Spitfire Beer Haulers

[SASless]

Pardon me if I have missed a previous thread about this....but saw an email today that had this article.

Modification XXX (http://ghostgrey.gaetanmarie.com/articles/2010/Modification%20XXX/Modification%20XXX%20-%20Beer-carrying%20Spitfires.htm)

[COCL2]

I've read - or been told - somewhere that Westland did something similar with barrels of cider on Spitfires that were going direct to front-line squadrons.. Possibly a memory of something my family said when I was young.
Certainly its seems to be documented that they used barrels of cider to ballast the rear seat of contract built de Havilland bombers during WWI if they were going straight to the front line.

[Duchess_Driver]

Should that not be Modification XXXX ?

Hat, coat....

[MATELO]

Seems the NAAFI run has been going on quite a while then.

[LowObservable]

A Spitfire carrying beer...

How could you improve on that?

If the pilot was...

http://georgesjournal.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/susannah_york_battle_of_britain.jpg

...and we're done here.

[scran]

Have seen an airborne shot of a Mod XXX Spitfire


YUp - that's the pic I have SAS

[SASless]

http://ghostgrey.gaetanmarie.com/articles/2010/Modification%20XXX/Modification%20XXX%20-%20Spitfire%20with%20beer%20kegs.jpg



Hi Drag Kegs......

[PPRuNeUser0139]

.. full of low drag beer..:E

[Schiller]

There's a story about a USN squadron at Guantanamo Bay when it was still a US airbase. They were due to return to their base on the East coast. One of the big (300 gallon?) drop tanks carried on the centre line of their A4's was steam cleaned and filled with good Cuban rum at some derisory price. The fuel transfer switches were firmly wire locked off and the aircraft set off. The pilot had to stop off on the way for fuel, and to clear customs. He got back to his aircraft just in time to see the refueller screwing the top back on the tank with the cheery cry of "It was nearly full, sir, but I topped it up anyway"

[SASless]

There's a story about a USN squadron at Guantanamo Bay when it was still a US airbase.

It still is an active Naval Base and Airfield.....with a minor assigned unit that houses select guests of the US Government.

Obama only promised to close the facility.....and we know what an Obama Promise is worth!



http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/cuba/Gitmo-airport.jpg

[Doctor Cruces]

There's a phot in one of my WW2 famous person's books ( I think Johnny Johnson but I'm not certain) of a Spitfire carrying beer barrels under the wings instead of bombs.

Doc C

[Exnomad]

I do not know about under wing stores, but in 1945 my brother was employed bringing back POWs from Italy in his Lancaster. The bomb bay was filled with other goods. We had a good stock of Italian wine.
I imagine the bomb release switches were disabled.

[Rocket2]

Seem to recall a Hunter at Chivenor (before it closed the first time) had made an emergency landing at some remote airfield whilst hauling Salmon & other stuff in sterilised drop tanks from a Scottish base, apparently crash & smash folk were pretty ill when they took the tanks off after 2 weeks in the open air.
Said Hunter had to be flown with everything locked down (rumour had it that the seat was pinned too) to Brawdy after our rather hasty evacuation of Chiv :{
Not sure how much (if anything) is true as I was in a drunken haze during my 6 months there :\

[kokpit]

I knew I'd seen a painting of this in my dim and distant pass:

http://www.stenbergaa.com/stenberg/wong-friendlyord.jpg

Friendly Ordnance by Ronald Wong.

Factory Fresh Spitfire Mk IXe's make their way to the forward airfields of Normandy carrying kegs of beer. The English brewery of Heneger and Constable donated fresh beer for the troops fighting in Normandy, and someone (history does not record who) came up with the idea of strapping the beer kegs to the underwings of the Spitfires that were being shipped to the forward airfields. The troops loved the freshly delivered, cold beer, but as with all good things, the British Ministry of Revenue and Excise stepped in and notified the brewery that it was in violation of the law in that it was exporting beer without paying the taxes on it. Needless to say, this morale raising gesture was shortly terminated.

[BEagle]

...whilst hauling Salmon & other stuff in sterilised drop tanks from a Scottish base...

