The passing of an incredibly brave pilot.

[Centaurus]

Reading today's Melbourne `Age`newspaper and turned to the Obituaries page (as one does at my age). One was about a former Royal Air Force pilot and medico age 93 who died in England this month. He was Air Marshal Sir Geoffrey Dhenin.

What caught my eye was the story of him flying a Canberra bomber through the mushroom clouds of atomic bomb tests to gather radiation samples. For those who have never flown a Canberra it is a twin jet-engine bomber operated by a single pilot. It does not have an automatic pilot, nor a flight director and has only one artificial horizon and it can operate over 50,000 ft. Imagine hand flying IMC at that altitude. Lose the one and only AH and you are on limited panel with a vengeance. It's all about good training.
Here are a couple of edited extracts from his exploits:

In 1953 Britain undertook two atomic bomb test firings in the Australian desert at Maralinga 500 kms north of Woomera. When the first weapon detonated on Octover 13, Dhenin was already airborne in a Canberra at 30,000 ft. As soon as the mushroom cloud developed he turned towards it and placed a wing tip with sensor attached into the cloud to obtain radiation readings.

Using special instruments his observer calculated the probable dose rate. Once assured the rate "would not be suicidal", Dhenin turned for the centre of the mushroom cloud.

It was dark inside the cloud and the aircraft buffeted dramatically, but Dhenin was able to maintain control. The transit was successfully completed and he made two further passes through the cloud, one through the top and one through the base, before returning to Woomera. It was the first time that an aircraft had flown through a mushroom cloud.

The sortie ended for him and his crew with an ice-cold shower and a change of clothing. He later remarked "We have seen Dante's Inferno".

In 1957 he flew an RAF Canberra to Christmas Island in the Central Pacific to obtain samples from a nucleur explosion. He flew through that cloud at 50,000 ft to obtain radiation samples. Again - no autopilot and just raw data.
You need superb pure flying skills to do that.

During WW2 he served as a junior medical doctor on bomber stations in England. One night a Lancaster crashed near its airfield on return from a raid over Germany. Dhenin was immeditely on the scene to find the injured rear gunner trapped in his crushed turret. Although there was a high explosive bomb in the blazing wreckage, Dhenin administered medical aid as he and another airman tried to release the man.

For 30 minutes they worked in the intense heat before a crane arrived to lift the wreckage. Dhenin then crawled under the raised wreckage and released the gunner, one of only two survivors of the seven-man crew.
............................................................ ...

I reflected on the immense bravery of the man and the skill of his flying a Canberra bomber through atomic clouds. Those were clouds infinately more dangerous than a Cu Nimb because of the tremendous heat inside the cloud and associated turbulence. Then I came home and switched on to Pprune and the first thing to hit me on the Oz forum was all gloom and doom and strike threats from Jetstar and Qantas pilots and I thought it would be a good idea to change the subject and write the story above. It's all relative, isn't it?

[ampclamp]

Thanks for recount. Great story great bloke.:ok:

[Union Jack]

Well done and well said, Centaurus!:ok:

A little more here for those who are interested:http://www.pprune.org/aviation-history-nostalgia/451351-air-marshal-sir-geoffrey-dhenin-obit.html

Jack

[TIMA9X]

Yes, thanks for the story.
God bless this special aviator. My thought's go out to the family as well. RIP

[aussie027]

Thanks Centaurus.

Always a privelege to read the stories/bios of another great brave aviator.

The stories of the many who gave so much in wars past, who survived so many incredible things and went on to live long lives is amazing.

I was reading about 1 of them just this morning, he is still with us, Col George "Bud" Day, only recipient ever of the Medal of Honor and the Air Force Cross as well as the Silver Star ( The 3 highest US awards for bravery ). He is often cited as being the most decorated U.S. service member since General (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_of_the_Army) Douglas MacArthur (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_MacArthur), having received some seventy decorations, a majority for actions in combat.
He survived a NO CHUTE ejection at low level from his fighter bomber in 1955!!! He was still strapped into his seat as it went into the trees!!!

