大象传媒

Continued from Training To Be A Flight Engineer.

The following day, after a practice run with instructors we were on our own. We practiced circuits and landings for the next few days. After that we were sent on several exercises of longer duration, the first of which I suggested we timed the minimum time up to 20,000 feet. It took us 20 minutes, and I had hiccups just to prove it. The flying went quite smoothly, including night flying, until on the 5th February, when we went on a cross country exercise of about 5 hours in freezing weather. The airspeed pitot iced up giving us no registered aircraft speed, and the carburettor on one engine iced up causing the engine to overspeed making the propeller control inoperative. We realised that if we stopped the engine, in the freezing environment, we would never start it again, and the air pump for the braking system was on that same engine, I throttled it back until the visible exhaust flame went out, and then opened the throttle until the flame just appeared, and left it like that until we arrived back at base.

By the time we arrived at base, the pitot head had thawed out at the lower altitude. We were instructed to 鈥渇eather鈥� the propeller, everybody [except me] had to go once more to the crash position, and Kit landed us very smoothly, considering the circumstances.

We were now beginning to understand how one should never take the moods of airframe, engine and weather for granted. You should allways keep your wits about you always.

We completed the course on 7th February and we were posted to 115 squadron at Witchford near Ely. The Squadron motto was 鈥淒espite the Elements鈥�; was there any connection with our exploits?

Our first flight, by way of introduction to the squadron, and the local landmarks, was with our flight commander. He was a Squadron Leader who unusually, was also an air gunner, and had the brevet to show it.

The Squadron was in 3 Group which specialised in radar controlled precision bombing. This was usually done in daylight in any reasonable weather, from above cloud, and in formation, known as a 鈥済aggle鈥�. We flew in groups of three. The leader did the aiming, and the other two dropped their bombs when the leader dropped his.

Our first trip was to Kamen in the Ruhr, on an oil refinery. As we approached the target we could see an enormous cloud. This was anti-aircraft fire, above the target. My immediate thought was 鈥渙h dear 鈥� or thoughts to that effect; but when we actually got there, we could see the explosions just beyond our wingtips but no closer.

The return flight was uneventful, until we crossed the English coast. Then the whole squadron spread out in-line abreast, and returned to Witchford in that formation at about 500ft. This was a sight I had never experienced before, or seen since. Of course we were entitled to egg and bacon for breakfast before we left, and the same again when we returned; we also had a mug of coffee laced with rum as soon as we landed. It was not a bad life, as long as you survived.

Our second and third (operations as they were called) were to Gelsenkirchen, also an oil refinery in the Ruhr and both in daylight, and with rather less gunfire. As we approached the target it looked ominous, but died away when they saw us coming. On several of these daylight ops we had an escort of Spitfires or Mustangs, the pilots of which would invariably wave as they flew past.

We then spent a week at Feltwell, in Norfolk for the navigator to learn about the radar bombing system, and then for us to fly off to gain some practice, by photographing a turret on one of the transepts of Ely Cathedral. The airfield was of pre-war origin, with no concrete runway, and had a country lane running across it, where the traffic had to wait whilst we were flying in or out.

We had the feeling that the war was soon to end, because a barrel of grapefruit appeared in the mess. All the more remarkable because for several years this had been no more than a dream. Eating them was rather messy, because one had to skin each segment, after removing the outer skin, because of course we had no sugar.

A lucky Escape

The next trip to Bruchstrassa was eventful in an unexpected way; we were on our way home at about 3000 feet with the automatic pilot doing the work. We had just put our cigarettes out, when the nose of the aircraft dropped like a brick, pointing us straight at the sea. This sort of situation calls for some very rapid thinking, and fortunately Kit [the pilot] and I reached the same conclusion, and grabbed the control column, and pulled it back as hard as we could, to bring the aircraft back on an even keel. The cause was fairly obvious, it was the automatic pilot; so the need was to switch the auto pilot off! It was possible to overcome the auto pilot, by a bit of manhandling, so our reaction was quite correct; but the impact on the loose bits and pieces in the aircraft was, including the crew, quite devastating. The bomb aimer in the nose did a backward somersault from his unofficial seat right in the nose.

Kit and myself hit our heads on the cabin roof, the pilot should have been strapped in but was not, I noticed the camera magazine, which was on the deck at my feet, rise up to head height and slowly sink as we pulled the nose of the aircraft up.

The navigator had his bag of maps rise up and settle on his table. The navigator and wireless operator, situated near the centre of gravity of the aircraft, did not feel too much influence from our sudden change of direction.

The mid upper gunner probably had the worst deal. To get into his turret, he had to climb in, then pull his seat behind and hook it on a rail at the side of the turret. Unfortunately, when the aircraft nosed over, he went up, and the seat went up, but the seat did not hook up on the way back down, so the gunner had no support. He fell out of his turret, into the fuselage, and was not too pleased about events.

The rear gunner, told us that he was out of his turret sorting out his parachute as soon as he realised that things were not as they should be.

The aircraft was quite alright, but the fuel tank must have had a good shake up, because the fuselage reeked of petrol fumes. It was a good thing that we had already put our cigarettes out, otherwise things could have been quite unpleasant.

When we returned to base, it transpired that the autopilot was not clutched in; the lever in the cab was in its correct position, but had not been checked for engagement by the pilot, by moving the controls full travel in each direction; thus the gyroscope was slowly processing until it hit the stops, when it toppled, we toppled with it! We were issued with an instruction card to tell us what we should have done, but the damage had been done, I no longer had any confidence in autopilots.

