NigG,
...only to find the text has disappeared on my return. Humph!...
I (and many others) have been caught by this malign gremlin which infests PPRuNePad. Clearly an evil intelligence is at work, for he always waits till you have almost finished before doing the dirty on you. Solution: always draft somewhere else (I use NotePad) where it should be safe, and then copy/paste onto PPRuNePad.
But beware: foiled in this way, he has found his way even into NotePad. Therefore, as soon as I've finished a draft on NotePad, I save it to Desktop at once. He hasn't sussed that one out (yet). But no doubt he's working on it !
... can you not re-post your 'My accident'? I can't believe it won't bear another airing...
Well, seeing that it has not previously been Posted on this Thread, and I'm a nice obliging sort of chap, and anyway I never tire of hearing my own voice, will stick it on the end of this.
... recently retired, he trekked up to London at their request...
They'd be on a hiding to nothing with me ! I retired 44 years ago, and can just about get to my own front door.
... I knew the Vampire was risky to fly... indeed I mentioned my father having to belly-land one (on page 3). But I didn't know the Meteor was dodgy...
The Vampire was very nice and reliable (your father was unlucky). And the Meteor was all right too. It was just too much for the poor young men who'd (IMHO) been inadequately prepared for it.
... What on earth is the point in learning a foreign language if you never use it?!...
You're not alone in finding our alphabet soup a bit difficult at times. I, too, have sometimes to ask at on Thread for an explanation. Do not hesitate to do so. Someone will always chip in with the answer.
Danny.
ANNEX 1.
Febuary 24th is a date I'll not forget in a hurry ! - for on this day 72 years ago I came within a whisker of the Pearly Gates. I told my tale here in three separate Posts some 3½ years ago, but as many of our newer readers may not have read the originals, I've now edited and combined them into one story (and added an Epilogue). Even so, it's still much too long for a single Post, so I've split it into three parts. Here's Part I:
On 24th February '44, in the Arakan in Burma. "Stew" Mobsby and I took off on our 53rd sortie, flying No. 3 (wingman on the left of) the leader, Bill Boyd Berry. We were going some way down south (Donbaik ?), and the formation was climbing more slowly than usual, as we had plenty of time to get up to our bombing height. I think we took off from Ramu II, but cannot be sure - there were so many places, we were moving all the time and they all looked the same.
So quite soon after taking off we passed over the battle area (the Second Arakan campaign was reaching its climax) fairly low. Johnny Jap would take a pot at us, of course, but then he had a go every time we came back from a sortie and did no serious damage, although it was not unusual for aircraft to land back with small arms hits. On this occasion, I felt and heard nothing out of the ordinary, and neither did "Stew". Twenty minutes into the climb, I had a look round the instruments. Oil pressure was zero.
Engines don't run long without oil, and I didn't fancy life as a Japanese prisoner. I signalled BBB (drew my hand across my throat, and pointed to the engine - we kept R/T silence), and started back. I warned "Stew" to be ready to bale out; we were at 3,000 ft and could easily manage it. The next few minutes were nail-biting, but then we were back over friendly territory again.
I was thankful, but starting to have doubts. The engine was still running smoothly. What was more, neither oil nor cylinder head temperatures were rising. I began to think that all I had was a dud oil gauge. With every mile my suspicion grew. By the time base was in sight (there was nowhere closer to land), I'd convinced myself. My screen was clear of oil, so the prop can't be throwing it out. "Stew" said we weren't making smoke, so we can't be burning it through the engine. The two temperature needles hadn't shifted. It
had to be the oil pressure gauge, and I felt a bit of a fool.
Even so, I might have put it down off a straight-in approach, but these were awkward and difficult in a Vengeance because of the very poor forward view at low speeds. So we normally flew circuits. As there seemed to be no hurry, I did so now. Bad mistake! Downwind, I dropped the wheels and started my checks. The engine seized.
It had shown no sign of distress. Now there was just dead silence and a stationary propeller blade staring at me. The Vengeance was a poor flying machine and no glider at all. It went down like a brick. It was doing just that from a thousand feet - too low to bale out and no time even to think of dumping bombs. I took a last look at the strip, but it would have been suicide to try to get in from where we were with no power.
Nothing for it but crash-land straight ahead. I yelled "Brace" at "Stew", lifted the wheels and cut the main switch, to stop the fuel pumps and isolate the battery to avoid sparks. I can only remember thinking "I must keep 150 on the clock to have any hope of rounding-out at the bottom"... Then my mind goes blank.
