Aeroplane – June 2018

AEROPLANE JULY 2018 http://www.aeroplanemonthly.com 23

Skywriters

Lightning bolt

Thank you for the article on

No 111 Squadron and its

Lightnings in the last

magazine. I distinctly

remember their display at the

Biggin Hill Battle of Britain

Day in 1965. The reason for

this particular display being

so clearly etched in my then

16-year-old mind was the

part following either a

‘bomb-burst’ or ‘Prince of

Wales feathers’ manoeuvre,

which resulted in Lightnings

being dispersed around the

sky. They could be seen

re-forming north of the

airfield and the crowd

remained focused on them.

What none of us realised was

that two Lightnings had

sneaked round to the south

at low level. They came up

the valley unnoticed and

along the front of the crowd

line, possibly 100ft or so

offset and at maybe 200ft

above the ground. I suspect

they were on reheat as I can

still picture twin blue flames

coming from the jet pipes.

The tremendous and

unexpected noise was like

being hit on the head with a

sledgehammer. That’s why I

remember it so well. I

somehow doubt such a

manoeuvre would be

allowed in this day and age.

The RAF would be sued for

inducing half a dozen cardiac

arrests at the very least. It

certainly impressed me!

David Weekes 

From Baghdad by flying boat

Having read the Flight Line

column in the January 2018

issue describing the

fascination of flying boats, it

brought back memories of a

flight I had in early 1945. My

mother, sister and I were

returning from Iraq to the UK,

and the first part of our

journey was to be on a flying

boat.

Our journey started on

Lake Habbaniya, 60 miles

west of Baghdad, in a BOAC

Short flying boat (type not

confirmed). The take-off was

interesting. Someone had not

closed the main passenger

door properly and a certain

amount of water entered the

cabin, causing some anxiety

among the passengers. The

flight path virtually followed

the oil pipeline to Jordan

over the desert and was

flown at fairly low level,

making it somewhat

turbulent. Aged eight, I

suffered severe air-sickness.

To this day my dear sister

insists that I turned a delicate

shade of green! We duly

landed on the Dead Sea for

refuelling, lunch and a swim

in the famous waters. Then

we were off again, this time

landing on the Nile in the

middle of Cairo in time for

tea. Altogether an epic flight.

Two years ago I had the

pleasure of meeting Willie

Lock, a retired BOAC/British

Airways captain, who flew

flying boats during the

Second World War. He was

fairly sure that he was the

captain on my memorable

BOAC trip.

Torquil George,

Somersham, Suffolk

remember seeing the Dutch

islands at the edge of the tube.

The usual procedure was

that, having been allocated a

target, contacted the fighters

and identified them on the

control PPI, we then had to

make a very rapid mental plan

based on the positions, heights

and speeds of both parties,

aimed at bringing them

together in an acceptable

location with the fighters in a

good tactical position to attack.

With day fighters, ideally this

meant them being in visual

contact and comfortably above

the target, up-sun, with enough

room to make any necessary

turn onto the target but

without getting into a long

tailchase. Apart from heights

from the cabin crew there were

no external aids: we had to do

it just by visual estimation. On

a good, clear day we might get

a ‘Tally ho’ from the fighters at

as much as 10 miles from the

target, but obviously in poor

visibility it would be less.

With night fighters the

optimum final approach was

very different. The fighter

needed to stalk the target from

about a mile behind and 500ft

below with a very slow

overtaking speed to give the

navigator time to get his own

good radar contact and take

over direction of the pilot, who

in turn would get the eventual

visual contact, ideally with the

target silhouetted against the

moon glow or stars. The night

fighters for Eastern Sector were

No 23 Squadron with Vampire

NF10s and No 141 Squadron

with Meteor NF11s, both

based at Coltishall and both, I

think, using AI Mk10. The final

stages of the interception

generally needed more precise

control than the day

equivalent, the call ‘Judy’ when

the navigator took over often

coming at a range of only a

mile. The GCI personnel also

lived at Coltishall and we often

had informal debriefings with

the aircrew in the bar.

It is obvious from the above

that we had ample scope to

get it wrong. We tried to

minimise this by constant

practice with the sector’s

fighters and bomber affiliations

whenever we got the chance

— plus, of course, real bogies.

As far as material deficiencies

went, the Type 7 itself needed

replacement. Beyond the

foregoing, its quite wide

beamwidth produced

elongated blips. At best they

were like thin, crescent-shaped

arcs and we had to estimate

the actual target position as

half-way along and on the

inside edge but many of the

cathode ray tubes, including

new replacements, turned out

to be soft with blips more like

woolly bananas. The other

general deficiency that I

remember was in height-

finding. The Type 7’s method

was crude and unreliable

— certainly inadequate for

night interceptions. We did

have another option, and an

accurate one: the Type 13

‘nodding donkey’. This was like

the Type 14 turned on its end

and driven to sweep up and

down through 20° or so. It

could be steered in azimuth by

selected remote control. Any

targets on the aimed bearing

appeared as blips on an

elevation display, at ranges

corresponding to those on a

PPI. I think we had two of them

at Neatishead, but each could

only be controlled by one

cabin at a time, and the crew

there had to carefully track

each target if its bearing was

changing rapidly because of a

necessarily narrow beamwidth.

For users of the Type 14 they

were the only option, and since

Neatishead was a reporting

station as well as a GCI there

was further competition for the

Type 13s.

One final gem from ‘Ardent’:

a Canberra pilot related how

he had opened his throttles

dramatically to out-climb some

Meteors, only to surge both his

engines. He then had to glide

down sedately to 25,000ft

before he could relight them,

surrounded by Meteors

gleefully shooting off camera

gun or GSAP film. The early

Avons were not the most stable

of engines.

Dick Guntrip, Helston,

Cornwall

The editor reserves the right to edit all letters. Please include your full name and address in correspondence.

The view from a Short Solent, a type used slightly later than

Torquil George’s BOAC trip. AEROPLANE

22-23_AM_Skywriters_July18_cc C.indd 23 04/06/2018 12:45