I thought the suspect guilty for several reasons. The testimony of the loadmaster who reported him I respected as I believed that what he saw was indeed a deliberate interference with the controls.
When we used to sit in the crewroom the suspect used to tell amusing stories of his experiences . The problem with this was that a great majority of these stories were either untrue or had happened to other people. I had served with him before and had heard the originals from others.
The clincher for me was his attitude when he was grounded. As I have mentioned before he seemed to delight in his 'fame' and made no attempt to challenge the system. He even wrote an article for the station magazine entitled 'Hydraulic 'X' ('X' = his christian name) !
If I had been accused as he was I would have asked to see the AOC and if that did not work then I would have initiated Redress of Grievance action. This cannot be ignored and it would have forced the system to come to a timely decision.
The other question of course is why did he do it ?
Yes he had some very nice unscheduled stops (Bali for a week for example) but I thought then, and time has only reinforced my belief, that he liked (needed ?) to be the centre of attention. Hence the crewroom tales etc.
Once these had grown stale he generated his own by the actions already mentioned. Once he started I think it became an addiction he could not kick.
That is the story to the best of my recollection from the events of 1971, an awfully long time ago.
Thank you for respecting my request in regard of questions until I had finished. I am now open for questions comments etc.
I know we have had this pic before but it puts some flesh on the bare bones of my story. Anyway I do like it and it somehow helped jog my memory.