大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a volunteer on behalf of Pilot Officer John A. Martin DFC (retired) Larne, N. Ireland and been added to the site with his permission. Mr Martin understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

Whilst I was with Transport Command, 51 Squadron flying between UK and Singapore we landed at Castel Benito in North Africa and the following morning we took off for Habbaniya. During the take off the trimming tabs broke, so we had to abandon the flight and jettison fuel, I had to pull controls back and forth, trimming the aircraft, until we landed it. We carried out repairs and took off the next night but after take off the port outer engine 鈥榩acked in鈥�, so we feathered it and landed back at Castel Benito again. On this flight we had about 50 soldiers as passengers, being taken out to the Far East. On the third night there was an Irish doctor from Belfast, he was always there, watching take off with the 鈥榖lood wagon鈥�. He said, 鈥淧addy, what are you going to do tonight?鈥� I replied that we would be spectacular tonight. We started off down the runway, and the pilot who was called Atkinson, had difficulty in controlling the aircraft which started slewing. The aircraft swung on take off and crashed, breaking her back in three places. When the aircraft made the first lunge my foot got trapped in one of the vent holes of the heating system, when the aircraft made its next lunge my leg came free. On coming to rest, old Mac Atkinson was lying slumped over the control column, concussed, and everybody was climbing over his shoulders to get out. He was lying there prostrate over the control column and everyone was climbing over him. We were lucky the aircraft didn鈥檛 go on fire. About half of the soldiers who were on board were injured, they weren鈥檛 strapped in, and were just seated. The seats ripped loose when the aircraft broke her back. There was h*ll to play when we got out with so many people being injured. That was the end of my time with Sterlings, after that I went on to Yorks, which were the peace time Lancaster. These replaced the Sterlings in Transport Command. We carried passengers in those days, people like bank managers going out to start up their bank鈥檚 again after the war. We brought WAF officers back from Singapore. These runs continued until I left the RAF in1947.

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