Greenham memories
The winning Herc at the 25th anniversary was the Australian Herc which was on its delivery flight from Lockheeds to Aussie which is why it was in such good nick, a little unfair I always thought. The most poular Herc at that display was the 47 Sqn Herc as through their link with Guiness ( 47 have a Toucan as part of the Squadron badge and Guiness have long used a Toucan as part of their advertising) A place for refreshment ( BAR )was set up in the back of their aircraft open to all the Herc establishment. And how do I know this, because at the time of that show I was a Herc ground Engineer and was invited in to partake by the crew.
I helped with the IAT at Greenham from the first one where I helped another SNCO from Lyneham, Sam Salter, lay out the aircraft parking aid for the display, this consisted of a big, and I mean big, sheet of metal hung on a wall in the control room painted to scale with the runways, taxiways and dispersals to which were attached by magnets scale aircraft so the parking plan could be worked out. All very high tech but this was rather a long time ago.
After that I worked as part of an aircraft handling party for the period of the show, very interesting working with all the different aircraft operators with far too many stories to relate here, although taxying a F111 from the side of a sloping dispersal where its tail was pointed at some display tents which it promptly blew into the air as a hefty application of throttle was applied to get it moving was one of the more repeatable!
I still have the IAT tie that all the helpers were given at the end of that weekend, it was a great time , a good time was had by all.