Part 3 In which I strafe a main road with gunfire and demolish a field of carrots

With the training course under my belt, I was now a fully qualified Armaments Officer (they said), ready for my first posting and real job. This turned out to be at Waterbeach, just north of Cambridge and next to the main A10 road. It was a busy place, the home of two fighter squadrons: Javelins and Hunters. I was to be kept busy with the Hunter squadron practicing by day and the Javelin all weather night fighters, at night.

A weakness in the layout of the facilities at Waterbeach was that there was no really safe direction to point the aircraft on the ground, once they were armed up with their cannon, rockets and missiles. The servicing platforms were of course, in front of the hangars, which faced the A10 Cambridge to Ely road. The bomb and ammunition dump was located between the servicing platforms and the main road. The potential lethality of the situation was dramatically demonstrated during my second day of duty at the station, in the presence of a visiting Group Captain from H.Q. Fighter Command.

We were busy turning around the Hunter Squadron, which was engaged on an air to air firing exercise. My office looked out onto the row of parked aircraft, which my visitor was studying as he quizzed me about safety procedures and the like. I jumped from my seat as I saw a momentary look of astonishment flash over his face, followed by an uncomfortably close and deafening burst of gunfire. About a dozen rounds from an Aden 30mm cannon had been shot across the main road. I left my sergeant to make the aircraft safe, leapt in the Land Rover and made for the perimeter fence that bordered the road. There was not a lot of traffic about and what there was, was proceeding normally. Beyond the road, was open countryside. It seemed we had been very lucky.

The subsequent Board of Enquiry concluded that human error was to blame. During a turn around, an aircraft would be swarming with technicians, each taking care of their own specialty. It turned out that at the time of the accident, a radar technician was working on the nose cone of the aircraft. He had called "OK" to his colleague further back along the fuselage. At the same time, an armourer in the cockpit was waiting with his finger on the gun-firing button, for his colleague to say the same, to confirm that the guns were disconnected. The rest, as they say, was history, or in my case, historic.

Waterbeach was on the edge of the Cambridgeshire fens and surrounded by open farmland to the West and North. Populated areas lay to the South and East. Our relationship with the local villagers was sometimes difficult. The night fighting rôle of the Javelins had to be fulfilled and jet engines had to be run on full power from time to time, for testing. We were aware that probably a majority of the local population would not regret our departure. Incidents such as the above were therefore especially sensitive.

The next disaster involved the inadvertent release of an air to air missile, into a field of carrots. The Javelins were being fitted up with a new heat-seeking missile, fitted in pairs, under the wings. A trial had been set up to test the mounting arrangement. Ground tests had already identified and supposedly solved potential problems. Our job was to confirm the theory in practice. We didn't. It was in the middle of the night, during the first round of tests that one of the missiles was lobbed off the aircraft, just after take off, as it began to climb. The trajectory would then have been at its most graceful, so that it ploughed its way through the entire length of the field of young carrots. Our attempts to retrieve the missile in the darkness only made matters worse. It had buried itself almost two metres deep in the soft earth. The farmer was expediently compensated for the loss of the entire crop, from what was known as a contingency budget, to minimise the risk of adverse publicity. Carrots featured strongly on the menus for several weeks, however.

Soon after these events the squadrons were transferred to less populated areas of East Anglia. Waterbeach was handed over to the army, who were more suited to deal with agricultural matters. I was dispatched further North, to take care of some intercontinental ballistic missiles. The posting offered unprecedented possibilities for mayhem and disaster.

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Part 4 In which I try my hand at bomb disposal, displease British Rail and preside over a temporary suspension of the cold war.

R.A.F. North Cotes was a bleak and desolate place, situated right on the coast, about 10 miles south of the fishing port of Grimsby, at the end of the Humber estuary. It had been there for quite some time. The accommodation was in wooden huts, dating from the First World War. Officers were provided with a bed sitting room about 12 feet square. Heating was by a coke stove, which was lit by the batman during the afternoons. Communal ablution facilities were situated in an unheated facility at the end of a long corridor. Here, one could also attend to one's laundry, if so inclined. The washing however, was usually dried in one's room, on a specially provisioned gadget called a "clotheshorse". Alcohol featured strongly in the social arrangements. There was little else. This was to be my home for the next month, as the incumbent armaments officer was away on a training course.
The rôle of the unit was a new experience for the RAF. We were charged with the responsibility for maintaining a dozen intercontinental ballistic missiles in constant readiness to respond to any provocation from the "East". The nerve centre of the operation was housed in a converted hangar surrounded by ultra sensitive security systems. Inside, just visible in the dim green glow emitted by a myriad of cathode ray tubes, were the operatives, in a state of constant vigilance, watching for the appearance of suspicious blips on their screens.

