RAF Goose Bay
Officially, Goose Bay was a 12 month unaccompanied tour. And like Gan and Salalah was seen as something of a punishment posting. My posting to Goose came about very quickly and just happened to coincide with an interview in which my boss warned me of the consequences of getting too closely involved with WRAF Officers. Even living in a cold damp houseboat on the canal in Lincoln wasn’t enough to keep things secret. (Still she was beautiful). Thus I arrived at Goose Bay on the Christmas re-supply VC10 on 22nd Dec 1969. On board with me where the wives of approx half the married men at Goose – going out to spend Christmas with those who were not able to leave.
We arrived in a total White-out and –35 Celsius. Visibility on the ramp was about 50 metres in snow and 35kt wind as we struggled to walk from the aircraft into No 1 hangar – where I was to spend almost every waking moment for the next two and a half years.
Most of the wives had dressed up to the nines to meet their husbands – but their (1960’s) ultra short mini skirts, white knee boots and silk blouses were no match for driving snow and –35 degrees. Still it looked good.
The next day, 50% of the detachment climbed aboard the VC10 to return home for Christmas. About 1 hour after they had left – I discovered that all my baggage was on it’s way back to Brize Norton. Five weeks and some 4 or 5 Brize aircraft later – I eventually got my bags.
Although Goose is cold – it is a very dry cold. You can fall in the snow and you don’t get wet. It doesn’t stick to you – you can’t make snowballs with it. It is so dry that static electricity is a major problem and people used to walk around earthing themselves on every pipe or radiator they passed. Miss a few and you are rewarded with a massive static electric shock.
My role was the maintenance and repair of all the ground equipment and vehicles (Houchin power trolleys, paloust starter trolleys etc. I was consequently involved in many of the hangar starts and other procedures described earlier in the thread.
I wonder who were the crew in the Vulcan whose starboard main wheel fell through the hangar floor – just after No 1 and 2 had started. Or the 2x crew chiefs that got distracted whilst refuelling and tipped their Vulcan’s on their tails by filling the rear tanks first? (Expensive)
Everything suffered from the cold. Particularly things made of rubber. The 3 inch thick power cables on the Houchin would shatter into 1 million pieces if dropped after a couple of hours in the open. The oleo seals on all aircraft shrunk, stiffened and in some instances cracked and fell to pieces. The Vulcan’s and Victors were not too bad compared to the Hercules. One Herc pilot was so keen to get home despite non existent oleo seals, that we ended up standing on the rear ramp pouring hydraulic fluid into the reservoir whilst he taxied from the ramp and onto the runway – with 90% of it pouring out of the wrecked oleo seals. When he was at full power and ready to release the brakes, his crew chief threw us out – and off he went. Try as we might – we never found out how he landed back at Lyneham (Gently?) We meanwhile had to clean up all the spilt fluid.
Goose has an annual carnival that was known throughout the Air Force. We would have anything up to 20 Vulcan’s, Victors Herc’s and VC10’s – all supposedly stranded at Goose during Carnival. Carnival was a straight 7 day period during which no one worked. Everyone took part in crazy competitions – and drank. Then drank, then drank some more. All the teams were focussed around one of the Drinking clubs on the airbase or in the local community. Although there was an RAF Officers and Sergeants mess – their combined membership was just 15. Therefore the Bulldog club became the focus for most RAF goings on. Especially for carnival, each club sold plastic walking canes. These were approx 3 ft long x 1.5 inches diameter with a screw top and were used to carry one’s personal supply of booze as you went from event to event. AFAIR the capacity was approximately 1 bottle of spirits. Just take of the top and have swig as and when needed.
Most of the events were highly amusing and some even tested Cockpit Resource Management to the full – e.g. strapping 5 or 10 aircrew onto a single pair of 20ft long “ski’s” – or two pilots onto one pair of snow shoes? Can you imagine starting out to build a life size ice sculpture of a sperm whale if you were sober? (80ft long 35ft tall at the flute and with 6 Eskimo hunters in kayaks). Or dressing up as an Egyptian Slave wearing nothing more than flip flops, loin cloth and fake tan cream – then prancing around an ice rink at –15-20 Celsius for over an hour. But it was fun. At least the bits I remember were fun.
The Bulldog club was officially the RAF Junior Ranks club – but was popular with all ranks – and with the local ladies. We held dances, disco’s and carnival events.