He then went on to do pioneering fast FAC work in Vietnam, was shot down, tortured etc for yrs in the Hanoi Hilton alongside John McCain et al.

Bud Day - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bud_Day)
George "Bud" Day - Conservapedia (http://www.conservapedia.com/George_%22Bud%22_Day)
Portrait of Valor (http://www.military.com/NewContent/0,13190,MoH_George_Day,00.html)
A true "Hero" in every way.
:ok:

[Centaurus]

This from a friend of mine. We were on the same RAAF pilots course all those years ago.

Well Centaurus. - your story is gripping in recognition of the bravery of the pilot and crew (records I have indicate that the crew members of the RAF Canberra were Wing Commander Dhenin, and Group Captains Wilson & Anderson (all RAF). Wg Cdr G Dhenin was the pilot, Grp Capt D Wilson was an RAF Specialist in Radiology (initiator of the flight trial - probably flying as an observer), and Grp Capt Anderson was the navigator). Of course the three of them were 'Flying Guinea Pigs'!
Points of correction and interest:
1. I witnessed Totem 1 from 14 miles away as one of the official observers, (Note: It was "Totem 1" not "Hurricane" - which was the name of the first Monte Bello tests),
2. It was at Emu claypan (original name 'Dingo', not Maralinga (we hadn't even surveyed where Maralinga was going to be at that stage - that is another story),
3. To us it was always referred to as X-200 (very hush hush),
4. It was the 15th October, not the 13th
5. I watched the Canberra fly through the cloud and thought what brave bastards they are!
6. See the attached photo and the stamp/writing on the back, autographed by Sir William Penney, UK Chief Scientist and Mr C A Adams, UK Scientific Superintendent. (just a little showing-off here - although the autograph by Sir William Penney has me as Sgt Scaife, in fact I had been commissioned as Pilot Officer as from 1 October, but the RAAF hadn't got around to telling me!
7. When flying the Press back to Adelaide about an hour after the explosion we flew over the detonation site on the climb out in Bristol
A81-4, and all you could see was a very large cicle of blackened devastation!
8. I have a photo-copy of relevant pages of a report entitled "A History of British Atomic Tests in Australia" by Dr J L Symonds, Consultant, Nijelo Pty Ltd, April 1985, which contains a wealth of information, including our Bristol & York flying and the air sampling by RAAF Lincolns and Dakotas.
Regards
Roy
PS Perhaps I should join to contribute to PPRuNe - how do I do that?

[Shrike135]

Thank you for that Centaurus.

[Fantome]

There were very few doctor pilots in the RAF. Air Marshal Sir Geoffrey Dhenin was certainly one of note, whose career we now know something of, thanks to the wide net cast by Centaurus. Another was a former Director General of Medical Services in the RAF, Sir Philip Livingston. His book Fringe of the Clouds is well worth the search, as it tells in his own words the story of the life of this exceptionally talented man.

One of his obituaries reads -

Air Marshal Sir Philip Clermont Livingston, KBE, CB, AFC, FRCS

Air Marshal Sir Philip Clermont Livingston, known to all his friends as P.C., died on 13 February 1982 at his home in Canada at the age of 88. He was an outstanding individual - not only because of his splendid physique but because he was endowed with a personality that was at once individual, attractive, kind, sympathetic, and above all enthusiastic.

Born in Vancouver on 2 March 1893 of British parents, he came to the UK on the death of his father and became an undergraduate at Jesus College, Cambridge, where in 1914 he gained a rowing blue. He rowed number 3 in the winning Cambridge University crew in March 1914. After passing his second MB he joined the RNVR, and from 1914 to 1917 served as surgeon-probationer on torpedo boat destroyers and armoured cruisers.

After qualifying at the London Hospital he elected in May 1919 to join the medical branch of the then embryonic Royal Air Force and proceeded, with foresight, to take the diploma of public health followed by qualifications in ophthalmic medicine and surgery and the FRCS of Edinburgh. He was later elected a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

In 1929 he was posted to Iraq as General Surgeon in the RAF, and while there he gained wide experience at the Royal Baghdad Eye Hospital, at the same time learning to fly and gaining his Wings. He then began to study the effect of sun glare on flying personnel in Iraq.

