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Ex March Hare 1973

Another one from Pete Mears’s archive. “Ahden during Exercise March Hare 1973. The field was so soggy we could only operate one Harrier (XV797) with each sortie consisting of a vertical take-off and landing from the MEXE Pad. The four pilots, Pete Taylor, Jock Heron, Whitney Griffiths and Pete Bennett, (shown fighting for the cockpit), managed fourteen sorties in one day – was that a record, I wonder? The aircraft and pilot were lost in a crash the following year.”

What? A Hollywood-style formation drama: “Saving Bugsy Bendell”

Where? 40,000ft in a No.IV (AC) Sqn pair from RAF Jever, 2nd Tactical Air Force

When? Second sortie on 28th March, 1958

Why? The Hunter’s pre-modified oxygen masks and connector system

On that memorable day 54 years ago, when flying from RAF Jever, my second sortie of three started quite normally. With two full inboard drop tanks the F Mk 6 took 7 minutes, so an extra 75 seconds from wheels roll to make 40,000ft. Within what seemed to me, both then and now, like a slowly developing Hollywood film drama, events rapidly unfolded, literally out of a bright blue sky but this way up above a lot of clouds. It had been a standard pairs take-off and climb-out through these several layers of cloud, mostly thick, deep and bumpy, with eventual tops above 30,000 ft.

Fg Off Tony ‘Bugs’ Bendell being briefed during a IV(AC) Squadron Sylt Armament Practice Camp by Fg Off Alan Pollock (right in dyed, rifle green 26 (AC) Sqn flying suit) probably in March 1958

Charlie Davis debriefing Chris Parker on a field deployment c.1980

Thanks Tom Hammond for posting this on Twitter.

From Alan Pollock:

“COLD WAR, HOT JETS” BBC 2 now being screened on FRIDAY, 8th November at 9pm and, one imagines, one week later. The first programme’s focus seems to be on the ‘development of the jet engine’.

You may remember that we tried, many moons ago, to marshal whomever we could for the programme which the BBC was wanting to research and film, initially on airmen’s earlier memories and reminiscences about the Korean Air War. It was rather strange how this focus at the Beeb altered from the half dozen we suggested mostly ex-Sabre. Separately the BBC team seemed not to grasp both the importance, vulnerability & high losses of the SAAF Mustangs – an excellent voice recording by AV-M John Howe of this aspect has been easily available at the Imperial War Museum in the Korean War section for decades, at the touch of a button, with an impressively rapid fire description of his memories of all those sorties and targets.

The BBC contacts and I were particularly grateful for Ken Parry’s timely E & pointer to our making contact, from memory through Richie Profit, with Flt Lt J J Johnny Walker, who is now living out in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia but Johnny did manage to meet up in UK for some filming with the BBC team. He had flown Meteors in Korea with RAAF 77 Sqn Meteors.

From what Eric Macey has kindly let us know now is that some or all of that venture may well have been absorbed completely into this wider two-part programme, originally for the series “Jets in the Cold War” and now re-titled “Hot Jets, Cold War”. Besides Johnny & Eric Macey (AV-M who was on 4 Course Hunters at Pembrey then 263 and 1(F) Squadron Hunters and then over into V-Force), I believe that Martin Bee has also contributed on the Fighter side but sadly not his U-2 experiences of five decades ago, amazingly still rather ‘sub rosa’ despite other publications elsewhere.

Just a final thank you also to all those who helped us trace our ex-Korean Air War guys for the BBC and set the Beeb off on this track which seems to have morphed into some of this two part documentary.

BBC Link