A mile or so away was an RAF Repair and Salvage Unit. I would think that most of its trade was in salvage. They did not have to go far to collect mine. As far as they could see, I was making for their clearing, but sank into trees before I got there. I must have rounded-out all right, for the aircraft survived touchdown to go skidding through the open jungle. They told me that the tail unit came off first, then trees removed both wings. So far things may have been fairly tolerable inside, if a bit bumpy, for we were having a ride in a sort of high-speed bulldozer. Then the engine broke out.
Deprived of its battering-ram, the relatively light remaining structure hit something hard, broke apart just aft of the gunner's cockpit, and stopped abruptly in the shape of an inverted "V". The front fuselage and cockpits remained intact, the bombs stayed good as gold and the fuel did not go up. Thank God for the brick-built Vengeance! (anything else would have disintegrated and killed us!)
We'd had a lifetime's entitlement of luck in the last few seconds, but were in no position to appreciate it, both knocked out in the crash. My luck had stretched even further. I'd been wearing my "Ray-Bans" under my helmet, with my goggles pushed up on my head. When we hit the final obstacle, the cable retaining my shoulder harness snapped and I jack-knifed face first into the instrument panel. (The P-40 recently found in the Saraha has the "Needle & Ball" glass smashed. It's dead centre of the panel: it's the only broken instrument glass - (cf 682al's pic on #2709 p. 136) - every picture tells a story).
By rights, the glass lenses should have shattered into my eyes and blinded me. But, as far as we could make out, the goggles had taken the first impact, in the next millisecond the lenses must have jerked out of the frame and away from my eyes. The frame buckled, scooped the bridge off my nose and ploughed into my forehead and left cheek. And that was the total extent of my injuries !
"Stew" had been facing forward, braced head down on his navigation table. He broke a bone in his left wrist and got a bang on the nose, leaving him with an odd disability - he couldn't smell. This was no great loss out there and he got scant sympathy on that account, but it earned him a nice lttle lump sum from the War Pensions people later.
The RSU people ran over to pull us out; watchers at the base had seen us go down and sent the camp ambulance. I came to briefly as they were loading me on a stretcher, and remember the hot sun on my face. I couldn't see as my eyes were full of drying blood. "How's Stew?" - "He's all right". I looked a lot worse than I actually was, and that had an amusing sequel.
I came to fully in a Mobile Field Hospital at Cox's Bazar. They'd had mostly malaria and dysentery cases, and were quite chuffed at getting two proper "battle" casualties. "Stew" got a big cast on his arm and his nose shrank to normal size over the next few weeks. The enthusiastic medics sewed up my face and a surgeon made up a new bridge for my nose out of a patch from my thigh. Kept in place by a "saddle" of dental plastic, this wasn't perfect, but has done very well.
We were looked after quite efficiently by a staff of RAF nursing orderlies, fiercely dragooned by a P.M. RAF Nursing Service Matron for the three (I think) RAF wards. (The Army, of course, had the lion's share of the Field Hospital: it was an Army surgeon who did my job). We must have spent about a month there, then "threw away our crutches" ("Stew's" cast and my nose 'saddle'), and prepared to go off to Calcutta on convalescent leave.
(Part II in a day or so)
Danny42C.
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(Part II)
First task would be to secure our belongings. The ambulance crew had reported back to the Squadron what they'd seen when they'd picked us up, but of course it had taken them some time to reach us and I'd been bleeding like a stuck pig all over everything in the meanwhile. So the tale they told was pretty gruesome; the general opinion was that they'd seen the last of me.
No use my kit going to waste. My DIY bed was a prize legacy, they had a draw for that. The rest was shared out among the others; there was no use trying to send stuff after me, it wasn't worth it and the chances were that it wouldn't reach me if they did. (This was standard procedure - anything personal or of value would, of course, be secured for safe keeping by the Adjutant or Intelligence Officer - we are talking about clothing, bedding and towels etc., which you could quickly and cheaply replace).
Six weeks later the bad penny turned up. A shamefaced procession turned up with various items of my kit: "Sorry about this, old man - didn't think you'd be needing it any more!" And of course I recovered my bed - not that I would need it for long, for all six Vultee Vengeance Squadrons were ordered to cease operations in June '44, and we would shortly be moving out from the Arakan (as it happened, never to return). "Worse things happen at sea !"
That done, we went off to Calcutta for our leave (transport no problem, you could always cadge a ride on one of the many 'Daks' which were continually shuttling Cal-Chittagong-all points- east and back. I will not describe our leave now, as I plan to make a separate Post out of Calcutta; it is worth a Post on its own
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(Part III)
Back on the squadron, the engineers debated. The engine troubles which had plagued the first Vengeance the year before had mostly been cured, and the most likely explanation for the failure was a lucky shot hitting an oil tank, cooler or line. But in the condition I left the aircraft, it might have been hit by a 3.7 AA shell and look no worse ! They returned an open verdict.
