Fairies and Queens and stuff....
I stand corrected then...
...but I do remember occasions on starter crew, having to sit it out in an old wooden crew hut during one those inevitable aircraft switches, while the radar fairies dashed around fitting TFR equipment from another kite before ours could do its trip. I don't mean simple 'crew-in' snags either, I'm referring to equipment shortages and the kites I was waiting to see off definitely had a pimple on their noses.
I also remember an occasion where an Air Radio Fitter was called out to a defective VHF. He was fiddling about in the racks below the pilot seats making test calls when he heard a reply from someone else saying that they couldn't raise the station either but they were receiving him OK. The snag was cleared and...
...well we've all heard of side-tone haven't we? (The incident made into Air Clues as a piece of fairy folk lore. I worked with that chap again later at Northolt, by which time he had somehow made it to Chief Magician).
Sending one off and then having it abort before reaching the runway like that was a bloody nuisance - especially when it was from one of the rear pans and you had to turn the b*gger round to face the right way again. Usually in freezing rain. Ex-Vulcan ground crew will never forget that tow-bar contraption. I reckon it was designed by the same chap who designed the Forth Railway Bridge. My hands still bear the scars of Vulcan towing duty.
On the subject of towing, we had a crew chief who acquired the nickname Chiefy 'Magoo'. It was a freezing cold and misty evening at Waddington and a B1A was due into the shed for a spot of seciond line servicing. The MPBW were ditch digging with a JCB along the eastern taxiway just opposite the bomb dump and in typical MPBW disregard for safety, left it parked with the arm in the up position. Through the mist comes 'Magoo' and his gallant towing crew, huddled down tight against the cold in the equipment well on back of the tug as usual, secure in the knowledge that the crew chief and driver were watching ahead. Except that Magoo was as blind as a bat and both his and the driver's specs were steamed up. The Vulcan lost about four feet of wing in the collision, the JCB ended up on its side and the flat spots on the tyres saved Ian the brake man's bacon at the Board of Inquiry. The aircraft became the queen of all hangar queens - a major source of spare parts for a couple of years. The Hawker Siddeley work party in Two Shed got it back out on the line just in time for 44(R) to convert to B2s and I believe that the aircraft ended up on the burning area for the firemen to play with.
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Through difficulties to the cinema