They were mostly frustrated pilots, taken off flying duties, to sit motionless in front of their electronic displays for eight-hour shifts. One sensed that morale could be a problem. Their free time was mostly spent doing circuits of the airfield in the overworked Station Flight Anson, in a quest to maintain their flying hours record and so qualify for the extra flying pay. Nobody seemed to have queried whether it might have been more economic, to allow the flying pay, regardless.

My own job was to bring the missiles into the armament compound at regular intervals, to carry out routine maintenance and check that all the explosive components were serviceable. I was very conscious of the dire consequences of an inadvertent firing of one of these devices, particularly as the regulations for their storage and handling had not yet been written. It was apparently part of my brief to make recommendations in this respect. I had not been in the job for many days, when I received an urgent call from the headmaster of a primary school in Grimsby. One of the pupils had brought along a strange object, to show the teacher and it was now smouldering, on her desk. I made my way to the scene. Sure enough, it was definitely smouldering; in fact, it was now giving off the odd shower of sparks and spurts of flame. Fortunately, someone had had the sense to put it in a metal bucket. I recognised it as the cordite filling from a large shell. (I learned some time later that an ammunition barge had capsized in the estuary, during the war and that these things were often washed up). With a little sleight of hand, I filled the bucket with sand, stuck it in the back of the Land Rover and made my way back, with no clear idea of what to do next.

Now, as it happened, I had become rather concerned by the nonchalant attitude of most of the crews at North Cotes, particularly the emergency services, who seemed to be under the impression that they were all redundant. The time was ripe for a practical reminder of the ever-present dangers of our operation. My plan was ready by the time I got back to base. I would stage a simulated disaster in the explosives area and test the response. The pyrotechnical discovery would be disposed of at the same time.

I rang the station commander and discussed my idea. He gave his consent, provided he could come to watch. We agreed that no one else would be told, except the station adjutant, who would give the alarm over the "Tannoy" system. I conscripted half a dozen volunteers from my chaps to disguise themselves as casualties and began the preparation of my "bomb". A 40gallon, open-ended oil drum was procured and half filled with used sump oil from the MT section. Over the open end, I hung about a pound of RDX explosive, bound with a length of cortex and a No.33 detonator, to which a suitably long length of firing cable was attached. At a given signal, the cordite from the school was lobbed in and the detonator fired.

The result was spectacular. The effect of the detonation was to create an immediate vacuum above the oil in the drum, which was sucked up, into the heat of the explosion and ignited. The resultant cloud of black smoke was propelled upwards, creating a dramatic black mushroom cumulus. A wonderful sight, visible for miles around. Then, all hell was set loose. The adjutant had broadcast the alarm and ambulance bells could now be heard approaching. My lads had taken up their prostrate positions around the scene of the explosion, which was in some fairly long grass. The first ambulance came screaming up to the site, the driver not really knowing what he was looking for and ran over the foot of the first "casualty". The cries of agony only served to add realism to the occasion.

The station commander made his presence known and the medics began to twig what was going on. However, his presence only compelled them to act out their part with increased urgency. The injured chap was loaded into the first ambulance, with his colleague alongside him. The driver shot off at great speed. Unfortunately, the acceleration caused the uninjured man to be jettisoned out, onto the grass, through the insecurely fastened doors. He became another genuine casualty: extensive bruising and a sprained ankle.

At this moment, my boss: the squadron leader, O.C.Tech.Wing, appeared on the scene. He had roared over from the Admin. Block in his new Morris Minor, which he had forgotten he was still "running in", as one had to, in those days. He was not a happy man. Just for a moment, I was secretly glad that I had only signed on for a short service commission. However, it was agreed that I had proved a point and procedures needed to be smartened up.

