to the Kodak Theatre and theSpruce Goose. We were even allowed to walk through it, evenbetter than the Princess!

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In the mid-1940’s the USA waslooking for a way to transport mili-tary personnel around the world –quickly. Howard Hughes, a multi-millionaire film mogul was a patriotand funded the design and build ofan aircraft that could fulfil his Gov-ernments requirements, theHughes H-4 Hercules known as theSpruce Goose, which wasdesigned to carry 750 fullyequipped troops or two tanks.

The good news was that Hughescreated a suitable airframe the badnews was that no one had yet in-vented engines powerful enough todrive the Spruce Goose! It flewonce, with Hughes at the controls in 1947 just a few feet abovethe water but regretfully the concept was fatally flawed. Today theonly Spruce Goose built is still the largest flyingboat ever, withthe longest wingspan of any aircraft and is on display at theEvergreen Aviation & Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon.

Sunderlands in the ‘Lakes’ - In 1940, due to the bombing oftheir factory at Rochester in Kent, Shorts moved some of theirfacilities to the Lake District. A new factory was built at WhiteCross Bay on the eastshore of Lake Winder-mere with hangers,housing, hostel and aschool, mostly now longsince gone, althoughthe wooden huts (oopssorry – executive holi-day lodges!) on the sitetoday may bring memo-

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ries back for some! This locationwas well removed from air raidsand spying eyes. At its peak thefactory employed over 1500 menand women.

A domestic area named CalgarthEstate was built to house the em-ployees and families, the estatewas composed of 200 marriedquarters, separate hostels for 300single workers. Facilities included aprimary school, two shops, a can-teen, assembly hall, clubhouse,laundry, sickbay, policeman and afootball team. For those who livedin them, the houses were christened ‘Shorts Palaces’.

When Sunderland production ceased at the end of WW2 the sitewas closed and many employees moved away. Poignantly, in1945 the estate was used to house 300 child survivors of the Hol-ocaust arriving directly from the horrors of concentration camps.In 1946 the housing was taken over by the local authority and thesingle workers hostels were also converted into family homes.

By 1961 all but a very few buildings ofthis remarkable little settlement had gone.The new Lakes School was built on theland where Calgarth Estate once stood,which opened in 1965. The old estateclung on however, and some of the oldCalgarth Estate school buildings contin-ued to be used until about 1973.

For those interested in seeing a Sunder-land, there are well preserved aircraft atHendon (ML824), which you can walk

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through and Duxford (ML796). In 1976 ‘796’ was discovered liv-ing in La Baule in Brittany where it had been stripped out andturned into a discotheque and drinks club.

Both Rosemary and I have a Sunderland expe-rience, although mine is second hand. Sunder-lands were based at RAF Oban during WW2and both our stories are linked to that base. InMarch 1944 Rosemary and her mother travelledto Scotland by train to meet Flying Officer Fran-

cis (Frank) Simpson, Royal NewZealand Air Force. Prior to thewar Rosemary’s grandfatherwent to work in New Zealandwith Ted Simpson. Much laterhis son, Frank joined theRNZAF and after qualifying as a pilot he wasposted to Oban, flying Sunderlands, a trip wasorganised to visit him. Frank survived the war andwent on to fly Sunderlands for Aquila Airways upto the airlines demise in the mid 1950’s.

NDT Section, 103 MU, RAF Akrotiri, 1968, 69 & 70. We weresix, Flight Sergeant, 4 x Chief Techs and me SAC APO. F/SErnie Kohler was ex-WW2 with a chest full of real medal ribbonsand the best boss I ever had. He told me that in August 1942, asan Airframe Mech, straight out of training and while serving on228 Squadron he was part of the ‘seeing-off’ crew for the first legof the trip from Oban to Invergordon for a Sunderland that was

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flying up to Iceland, one ofthe passengers was to bethe Duke of Kent, the Kingsbrother. The aircraft neverreached Iceland but raninto a mountain in the northeast of Scotland. The rea-son for the crash has neverbeen positively establishedbut the most likely it was a

navigational error. Ernie told me that within hours of the aircraftbeing declared lost he was ‘arrested’ and placed in isolation. Af-ter being questioned a number of times over a prolonged periodhe was eventually ‘released’ but not to RAF Oban, instead takento an RAF station in England and then posted immediately toNorth Africa.

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This could be the answer to ‘ageingpersons deafness’?

Should have gone to Specsavers!

Ex-Boy? Do you rememberyour first flight at Cosford?This one is owned by the

RAF Memorial Flight, and isex-BRIXMIS.

Found this after the Lysanderfeature had gone to press,

anyone you know?

Seen in a local junk shop, I hope thisChifies retirement went better!

Brilliant photograph,regretfully this Vulcan’s

looks did not save it frombeing made into razor

blades in 1968. What didthe Fire Section think theywere going to do with that

ladder?

I still worryabout this

photograph!

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RAFPA - Minutes 2016

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RAFPA - Accounts 2016

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