January 1957 was a short flying month, starting with yet another Navigation Bombing System test flight in a Valiant. By now I was rapidly becoming the resident operational expert on the Mk10 autopilot and its coupling units for Nav/Bombing and automatic landing approaches. The Beverley was also receiving my attention with autopilot trials.
In January I flew a Mk3 Shackleton for the first time. Having previously flown some flights in a Mk2 Shackleton, it was interesting to fly the later model which had been fitted with a nose wheel. The cockpit had changed quite a bit, as had the fit out of much classified anti-submarine equipment. My mission was to drop some bombs at the Imber range for clearance purposes.
On my return to Boscombe Down I became intent on achieving a smooth touchdown and for some reason not clear to me I translated myself mentally into a Mk2 version with a tail wheel. Following touch down on the main wheels in a tail down attitude I waited for the non-existent tail wheel to contact the runway. Instead the nose started to come down against my control back pressure. With the control almost fully back I yelled a warning to the crew to brace themselves, as we were going over on our nose. As soon as I had yelled the warning I realised what was happening and could have bitten out my tongue for having been so foolish. The nose wheel hit hard on the runway with the crew asking whether the emergency was over yet. To the delight of the crew, I bought beers all round in the mess that evening.