Machrihanish 'fish runs' were once quite common. Prawns in polythene bags were stuffed into the sabrinas for a quick trip home.

Although in the Summer of '76, one chap did a fair bit of low level on the way home, which rather ruined the plan to pop the prawns into a freezer as they were already turning rather less than fresh after their flight back to Brawdy in the summer heat...:uhoh:

[ShyTorque]

Surely it was perfectly normal, for some marks of the Spitfire, to have a single barrelled cannon on each wing?

;)

[ShyTorque]

And wasn't there a Buccaneer crew who forgot where they had loosely stowed their "duty frees" and personal kit after a detachment and then rolled the bomb door open during a departure "flypast"? :)

[surely not]

My father who was based at RAF Friston in 1944 is sitting with me reading this thread and he remembers the filling of drop tanks with beer and hanging of beer kegs from Spitfires. He also has a vague memory of the Mustang having similar modifications to allow for beer to be carried but isn't 100% certain of this.

According to him it was not at all an uncommon a practice.

It has started a flow of more stories............

[teeteringhead]

Machrihanish 'fish runs' were once quite common. .. had some live lobsters escape from one such in the back of one's Wessex once.

The "freight-deck executive" was not happy chasing them around, and I suspect some returned to the Irish Sea in free fall....

Got some lovely mackerel for free there once - the crab/lobster fishermen used them cut up as bait.

Was enjoying one for dinner in the Mess later that evening, when some one else joined the table as said to the steward:

"Mmmm, the mackerel looks good - I'll have that"

Cue aged retainer (Cecil IIRC):

"I'm sorry sir, they are for Mr Teeters and his crew and guests only ....!" :ok:

[SASless]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v320/Kristorf/JuniorsBeerRun.jpg


Found this a few minutes ago.

[BEagle]

And wasn't there a Buccaneer crew who forgot where they had loosely stowed their "duty frees" and personal kit after a detachment and then rolled the bomb door open during a departure "flypast"?

I heard that this happened at a Yorkshire FTS. The Bucc team had been briefing the baby Bloggs about their jet the previous evening, then said 'good byeee' in the time-honoured manner. Cue overnight kit etc. to depart the aircraft. But worse still, the classified 35mm slides were still being handed in by local farmers several weeks later....:uhoh:

[ex-fast-jets]

At Lossie in the late 70's, a GAF 104 arrived on one of their regular Malt Collection runs. Minibus seen transferring lots of bottles into the centreline baggage pod. Amazing how much can fit in there.

Young pilot takes off for return flight and has a major hydraulic problem - which was apparently quite serious for the 104. Correct action was to clean the wings and land asap.

Unfortunately, that model of 104 apparently did not have selective jettison, so it was all or nothing. Young lad decides this will not go down well with his mates, so elects to land with the four external fuel tanks - and the all important baggage pod - still on.

Lands fast - even for a 104, and a bit too far after the numbers. Waits for drag chute limiting speed to arrive before deploying it. Now well up the runway. Decides it is not looking good, so drops the tail hook - just after passing the upwind wire. Tries for a fast taxy off the runway, but doesn't manage the turn, and skids gracefully onto the grass where the aircraft then settled onto the baggage pod.

Later that day, a 2-seat 104 arrives, and young lad is loaded into the back.

We were told that the pilot stated that: "Ze Sqvadron Commander has some qvestions to ask him!"

Never did hear what happened to the young lad. Probably went to Lufthansa!!

[BEagle]

A phamous phighter base somewhere in Suffolk would often be visited by a Luftwaffe F-4 just before the weekend. Oddly enough, it would usually be in 3-tank fit. When asked whether they had anything to declare, there would be a clink-clink, thump-thump as 2 x bottle & 200 were duly presented by the crew. Customs would then depart, whilst the Herrenvolk stood about waiting for their mates from Cottesmore to turn up with the transport.....and an un-Dzuser.

With HM Customs safely out of sight, a panel would be un-Dzus'd from the 4000lb centreline tank and all manner of contraband would be unloaded into the transport. Including, I gather, a complete Mercedes exhaust system on one occasion. Off they would go to Cottesmore and their jet would be safely hangared.

