Then there was the 1985? Great Lossiemouth Bombing Competition.
Somebody got the Mess to buy a new piano.
Obvious suggestion - let's have a party and burn the old one. Staish said no, let's put it on Tain Range and blow it to bits.
The competition was announced and published and everybody started practising (remember this predates laser aiming systems, and anything within 40 ft was considered a DH).
A set of rules was written, which included such gems as:
(x) nobody may fly more than 2 types (Lossie at the time hosted 5 Types and 3 additional Marks)
(x+1) except the Station Commander.
Came the day, and 202 Sqn underslung the piano onto Tain. The padre was installed in the tower as a neutral and honest referee. Opening shot - 202 went round and dropped a dummy, which missed. Padre's comments unprintable as the "body" fell to earth.
EVERYBODY who could fly found some sort of a weapons system to throw at the piano. The Staish had a go in a Bucc, and missed. He came back in a Jag, and missed with the bombs. Then said "no-one else is allowed to do this", and strafed firing out in one pass - and missed. The video shows the shells either side of the piano. Someone on the Hunters, in honour of all the times they'd pigs'd the switches, got clearance to dispose of a couple of jugs at the piano. They turned up, pigs'd the switches yet again and left them 6 0'clock at 4000.
The Shackletons had a go with a load of 1.75 flares, and missed. The Rapier Sqn were defeated by the rule that said min height 100 ft min spd 100 kts. They did ask 202 if it was possible to undersling a live FU - the technical answer is yes, but someone realised the limits of common sense.
Then 202 turned up, with the advantages of radar height hold, a doppler groundspeed computer, a drift indicator and a chinagraph line on the windscreen. One carefully timed boot later out the door and the piano was a fetching shade of yellow from a 5-gallon drum half full of Aunty Betty's finest canary acrylic.
Nobody else scored a DH, though the whole process, which lasted about 6 weeks, did wonders for wpn accuracy across all the sqns. After the event, the still-intact but conspicuous piano was spirited off against the next occasion that Lossie needed a serious morale raiser (has anyone seen it it since?). The trophy (a small model piano with a projectile sticking in it) can still be inspected at D Flt 202 Sqn.
If anyone has the video (which was seriously mates in confidence at the time) I would love to see a copy.
Sven
Mad scientist to D Flt 202 (Bomber!) Sqn