Where Are They Now?Please feel free to post contact information here if you are looking for long lost friends or trying to find out what has happened to colleagues. Obituaries and condolences can be posted here too.
Well that's a few then. Don't book Hamble in Hampshire. It is not there anymore, Maybe Hamsters do not like to be remembered as Hamsters. Funny lot anyway. Looked the same, talked the same, all wanted to go to BOAC but few did. Wound up as Navs anyway. Best re-union would be Course 230 South Cerney. Boy, what a thread. Perth, Oxford, Prestwick,Carlisle....Geeees..not in the same league.
Not quite true mate. I have heard them called the Hamble Mafia. And then again I have a quaint Sarfend accent and did managed to do both corps sans flight nav ticket before I quit! And whats this about cerney? Is that the hillside where one of the locals found it necessary to carve his figure into the hillside and exaggerate the size of his penis cause he felt so inadequate? Wasn't you was it? Sorry folks thought cerney man was cerne Abbas man....an innocent mistake for a blind navigator...
Last edited by blind pew; 28th Feb 2013 at 07:05.
Reason: Cerney
Just been reading your various postings on Prune. Odd, to say the least. You appear more suited, if I may say so, to 'Twitter', with its short one-liners.
Regarding South Cerney - being rather more youthful than you, I went to Church Fenton, where my course-mates and I spent happy weeks in the middle of the worst winter Yorkshire had seen in years. I understand that South Cerney is in the nice warm south of the country. Lucky you.
Further, having been through both the RAF system, and Hamble (the RAF was going to make me a military airline pilot without the pay or the girls, so I told 'em to shove it), I must inform you that I was surprised at how very, very much more demanding and professional Hamble was compared to the RAF, who seemed to think all that was needed for one to be a 'good egg' was to hold one's beer and laugh at the jokes of anyone with more rings on his sleeve than you.
One should not criticise what one has no knowledge of.
Well that's a few then. Don't book Hamble in Hampshire. It is not there anymore, Maybe Hamsters do not like to be remembered as Hamsters. Funny lot anyway. Looked the same, talked the same, all wanted to go to BOAC but few did. Wound up as Navs anyway. Best re-union would be Course 230 South Cerney. Boy, what a thread. Perth, Oxford, Prestwick,Carlisle....Geeees..not in the same league.
Speaking as one from Course 692 I can assure you Landflap that we were very definitely all individuals and to say we all wanted to go to BOAC is rubbish.
It's a pity a training centre of excellence like Hamble is no longer around these days as many airlines are now discovering.
Last edited by fireflybob; 27th Feb 2013 at 12:44.
Yes I'm an individual too and so is my mate if I allow him to say so.... And you missed out choosing BEA Bob. Would agree wiv you re no more establishments like HA...just let down by the subsequent training est. after I left.
You need only read the 'Military' section of Prune to appreciate the military mindset. Endless posts regarding medals - just for 'being there'.
I remember the voluntary operations into and out of Belfast, when the IRA were boasting of using a Sam against our Trident aircraft. We volunteers spent the whole bloody roster flying weird erratic approaches into BFS, and even odder departures. For a year or so.
There was a bomb on a T3 which malfunctioned.
I was P3 on a BFS-LHR with a specific bomb alert.
Medals? Of course not. We just got on with the job.
The sheer number of ego-posts on the 'Military' site is staggering. All, I may add, contrary to my own experience of ex-RAF pilots. Some were very good indeed, but many were dysfunctional in a co-operative crew operation.
My impression of the Army is of self-effacing professionals. The RAF people need a serious anti-ego drug. Sorry, guys, you're good; but nowhere near as good as you think you are.
And I can assure you - most of you would not have survived the 50% chop-rate at Hamble.
Those of us who were so fortunate to be able to attend the British Airways flight training courses at that time and, thankfully, could start and continue a flying career, should be eternally grateful for such opportunity, and not cast nasturtiums. What about a combined reunion of all BOAC/BEA student pilots from that mainly happy time? The coming oil crisis almost halted us in our tracks. Does anyone have a copy of that BOAC/BEA information document for would be trainee pilots issued a few years before that time? It was named "Flight Plan" and told about pilots' lives from preflight preparation, take off, climb, cruise, descent and landing. Metaphorical for a pilot's career. I read it how many times and it became my dream. I did not keep a copy and would love to see it again. We have to remember.
Last edited by Bueno Hombre; 26th Mar 2013 at 10:39.
Don't have one but bought a couple of Hamble DVDs a couple of years ago when I attended a reunion in Hamble. Titles are airline pilot and all in a days flying. One featured Johnny Morris who used to present Animal Magic and featured cadets as well as a father flying the Iron duck and a bit of a poncy (in my view) SFO flying the gripper. Think it was made in 1969. Last night I attended an excellent lecture at Howth sailing club by an ex chief pilot - hamster from 67?. Incredible character and a pity that BEA never had anyone of his abilities. (might not have resigned!).
Nah, just made handling easier on brutes like Viscounts,Vanguards & Argosies. Bit poncy in the jet-world. Anyway, before threatening Mod shuts us down, back to thread. Aaaaaah, this is more like it. HAMBLE RE-UNION. My point was that in this fabbo page of "Where Are They Now?", lies a great read."Course 230". I was hoping for something similar from the Hamsters. You know, loadsa photos, names, fun times etc. reminding all of us, lucky enough to have trained in those times, of the College's background and success. But, oh, here I go again; of the "50% chop rate"; something wrong with the Selection then , eh ? I was on the Selection Board of my Company & if we had a 50% failure rate out of the people we passed through selection, lots of questions would have been asked by the Accountants. Remember the start point if you were 'selected' for selection ? It was an Essay requirement entitled " Why I Want To Be An Airline Pilot". I wrote ' Well, it is the only job where you get free transport from pub to pub'. Had a lot of explaining to do at subsequent interviews..................C'mon Hamsters....LAUGH ! And get those photos & memories to us ! Or as Frankie Howard would have said; "Oh Pleeze yourselves !" !
Just to put you right, and remind you of the historical perspective: in 1971 BOAC decided that they did not need any further graduates from Hamble. BEA only wanted the numbers they had previously advised. Ergo, Hamble had between 30-50 percent too many 'undergrads'.
That was when the chop-rate went through the hangar roof! The Powers That Be have always denied it, but it was clearly a way of solving a manpower problem without cost to either Corporation.
Almost all of the pilots chopped from my course went on to have successful (and in a couple of cases downright distinguished) careers as airline pilots. They were chopped for the most absurd reasons.
You can see, therefore, that there was indeed nothing wrong with the selection procedure. It's a shame, really, because the Corporation politics put everyone under a strain at the time - most of all, probably, the Hamble instructors (who were a great bunch of guys). The collapse of demand for graduating Hamsters resulted in me being a night-watchman for many months (I didn't qualify for 'the Dole'!), and a subsequent long and bitter legal action between thirteen Hamble graduates and BEA.
History lesson over
Last edited by Aileron Drag; 2nd Apr 2013 at 10:07.
Land flap perhaps aileron drag might republish his P*** take of terminal four...now that would be a larf. Around our time there was a night rally on the airfield without lights - ended up with a "borrowed" hot wired mini crashing into the DF caravan. A guards push bike placed on a very high roof and the painting of bishops Waltham? Gasometer... Plus the normal bun fights, explosive devices and removing branches from undercarts. But we had to be very careful because of the chopping policy which was denied then and also from the last CFI two years ago "didn't happen old chap" - utter rollocks.
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Hamble Memories