Unfortunately this cunning little system had to stop when the RAF managed to ding the stabilator on a hangar door and the Luftwaffe squadron boss decided that enough was enough!

Very flexible, the Luftwaffe. One Tornado once appeared at Brize having flown across from the Fatherland on airways. The sole reason for the visit was so that the Brit exchange officer could do his pre-ATPL RT exam with me...:\ On another occasion, a couple of crews asked to fly to Norway for the weekend. "Why do you want to go there?", queried their boss, knowing that this part of Norway wasn't exactly at the top of the 'great places to visit' list. "We've heard about this great little fish restaurant", they told him. "OK, sounds good. Mind if I come too?", was his response...:ok:

[LowObservable]

SASLess - Don't go that high - you'll freeze the beer!

[chopd95]

Memory fades, but I am certain that there never was a routine system whence the kipper fleet lived up to it's name, and also didn't bring cornwall's finest cream to the med. Neither were crayfish tails transported from the gulf, nor did Seiko watches arrive. Must also have dreamt a herc taking a full load of beer (well Hopleaf ) to a detachment in yemen that didn't happen. as for a lorry load of indulgence freight xmas trees from a wiltsonian airfield - surely not?

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Tornado F3 ammo bay very useful for:
Fish runs from Stornoway. Docks at 5am, jet airborne at 6:30am, 30,000 ft at 6:32. Salmon in N Yorks for lunch.
Champagne Runs from Rheims. Mach 0.98 and not above 20,000 ft or there are a lot of popping noises.
Only snag was transits back to UK during the Gulf War - ammo in the ammo bay! Nice to see Ghadaffi finally got his just desserts for that inconvenience. Suffice to say you can squeeze lots of stuff into all those openable panels, and Customs didn't seem to know about them.

[Waddo Plumber]

Vulcan pannier? I seem to remember it was useful for Waddo mess functions.

[Dan Gerous]

Bomber H, I was at Lossie when that happened. Rumour was one bottle survived, and the fire section rescued that. This happened a few days before an airshow was due to take place, and the F104 was put on display along with pics of its recovery.

[teeteringhead]

A slightly connected tale concerns the vast amounts of Grolsch brought from Germany to Odiham. Bottled Grolsch - and you can get quite a bit into a Chinook. ;)

Trouble was, the Grolsch bottles had those tops which those of us of a certain age would call Kia-Ora tops - sort of hinged with wire and re-sealable.

Also v expensive so local (UK) offies were charging £1 returnable deposit on each bottle they sold. You can guess the rest ....

Cue bright idea from Odiham followed by mini-recession in the Basingstoke licensed trade.

[Dop]

I wonder if the people at Shepherd Neame could arrange to duplicate this feat?

[Rocket2]

"Vulcan pannier? I seem to remember it was useful for Waddo mess functions" For us based at Goose, the hiding place was in the the leading edges by the rapid start bottles - everything frozen on arrival including one day in early 1980 when we asked the returning crew chief to bring us a crate of gold top milk :mad: The CF customs folk were quite amused at that!

[ShyTorque]

Ah yes, the Grolsch! I might have to accept some "knowledge" regarding that one. The Gutersloh NAAFI began stocking Grolsch and we could buy a crate for the equivalent of 17p per bottle.

Very shortly afterwards we came back to Odiham for a task and went in a certain pub not far from the Basingstoke canal. Behind the bar was a bottle of the same beer, for £1.30 (!) but as Teeters said, that included a big deposit on the returnable glass bottle.

So..... silly not to....the more Grolsch drank in RAFG, the more money made on the returns in UK.

The Chinook boys got in on the game, filled the pub back yard to overflowing in very short order and the bottle bank business soon went down the toilet, along with the beer.

[Martin the Martian]

For the modellers among you, Italeri produce JE-J in 1/48th scale in bomb-truck configuration.

[Karl Bamforth]

I helped to load an F16 at Wildenrath in the early eighties.

The wing pannier was filled with bottles of various types of spirits.
During the takeoff something was seen to fall from the aircraft and it returned to land.