Conspicuous by their absence until all the fun was over, were the fire-fighters. They had had difficulty in starting their vehicle and, it transpired, didn't really know which one to take, anyway. Although it was not any part of my remit, I was charged with the responsibility of bringing the fire service up to scratch. I set about the task straight away.

I soon learned in fact, that the team had never had to put out an actual fire, in all the time that the unit had been operational. Live practice was required, on real fires. My first problem: where to find a real fire? It was some years before Mr. Beeching had arrived to desecrate the rail network, with his axe. North Cotes was served by a branch line from Grimsby town. Now it was the practice in those days, for the railway people to keep the grass and vegetation alongside the lines under control, by setting fire to it, from time to time, during the summer months. The approach to our local station passed through a length of embankment, which was a suitable subject for the treatment.

I went for a chat with the Station Master. The response was exactly what I had hoped. Yes, the burning off was due, but it would be too dangerous to start it just now, as everything was excessively dry. A deal was struck. I would arrange for my armourers to set fire to the entire length of the embankment, which we would subsequently get our fire people to extinguish, by way of practice, in a simulated emergency.

The plan was activated a few days later. Once the embankment was well alight, I phoned through the "alarm", to the fire brigade and awaited results. They arrived on the scene without delay and enthusiastically set about their job. They had decided to use a foam generator, as they had so far had no experience with it. This device was capable of covering a large aircraft with foam, in a matter of seconds.

They were doing well, spraying the foam onto the blaze, from the opposite bank, across the tracks. Then, my heart skipped a beat as I heard a distant rumble. I had overlooked the fact that the through train to Grimsby was due to pass at that time. It would have taken some time to shut down the foam machine. I braced myself for the inevitable. The locomotive passed at full speed. The lads, totally engrossed in their task sprayed the whole bloody thing from end to end with a thick layer of foam. A sight which I will never forget, was that of the guard sticking his head out of the observation window, to see what was making the flip, flap, flop, flip racket and having his face instantly obscured by the suppressant. Some diplomatic activity fortunately prevented the protests from reaching too high a level, but subsequent practices were limited to the confines of the station.

We were required to do Orderly Officer duties about once a month. My name came up on the roster over the last weekend I was due to spend at North Cotes. The duties were largely routine and involved periodic security checks and generally dealing with eventualities. I took over on the Saturday morning, in torrential rain. It had been raining all night and showed no signs of abating. Still we were not a flying station. I looked forward to an uneventful weekend, (I thought).

One of the silliest things every Orderly Officer was required to do during his spell of incumbency, was to walk around the airmen's dining hall and enquire if there were "any complaints?" (Those were the words to be used). Normally one would impose a suitable air of threatening authority during this interrogation, to elicit a negative response. I must have been lacking in the appropriate authority on this occasion and received the spontaneous response: "you must be f****** joking" I tried to assure the young gentleman that I really was not. I promised to bring his complaints, of which there were many and not all to do with catering, to the attention of those in authority.

The rest of the day passed peacefully enough, but the torrential rain continued throughout. At dusk, following the brief flag lowering ceremony, I retired to my billet and set about tackling some long overdue laundry. I hung the damp washing on the ubiquitous clotheshorse next to the coke stove and laid back on the bed to listen to the omnibus edition of "The Archers" but fell asleep. I awoke suddenly, much later. I was sure I could hear the gentle lapping of water. I groped for the bedside lamp to ascertain the cause. Sure enough, the floor was immersed in about two inches of water. Without a moment's hesitation, I leapt out of bed and repositioned my laundry onto a higher rung on the clotheshorse. It wasn't actually until the following Thursday, that it was discovered that the entire missile installation had been unserviceable since that weekend, because of a flooded cable duct, which had caused an open circuit. It is apparently recorded in the official records of the subsequent enquiry, that the Orderly Officer's first action on becoming aware of the flood, was to move his socks one rung higher on his clotheshorse. But I've often wondered what would have happened if the water had caused a short circuit, instead of an open circuit.

For information:

This is the story up to Chapter 4 and there is more to come from George and I will probably post chapters separately. Paging is difficult as the text will wrap round automatically and the amount you see will depend on the resolution setting of your display. I use 800 x 640 as this is easy to read when composing. Most machines will be set at a higher resolution so that much more can be fitted on a screenful. This only matters if any of you wish to take a print of the material - something I only do rarely.

Mike M-Rogerson Aug 6 2007