A little later, I went for lunch (I must have been a "day worker" as Supervisor). Of course, I first joined the curious crowd that now surrounded the Voodoo on the line. I'd never seen one "in the metal" before (I don't suppose many of our people had), and inspected it closely. I was shocked at the rough standard of finish (much inferior to all the other USAF aircraft I'd ever seen): it had an almost "agricultural" appearance. For all that, it was a powerful, ugly brute and (so Wiki tells me) had more than enough performance to keep up with the crowd.
A USAF Servicing Party flew in from somewhere in E. Anglia later in the afternoon, found and fixed the leak, the Voodoo was refuelled; our grateful guests departed with mutual assurances of goodwill.
It was the favourite subject of conversation at lunch in the Mess; then I strolled back to the Tower, where now the afternoon watch had taken over. Of course the incident had been related in great detail during the handover, and Tony must have voiced relief at our having escaped very possible disaster because I'd called it right when he'd asked to leave his position to see the last act in the drama. The oncoming watch were debating the lessons to be learned: the consensus being: "The thing works best when everbody sticks to his seat and does his own job". (I would not quarrel with that !)
SATCO had by now joined the "jam session" (for our Bloggses had not come back from lunch, or were still being briefed before launching into the afternoon mass assault on ATC). IIRC, SATCO had been out of the Tower before the incident, and gone back to his MQ for lunch, so he was all agog for the gory details of what had happened (and, more importantly,
might have happened). And I found myself in the unusual role of the Blue Eyed Boy (for the moment, anyway).
At close of play that day I went off for a couple of weeks (leave ?), was very busy about our own future arrangements and forgot all about it. Meanwhile "Down in the Forest, Something Stirred".
Many of us remember how the much loved "Tee Emm" of wartime was reincarnated as the "Air Clues" of peace (but W/Cdr Spry is immortal). Editorial Policy had changed in one respect. "Tee Emm" carried a monthly citation for "The Most Highly Derogatory Order of the Irremovable Digit" as the wooden spoon for the most stupid flying mistake of the month.
Now, it seemed, the carrot was deemed preferable to the stick (on the basis that you got a better result from a pat on the head than from a kick up the backside).
Accordingly, in "Air Clues", there was now a monthly "Good Show" instead. It must have been "lean pickings" on the flying side that month, for W/Cdr Spry was obliged to cast his net wider - even as far as ATC. And so it was that our rescue of the Voodoo was held up for the admiration of the multitude. Accompanied, of course, by a mugshot of the recipient(s). An offical "Air Clues" photographer turned up to do the honours. Three of the four protagonists were on hand for the line up. The fourth had swanned off on leave (and you don't want to bother a chap when he's on leave, now do you ?) SATCO was on hand to fill the gap, anyway.
And so when the real hero of the moment turned up a week or so later, and the new "Air Clues" of the month hit the newsstands, I found (to my justified indignation) that "Hamlet" had been staged without the Prince, as it were. To my indignant expostulations: "
What's your yelp ?", they said,
"There's no money in it, anyway. What would you have us do - drag you back from leave just for the photograph ?).
I nursed a sense of grievance for quite some time.
Goodnight, friends,
Danny42C.
There's no justice !
PS: Tony H was a professional standard draughtsman (might even have been his profession pre-RAF), and later presented me with an excellent line drawing of a VV, which I may reproduce on Post some day if I can (a) find it and (b) learn how to to scan and paste it. (Don't hold your breath).
What follows is rather murky, put together from unguarded snatches of conversations half overheard and odd mutterings, all of it hearsay, may be entirely false and is certainly libellous. And I do not stand by a single word of it. So for what it is worth:
He'd started as a Bloggs, must have gone a long way, for it seems that he was Third Man in a Shackelton somewhere around the North Cape one stormy night. Captain and Second Dicky had gone for their humble repast, leaving Tony to mind the store (Bad Idea). What he did, or what happened, I know not, but Skipper got back just in the nick of time to save them all from a watery grave. Clearly, Tony would be expensive as a member of the TWMR.
But a perfect candidate for ATC , and so it was ordained. (Sorry, Tony, if this should ever come to your ears, for it is a poor recompense for your generosity, but it is so long ago that I hoped you would not mind)....D.