As it taxied it we could see that the pannier door was missing but an inventory showed that not a single bottle was missing.

On another occassion a 2 seat F16 arrived on the regular duty free run. When the crew returned to the aircraft they had a video and TV with them. Way too big for the pannier so they were unpacked on the pan. The rear seater strapped in and the video was placed on his lap followed by the tv. He could just see over the top. A quick full and free check of the controls and they departed like that.

I can only imagine the ejection procedure.
Jettison canopy, jettison tv and video, pull seat handle. All in rapid succession of course.

[Wwyvern]

Teeteringhead.

Rathlin Island was also on the fish run, as I remember.

Might you have been on an early 1970s heli detachment to the North of England whose stated intent was to inform the local populace, by way of a local newspaper advert, of the arrival of a number of "Gentlemen Aviators"?

[teeteringhead]

Wwyvern

... might have been (see left) :E I think the full description was "Gentlemen Aviators and Connoisseurs of Fine Women" but:

a. I was young and single then.
b. What happens on det ..........

longfellow has recently been in touch - I understand his rhubarb still flourishes.....:ok:

[davedrake]

It was april 1972 when the Chivenor -Macrihanish fish run ran into difficulties and the 4 x 100 gallon tanks had to go! As luck would have it, it was on the way to fill up with fish! Bill L dumped the aircraft XL576 into Llanbedr. I went with Wally W to collect it some days later. As we were ready to leave the airfield was in the process of recovering a jindivik so we were given the option of delaying or using the "short" strip. Wally opted to go! If he made it, I was in a clean jet!! Needless to say all ended well. Very, very happy days.

[Jim DeGregoria]

After Vietnam I was assigned to a USAF SQ @ Eglin AFB,FL. working on F 4 E aircraft. The mod dock was in Hill AFB ,Utah and we would rotate aircraft twice a month. At that time Coors Beer was not available on the east side of the Miss. River. Seemed to be a highdemand beer so a few of my fellow mechanics worked a plan that we'd load three converted napalm tanks on the wing pylon stations and our counter parts in Utah would cross load them to the returning Phantom. Naturally they would hold about ten cases each and when they'd arrive at Eglin they would be really cold and ready for a party. Eventually we were directed to cease this pratice.

[Arkroyal]

Ah! The Grolsch.

Teeteringhead, and Shytorque, remember well and the FAA got in on it too. The staff at Tesco in Yeovil must have wondered how they had more bottles returned than they ever sold!

On a land away to Wildenrath for the sole purpose of Grolsch taxi, a stude was tasked with working out how much we could cram in to the Wessie 5.

Most impressed with his calculations we taxyed away for a running take off which seemed to go on for ever. Finally airborne, and skirting around the Roermond chimneys, as we would struggle to get over them, said stude was belatedly quizzed about his loading calcs.

'Well I took the s.g. of the beer and multiplied it blah blah blah.'

'And the weight of the crates and bottles?'

Silence.

[Treble one]

I had a dearly departed chum who flew with the SAAF in WWII prior to taking up a commission in the RAF.

The SAAF had a daily brandy allowance (IIRC) which he said would often be hauled in modified Spitfire drop tanks between sites (in the desert in his case)...

[BATCO]

Pierre Clostermann (Free French Air Force) captions a photo in his 'Le Grande Cirque' as follows:

A clandestine operation hyper forbidden! Robson brings us a replacement Spitfire from England. He took the trouble to fill one tank (new) with 70 gallons of an excellent beer which would be welcome in the dust of Longues [an ALG]! Moreover, it would be really cold as our Canadian would have had on the way the care of flying at 6000m where it is minus 20 degrees!

page 313 of the Flammarion 'J'ai Lu' edition published in 2001. Trans by Batco

Looking at the picture (with my very untrained eyes) it seem s that 2 x kegs are being emptied into a drop tank.

A votre santé!
Batco

[Danny42C]

The Flying Brewer's Draymen !

This has been aired, about three years ago, on "Gaining a RAF Pilot's Brevet in WWII", around Page 182, #3633.

Danny.