The next operation to Bruchstrassa, again in the Ruhr. It does not bring back any memories, except the perennial thought that with about 12,000 lb. of high explosive on board, what if an engine gets a bit moody on take off; there is no simple answer to that, except that with 4 engines, once you have gathered enough speed to make it difficult to stop, the remaining 3 engines should be adequate to get you airborne except for a little cold sweat to deal with.

A similar situation occurred on the next operation

Munster was the next target, and on the approach to the target, the starboard inner engine started to run a bit hot. I should point out that flying in formation, in a cloud of protective 鈥渨indow鈥� to confuse the radar, to leave the formation was exposing you to predicted gunfire, so it was not a good idea to go on alone at a reduced altitude because in isolation the guns could get 鈥渁 bead鈥� on you. So, I throttled the engine back, to see if it would cool off, but after several minutes when I opened the throttle again, it went all 鈥渓umpy鈥�, so it was decided to opt out and 鈥渇eather鈥� the engine and turn for home.

This was quite an exciting event. First we had to jettison the bombs over the sea, which made quite a splash, because the cooky was a bit touchy, and all 4000lb exploded which rocked the boat a little. As we approached the coast, a Spitfire arrived and flew alongside, and required us to identify ourselves by firing off the identifying 鈥渃olours of the day鈥�, which we did and he went home. When we landed, going through the normal routine, Kit unfortunately levelled out a bit high, and we bounced rather higher than was sensible, so he caught it on the throttles. That is he opened up the engines to full power, to fly round again, remembering that we only had three engines. This was not the recommended procedure, but by now we were committed. So we immediately raised the undercarriage, and lifted the flaps from full down, to the normal take-off position and sat tight hoping the aircraft would increase speed, which it thankfully did, and we landed satisfactorily next time round.

As soon as we had landed, the trestles were up and the cowling off the engine to see what was wrong. I did not find out at the time, but subsequently heard that the cylinder head was prone to crack if the temperature changed too rapidly, such as when formation flying. As with the autopilot problem, we were issued with a foolscap sheet with all the flying limitations, one of which said that once you had committed to a landing with flaps fully down, then land you must. We were gradually getting the hang of the business!

We did one more daylight operation to Hamm. This was more uneventful. Then we were switched to a few night operations. The first was to Kiel, when the first person to see the target was the rear gunner. This suggested that we had gone too far, so we made a big circle round to join the stream to have another go, when we saw the target, we dropped our bombs.

It was about this time that my friend Len Cooke, lost his life when the Halifax bomber he was flying in crashed in the North Sea off the east coast of Scotland near Wick.

Another Near Miss

We went back to Kiel again on the 13th March, when halfway across the North Sea, another aircraft flew straight across in front of us, missing us by a matter of feet. Of course in the dark it is very difficult to see anything at any distance, so there is little warning when another aircraft does get close. Collisions were not unknown and people rarely survived.

Someone was lucky enough to sink the battleship Admiral Scheer, it could have been us but I very much doubt it. It happened to be Friday 13th it was nearly bad luck for us but certainly bad luck for the sailors.

Our 9th operation was to Heligoland. This was an island in the corner of the North Sea, near Germany. It was a beautifully clear day, and we flew out in our usual gaggle. From what I could see, bombs were dropping all over the island. There was no obvious opposition, so I suspect that bombs were dropped on any obvious target of opportunity.

Our penultimate operation was at night to Potsdam, near Berlin. It was also in clear sky conditions. This was the only time we had an opportunity to observe a raid on a good sized city, and it was all that photographs have shown. There was a sea of fire at ground level, a blanket of light 鈥渃loud鈥� of anti-aircraft fire at about 10000 feet. It appeared to be aimed at aircraft flying a lot lower than we were, and the hope was that the gunfire stayed at that altitude. Nothing untoward happened to us, but it was an experience to see what a city looked like under bombardment.

The European War finished on 5th May, but before then we were doing some practice drops of sandbags, a repeat of an exercise carried out a few weeks earlier for reasons neither not known, nor understood at the time. But the purpose was now revealed, and it was to drop bags of food to the starving population of The Netherlands. They were surrounded by German troops as a last pocket of resistance. This we did at about 1000ft on to the racetrack at Den Haag past German gun sites where the gunners just stood and watched. It was what you might call a pleasant day out with the object of doing some good, rather than destruction for no sensible purpose.

We went out again on the 5th of May to drop more food, in sacks and packages on the same target. This food dropping operation was called 鈥淥peration Manna鈥�, as from Heaven.

A few years after the war, an association was created in conjunction with the recipients of the food to liaise, via the Manna association, which was a mysterious club of elite members who appeared to be reluctant to divulge their activities!

The next task we had, after spending a bit of time practising 鈥渃ircuits and landings鈥� was to ferry ex prisoners of war, back home from France where they had been carried by lorry, usually from Eastern Germany. The original specification for the Lancaster bomber was that should be capable of conversion to troop carrying; this was accomplished by providing all passengers with a leather cushion, on which they could sit on the top of the bomb bay. In total we did 7 of these trips, which were very satisfying when they set foot on mother England; our pick up airfield was Juvincourt near Rheims, in France, and Brussels in Belgium. The journey was at a relatively low level, and passed over many of the First World War cemeteries which were a sight never to be forgotten.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.