In 1934 he was appointed consultant in ophthalmology and he remained consultant until 1947. In 1937 he made a tour of medical establishments in Germany used for the selection of future German air force pilots. It was a result of this visit that the then inferior flying equipment of the RAF was redesigned, and apparatus for evaluating the physiological needs of pilot and air crew was constructed. The 22 feet long low-pressure chamber, the human centrifuge, the depth perception and night vision apparatus, and the redesign of RAF goggles are some examples of his drive and foresight.

He regularly attended the Congresses of the Ophthalmic Society of the United Kingdom and gave some interesting papers, including 'Heterophoria in aviation, its significance and treatment', in 1941 and 'Ocular disturbances associated with malnutrition' in 1948.

All this is admirably summed up in an appreciation which appeared in The Aeroplane:

'Livingston, who was a Specialist in Ophthalmology to the
RAF during the War, perhaps because of his personal
experience of a pilot's needs, was better able than most
specialists to appreciate the limitations of the consulting
room. His deep knowledge of human nature, coupled with
his ophthalmic skill and long acquaintance with aviation,
allowed him in passing men for flying duties in the RAF
to offset optical infirmities by flying experience and
courage. Many pilots, well below the accepted standards
of vision, owe their flying careers to Sir Philip's
perspicacity.'

He was appointed Deputy Director General of Medical Services (RAF) in 1947 and was promoted to the post of Director General one year later. He held this appointment until he retired in 1951. His honours and awards included the OBE in 1938, the AFC in 1942, the CBE in in 1946 and in the same year also the Medal of Merit (Czechoslovakia), the CB in 1948, and the KBE in 1950. He was honorary surgeon to the King from 1948 to 1950 and was a Commander of the Order of St John. He won the Chadwick Prize and Gold Medal for research and he gave the Montgomery, Moynihan, and Chadwick lectures in 1942-45. On retirement he returned to Vancouver Island, where he continued to practise ophthalmology and where he wrote an interesting autobiography entitled Fringe of the Clouds (1962).

He was married in 1920 to Lorna Muriel, only daughter of CW Legassicke Crispin, of London. He is survived by his widow and one of his two sons.

T. Keith Lyle, in The Journal of Ophthalmology, July 1982.


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If any PPRuNer can find an obit for Dr Matthew Banks, an Australian
plastic surgeon who worked with Sir Archibald MacIndoe, attained in the War his RAF Wings, and later flew his Miles Gemini far and wide throughout Europe and the Middle East, working as a plastic surgeon for the rich and notable, I'd be most interested to read a copy. Dr Banks' biography (No Man Despairs) was written by Alan Mitchell, who also wrote one on Neville Duke.

[Wander00]

Two small points - last year stopped at a small airfield in western France to look at an airworthy Flamant kept there. French guy spoke to me asking if he could be of assistance. Then went on to ask if I had been in the RAF and did I by any chance know his former Father in Law, Geoff Dhenin - was a bit surprised that I had known him , when he was at RAFH Ely in the 70s.
Other point was, there was a gp capt medic as SMO at Cranwell in the early to mid 60s who was also a pilot, but cannot remember his name. Strangely met his mother once- she was working at Robert Sayle (John Lewis) in Cambridge.

[DeRated]

I note that Post #6 was from Roy Scaife, a recent Vale by Centaurus.

[allthecoolnamesarego]

Centaurus,

Thanks for posting that wonderful story. I had not heard the story in detail before, being only vaguely aware. It is important that we remember our past, thanks for helping us do so.

[gerry111]

Centaurus's posts are always most enjoyable and a refreshing change. I note his rather interesting story about Air Nauru in the current (RAAF) Radschool Association Magazine on pg 16.


The Canberras sure didn't have an autopilot but they did have that wonderful (?) Doppler Navigation System known as Green Satin. I remember that was still being taught at Radschool at Laverton when I was there in the mid to late 1970's.

[mikedreamer787]

Very good contribution and well written Centaurus. Thanks.