In an earlier Post I have worked out that the Sqdn finally moved to Samungli (Quetta) on 6.8.44, so it stayed on in the Arakan doing nothing much for three monsoon months. Early In that time it must have left whatever 'kutcha' strip it was on and fallen back on a paved strip (I think Chittagong or Dohazari) or they would never have got the aircraft out of the mud to fly away. And both these places were rail points, from which the ground party could move. I have only vague memories of that time, but I flew a couple of times (non-op) in July, and I think I was loaned to 244 Group in Chittagong to do some paperwork, so I wasn't altogether idle.
Once the decision had been taken to stop VV operations, there was absolutely no reason to leave us in the Arakan a day longer. For although there were dozens of 'kutcha' strips, there were relatively few with a paved runway and drainage: these should have been left for the Hurricanes, Beaufighters and Mohawks who could still do useful work even in monsoon conditions. We were just cluttering up the place.
We became entitled to a "Wound Stripe" apiece. This daft and short-lived thing may have been peculiar to India. I never heard of it after I came back. The idea was similar to the American "Purple Heart", at which we poked much fun (it was said that you could get it for being nicked by the camp barber!) But it was entered on our records, and I seem to remember that I had an inch-long gold lace stripe to sew on my khaki tunic sleeve. As we never wore tunics (only bush jackets or shirts), it didn't seem worth bothering with.
"Stew" and I had been amazingly lucky: we both knew we'd live the rest of our lives on borrowed time. It's a pity that no photographs were
AFAIK, taken of the wreck - it would have been quite a memento in my logbook. But then, after all, down the years I've had a reminder every time I've looked in a mirror!
(He and I parted soon after this, as I was posted away from Samungli, but were reunited the following year, when he rejoined me as my "Adjutant" in Cannanore. Having come out to India much earlier, he went home earlier. I looked him up once (in Southend) after the war, but then, I'm sorry to say, we lost contact).
Many years later I watched a TV documentary about an oil sheikh's new racecourse complex somewhere in the Gulf. The architect was mentioned. There couldn't be two of that name! He appeared. Incredulous, I looked at this little, bald, fat chap - a far cry from the wiry young man with the Byronic looks I remembered. (Ah, the ravages of time !)
There is a present-day slant on the tale of my crash. In any forced landing a pilot has to make the best of a bad job. He can do no other. In two cases which have hit the headlines in the last year or so (the 777 which just managed to flop over the fence into Heathrow and the Airbus ditched in the Hudson river), the pilots concerned have been surprised to find themselves publicy fêted as "heroes".
My case was the same as theirs (in kind, though much smaller in degree). Naked self-preservation was the name of the game. Three questions arise: Did I do a good job? - Yes! Was I "incredibly" (in the true sense of that now much abused word) lucky? - Yes! Was I a "hero", in any sense? - Sorry folks, but No! I did what had to be done, and so did they, and we all got away with it, and there's no more to be said.
That's all for the moment, Goodnight, all, Danny42C.
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EPILOGUE
________
Since that February morning in Burma, long, long ago, I've often looked back on it and it's become obvious where I went wrong. I should never have decided, in the absence of other symptons, that the oil pressure gauge was at fault. I should have "played safe", assumed the worst and acted accordingly. I should have hung on to my 3,000 feet to the end, dumped my bombs "safe" (there was no provision for dumping fuel), and perhaps lowered 20°-30° flap (which would have given me a lttle more gliding distance if the engine failed).
The coast was not far away, I could have followed the shoreline North until I was close to base. There were miles of sandy beaches. Apart from a few inshore net fishermen, these would be mostly empty, if necessary a wheels-up landing should be easy.
Then I should never have come down into the circuit, but kept my height until overhead the strip (as it happened, the engine would have kept going till then), and used the "90° Left" or "270° Left" procedure taught me in the U.S. for forced landings. (How many times had I practiced this at Carlstrom Field in Florida !) From 3,000 ft, wheels down and 120-130 mph, it should have been child's play to dead-stick it down at one end of the strip or other (there wasn't much wind anyway, just a light sea breeze across the runway in any case).
Instead, you know what happened ! It was amazing luck that I wasn't killed (but if I had been it would have been my own fault). But poor "Stew" (who survived with me) wouldn't have deserved to die on that account.
But then, isn't hindsight a wonderful thing ?
Danny.
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