Even more thanks all round!
(It'll have to be another scattergun reply)
500N (#2420) Thanks! My cup runneth over! This is exactly the response I hoped to provoke. Now my old "virtual" crewroom is alive again.
BEagle (#2421) Ta! - Lovely picture. I think the buildings at top left are where the old RAF flight huts were. I guess the top frame would be heading East, the left therefore North (but see reply to diesel addict below). The long run would therefore be NW/SE, which seems about right. We would have landed into NW when my little chap had his mishap, and the night flying flarepath would have been laid on this heading. I have no scale: how would 800 yards have fitted in?
Chugalug (#2422) Sorry, old chap - I wasn't trying to make any point. But I think Higher Authority was having to "play it off the cuff" all the time to suit changing circumstances, and this gave the impression of "organised chaos". This would apply to Courses and Postings above all. It was commonplace to get outcomes like mine: in a previous Post I have recorded an occasion when they (most unusually) asked me what I wanted, and then gave me the precise opposite! And I shall shortly relate how they trained me on Spitfires, then sent me out to India, where there were no Spitfires at the time. Also, when I came back in '49, they converted me on to Meteors, then posted me to a Vampire unit! This happened to everyone, so you can see how the "monkey" jest could become popular.
I think Tolstoy, in "War and Peace" (no, I didn't finish it, did anybody ever?) has a character explaining how a General starts off a battle according to plan, but then the battle develops a mind of its own and goes off increasingly out of his control, until he is just being dragged helplessly along by events.
(This recalls the apocryphal story of the flying instructor, who is supposed to have summarised a report on a pupil as follows: "This young man opens the throttle on take-off, and initiates a series of events over which he exercises no further control!")
Re scrap metal: I heard that the Vickers Valiant carcasses (minus engines, all electronics and instruments) went for £75 apiece. Don't know if it's true.
diesel addict (#2423), and Chugalug (#2424), Love the LP - Jolly good! You're from Wiltshire, d_ a, I see. Can I ask you, please, to confirm my orientation of Castle Combe from your OS Landranger map? and the rough dimensions? - if it's no trouble.
My sincere thanks to you all,
Danny42C
Last edited by Danny42C; 17th Mar 2012 at 04:52.