Airmen could take turns to run the bar for a one-month period. During this time you got to keep all the tips and all the profits from any extra events or services you were able to sell. In this respect, our relationship with the Vulcan crews was absolutely critical. The Vulcan panniers were always full of not just official spares – but also barrels of English Beer and delicacies such as Walls sausages, Danish Bacon, Cadbury’s Chocolate and anything else the duty bar manager thought he could turn a profit on. Fresh milk was also high on the list since we had to live off re-constituted milk. (Cows couldn’t survive the climate)
I had some secondary duties - including helping teach arctic survival. (Building snow-holes, Igloos, tree shelters – and trapping / ice fishing). I also had the dubious task of driving out onto the frozen lake to drill holes and measure the thickness of the ice. This was part of my standard duties and every week I sent a signal back to Strike HQ reporting the ice thickness at certain points on the lake. It had been calculated that if the runway was obstructed, a Vulcan could land on the ice. (Rather him than me).
I also had to maintain the electrical generators and radios at three RCAF Resource and Initiative training camps located on lakes in the wilderness approx 60nm east of Goose. In reality, these were fishing and hunting camps were senior officers used to go for a week or so’s hunting and fishing – courtesy of the taxpayer.
The climatic seasons at Goose were very exact and predictable. Summer starts April 31st – autumn starts October 1st spring starts April 1st – and summer again on April 31st. One year, we were as usual ferried out to the camps in two Chinooks of the RCAF on about 15th June – e.g. well into summer. My Chinook landed at Crooks Lake whilst the second went on to a lake some 30nm east of us. Everything seemed normal. We started the generator, got the HF radio aerial set up and established two-way comms with Goose. We cooked a meal – drank some beer and retired to bed happy and content – and in love with the great outdoors. About 0415 we were woken by the unmistakable sound of a Chinook in the hover just outside our hut - this was not part of the plan. The chap closest to the door stumbled to the door in just his Mk9 shreddies. As he opened it, he and the interior of the cabin were swamped in swirling snow blown in by the landing Chinook. The 2nd Chinook had encountered an unexpected snowstorm en route to their destination. The flew around searching for it in ever decreasing weather until the snow, approaching darkness and fuel shortage forced them to put down in a convenient clearing. Overnight the temperature had dropped to –5 or so but they did not have enough fuel to run the APU and keep warm. The crew and pax spent the night huddled together – just switching on the heaters for a few minutes every hour. At daybreak – they took off and found our site and landed (very cold, very shaken, but happy to have survived). It doesn’t end there – but a public forum is perhaps not the place to describe refuelling a Chinook from 45 gal drums of JP4 – still suspended in a cargo net beneath a hovering Chinook.
Overall Goose was just brilliant. I extended my tour 3 times before they eventually frog marched me onto a VC10 back to the UK. We had probably the highest divorce and buy out rate in the RAF. So many guys fell in love with the place, the local ladies or just the Canadian way of life and simply stayed there. Often leaving wives and family in the UK.
For me, I owned a car, a skidoo and played drums in a band with a bunch of USAF guys – and did a lot of great flying.
If you visited Goose – you will have seen 2 or 3 civilian light aircraft nestling like chick under the wings of your Vulcan? These were owned by the Goose Bay Flying Club, who, as payment, each year awarded a free flying scholarship to one member of the Detachment. I won – and our Sqn Ldr Ops (who moonlighted as CFI) taught me to fly. To my shame I can’t recall his name – and the logbooks were stolen some years ago. He was tall slim guy and a former Red Arrow – I’d love to know his name / what he is doing now. In those days I just called him Sir. Goose was relaxed, but JT’s and Sqn Ldrs were still not on first name terms. I got my Canadian PPL and for the next 2 years enjoyed some of the most enjoyable flying anywhere in the world – flying on wheels, on ski’s, on floats and amphibious floats. There was a never ending stream of people wanting to fly. When my colleagues went off on fishing & hunting trips – I would air-drop essential supplies (too heavy to carry) – particularly the beer.
I’m not sure, but I think I was the first, perhaps the only, AOC’s Pilot with the rank of Junior Technician when I took (IIRC) AVM Spotswood aerial sightseeing around the Goose Bay area whilst on an AOC’s inspection. Certainly the RAF News made a big splash about it.
There is much much more to tell, but not now. (Tales of my (5) trips in the back of a Vulcan, of crossing the North Pole in a Herc with a faulty door seal – and coming back sleeping in the British Ambassador’s official car, the entertainment in the USAF NCO and Officer clubs, of getting caught in black power riots on the USAF base, the wonderful Eskimo’s of Happy Valley and north West river, driving and crashing vehicles in the ice, forced landing on a beach, the parties in the barracks - and of the Goose Bay Search and Rescue team – and bringing back the remains of crashed pilots) Maybe I should write a book – but few would believe it.
In 1998 I flew some friends to a vintage aircraft fly in at Schaffendiest in Holland, on walking into the vast hangar with perhaps 2000 people eating lunch – when suddenly a voice is heard above the crowd “Oi Squiffy” a nickname I hadn’t heard since boarding the plane home from Goose Bay some 26 years previously. At the bar (where else) stood Alan Lovejoy another
long lost Goosite.