Leuchars memories
 

Ladies & Gentlemen,

If any of you have any memories of or anecdotes relating to service or time spent otherwise at R.A.F. Leuchars, at anytime at all. Could you PM me please!

FB:)

A big thanks to those who have responded so far, keep 'em coming, if anyone want to post their anecdots on here then that's ok too. I will then PM you all individually.

Many Thanks,:ok:

FB:)

I remember sitting in the caravan as a mighty F4 departed one frosty morning. Said F4 turns downwind after take off and announces a hyd failure / cable engagement.

F4 appears over fence, hits terra firma, engages cable and the bloody thing broke!! All i saw was runway lights popping up as they were torn from the runway edge.

F4 man rolls does a smart u turn and takes what was the overrun cable!!

I was fine till a mate on the arrestor team appeared at the caravan and pointed out where the broken cable had ended up at!

In the early 1970's I was a young and inexperienced Flight Systems Engineer with Hawker Siddeley Aviation at Brough in East Yorkshire. One of the jobs I was involved in was investigating problems in the engine fuel feed system of the Phantom, particularly the Royal Navy FG Mk1s with fast reheat Spey 203 engines.

After several short trials at Leuchars using 892 Sqdn aircraft it began to look like the engine was to blame and MoD were going to hold Rolls Royce responsible, As a result we embarked on a week long trial at Leuchars during which HSA and RR would fit their instrumentation side by side and we would compare the results. This was my first ever visit involving an overnight stay in the Officers Mess of an RAF station and I was somewhat apprehensive. On waking up in my room on the first proper working day, I found an aged gentleman leaving me a cup of tea on my bedside table. So this is how the officers live then, I thought, must be a batman.

While fitting our instrumentation we had a bit of an accident and as result I got a couple of pints of Avtur spilled down my front. Fortunately I had a spare pair of trousers but only one pair of shoes, which were brown suede Hush Puppies - all the rage at the time. I attracted a few unapproving looks in the mess that night as the powerful smell of fuel permeated the bar.

The following morning my cup of tea appeared again as if by magic but when I got dressed I could not find my shoes anywhere. Bloody hell I thought, some thieving bugger has stolen my shoes, I would never have expected that in an officers mess. Unabashed I padded out of my room in my stocking feet to investigate. At the end of the corridor was a small cubbyhole and in it was the batman who brought my tea. On the table in front of him were my shoes. I marched up to him and in a very accusing tone said 'You've got my shoes' 'Aye sir' he said, 'I've scrubbed and I've scrubbed and I've scrubbed but I canna get rid of the smell of the fuuuel'

I returned to my room somewhat chastened with my shoes looking the best they had been since new, but still smelling of Avtur.

Early 70s. Exercise.....? ATCOs dispersed to Rwy caravan and radar head. (CR787). I was sent to the radar head on one exercise with a very competent NCO and we continued to provide a service for some 36hrs. Endex, we retired for debriefing and as we left the building, a GRSF cpl pointed out a notice that said "do not remain in the vicinity of this building for more than 4 hrs." AFAIK neither of us suffered any harm! Happy days.

Nothing changes, in the 80's we used to "guard" the AR15 for endless hours and that had similar signs all over it.

Events at Leuchars
 

A 100Sqn Canberra pilot, TS, intended to do a bit of a beat up there one morning. To enhance the shock effect he nipped round the back of some cu at the end of the downwind leg and emerged with a tip tank missing. Knocked off on the hill. They found the tip tank later near the hill top. Nav was Al Puncher

That would have been Terry "Tip Tank" Summers....

Noisy
 

My father was a FJ pilot there in the 60's [when I was a small boy] and all I can remember is the NOISE!

Hi fetch,

Lightnings or Javelins?

FB

Noise!
 

