Yankee Whisky (your #306),
Thank you for awakening old memories of a (too) exciting time! I did my Meteor conversion at Driffied (No.1 Short Course) in February '50, and a refresher at Weston Zoyland in November '54. Completed Course, then permanently grounded by CMB - sad story on "Pilot's Brevet" (p.196 #3901). Stayed at Weston until March '55.
Now for the nitty-gritty:
f11367c29261da620e61 (#267),
...On completion of my ground tour I also went through the Meteor Refresher. My instructor (Fg Off Lamont) had been a student of mine when I was instructing at CFS...
BEagle (#270),
...My instructor (Fg Off Lamont) had been a student of mine when I was instructing at CFS.
f11367c29261da620e61, if that's the Colin Lamont who later flew the Meteor T7 with the Vintage Pair, his final RAF years were as the DCFI and IRE at the University of London Air Squadron. He then became an Oxfordshire County Councillor for Harwell, before retiring finally in 2009...
Germander (#272),
...I have just reincarnated myself to this user name, as my rather inept initial registration landed me with an unintelligible string of characters. (Starting with f11367c2926 etc.)
My instructor at the School of Refresher Flying at Stubby was Colin Lamont. however I have no record of what he got up to after I left...
P2 Lamont was my instructor (on Harvards) at Finningley when I came back in in summer '49. Nice chap - almost certainly the same man.
Green Flash (#284),
...Somewhen before 1959 my father witnessed a Meteor accident near York. He lived south of York airfield and his attention was drawn one day to the sound of a jet aircraft above the overcast. A Meteor appeared, diving vertically at what appeared to be full throttle and went in with a terrific bang next to a railway line...
I would hazard a guess that the three-needle altimeter had claimed another victim.
A2QFI (#291),
...Don't forget the decoding of the PUNDIT beacons!...
A wartime tale (Tee Emm ?) told of a character who came upon a Pundit one dark night, orbited it a couple of times waiting for the ident - and then realised it was his port wingtip light !
alecoc (#277),
...Secondly, the double fatality night at Westonzoyland, where I was flying myself...
Dennis Kenyon (#304), for
Alecoc,
...Having just joined the associated thread on: ... see ... 'The Night it Rained Meteors,' I'd like to make contact with Alecoc as I was also flying that night of Feb12th 1954 when FOs Tilley & Fry were lost along with three Meteor aircraft. Sadly one surviving pilot of that night was lost a few days later over the River Severn.
I'm the guy who managed to force land a Mk7 alongside the blocked runway in fog conditions and as mentioned on the other post, I've been asked to write an article about that occurrence at Weston Zoyland...
For a (grimly amusing) take on the aftermath of that night, read my Posts (on "Pilot's Brevet", p.197 #3931 and #3939.
But they were great days !
Danny42C.