The squadron - once I'd been
they had a detachment to Libya
where all 12 of our squadron
would fly to Libya for
I haven't mentioned already, but the
It was a - it had broken records.
It was the first ever
It had broken height records,
So for me, as an electrician,
at that time, if you're
So we flew to Libya,
The ground crew flew to Libya as
So that was my first trip on an aeroplane
and this time to a foreign country,
But we had an RAF base there called Idris.
Idris was also the name of the king
And I enjoyed 4 or 5 weeks there
The squadron had a football team -
I was quite good at football,
And 6 months later,
but this time in a Canberra
When an aeroplane was going to
if it was going to a Canberra base,
another RAF base that
just the pilot and the navigator
But if it was going somewhere
then they would take a ground
That was a popular trip, you know,
so people were lining up to do that.
I rarely got chosen, but on one occasion,
I think it was a bank holiday weekend
when nobody else was available,
I was delegated to be the
that would go with the crew
So I had to go to the
to pick up a flying suit,
some other bits of equipment,
but also, because I wouldn't be sitting
I picked up a parachute which I had
when I was in the aeroplane.
So when we get to the aeroplane,
the pilots and the navigator sit in
but I sit on something
Now the Canberra, if you can imagine
the door to get in the Canberra is on one
and the door hinges up,
and you, you get into
All the crew get in that way.
It's the only way in or out
Once the door is closed, a metal seat
and a sort of pogo stick goes
on this metal seat with this
And it was only later that when I—
suddenly thought,
Because I'm sitting on a seat
and the door is the only
I have to ditch the door
sitting on a seat where they just pull
And I sort of thought later that I think
had had a some sort of serious problem,
Not that I was very worried about
The other good thing about
that the navigator sits
He cannot see out the front
strange if you're a navigator.
But the pilot sits— as the curve of the
he has a Perspex canopy over his head that
There's a really good view.
And me sitting on the rumble seat,
I'm sitting just here,
completely around the horizon.
And we fly to Germany.
We fly to a port called Wilhelmshaven
an RAF base called Jever.
We land there on the Friday
They disappear for the weekend.
I'm looked after by the ground crew,
on the Monday.