Dragonfly (I think) plus Battle of Britain display sometime early 70's?
Victor K1 parked by the end of the active with a dead NBS scanner.
My job, go check the wiring in the radome, I hated Phantoms after that::mad:

Also on the Friday watching the US 130's coming in from Germany with senior people coming over to play golf for the weekend, never seen so many golf bags

C

Other wizard prangs at Leuchars
 

There was an accident that went something like;

Phantom has radar blooming tries to dump air pressure gets emergency flap lever by mistake, dumps all hyd pressure into flaps, speed about 300, flaps fall off.

Going home, no utilities gear down, no flap, no hook, on landing no brakes or nose steering or rudder. Starts to drift to side of runway, go round start again, no nozles so acceleration poor, nav punches both out, Nig Randall I think.

Aircraft continues full cold, some hyd pressure now so hook comes down catches far end wire, aircraft stops on road at end of runway engines in full cold and hanging on the wire pointing at MQs.

No way of stopping engines until it ran out of fuel

Tinribs,

No, fella. The story isn't quite like that. I was there and wrote about it in my journal. By the way, it was at Coningsby. Corrected by those involved, if you're interested, the story is here: XV436

The Courier - Pressure on MoD for RAF Leuchars answers

Not so much Leuchars memories as Leuchars future?

FB

Jav 9 (11 Sqn ) circa 1964/65 approaching over sea. Some sort of emergency that required the ventrals to be jettisoned. Also went (by accident) were the dummy Firestreaks. One went over the Eden estuary and bedded in on one of the famous fairways at St Andrews. As it was "student" rag week, everyone thought student stunt, until Leuchars arrived to ask for the missile back !!
If my memory serves, nice picture in the St Andrew's Courier. Happy days , two of my kids born there.

Many, many happy memories of Leuchars. Hoofing it slong the airfield in a cut down Landy in pursuit of a Nimrod that was playing baddy. Trying to do a rolling debus but the LMG gunner wouldn't jump. A swift boot and off he tumbled only to spend the next fifty yards chasing us trying to get his gun off too!
Exercises, detachments, easy living in a great area. What a way to spend your late teens!
Mind you, I also remember standing under an E3 in horizontal rain all night, sitting in the 'chute recovery motor on the Eastern end with the rain howling through the canvas and range guard at Barrybuddon. Two days of making sure no boats got too close to the range. Anyone care to guess how many boats go up and down the Tay daily?

XV436
 

Complete thread drift since the incident happened at CGY, but excellent story Courtney Mil - really well told! :D:D

FB

Javelins, 25 squadron, then across to Gutersloh, then back again!

Fetch

XV436 Vs the Hay Bails
 

Courtney Mil wrote:
good day,

Blimey was it really 5th March 1980 ???

I was on 228OCU at Coningsby, a Liney, all scuffed toe caps and holes in the knees of my Number 2 Trousers! Instead of Stn Guard Duties we OCU Lineys did Fire Picket for a week, spending our night with the Fire Crew.

I was on that night XV436 went bouncing off the end of the runway:

The damaged Mk9 fire engines wasn't caused exactly as you state in your Journal; we all scrambled to our vehicles and lined them up on the small track from outside the Fire Section to the runway in line astern. As the very unwell but still Mighty Toom passed our noses and there was the double bang of Martin Bakers finest working to their usual perfection, over the radio came the call from Crash 1 of Go Go Go followed by someone else shouting Stop Stop Stop. That came from ATC I think as the the crew were still dangling beneath the silk. Unfortunately Crash 1 and the First Mk9 stopped but the second Mk9 with young SAC Howie didn't by means of its own brakes and smacked into the rear of the first one. I ended up in the foot well somewhere hugging a large fire extinguisher which had just belted me round the back of the head.

In all a most memorable night !!

That's a very interesting site you have there and I think I'm going to enjoy reading it.

Regards
H

PS to steady the thread drift a bit, soon after I was posted to 111Sqn at Leuchars, just after the Sidewinder Incident. Anyone have the full story of that one???

Ooh! Also recall just getting all the new Mk10 helmets painted grey when SOMEONE turned up from Coningsby with a white one with Sonic emblazoned on it. Suddenly everyone wanted a white helmet and a daft sticker and we all know what stickers do to helmets don't we? ;)