Bueno Estente...!

Earlier this evening I was flicking through the Sky Channels and came across an episode of "The Fast Show" and in particular the sketch was the famous Chanel9 News and weather. If you've not seen it, the weather girl on there gives the forcast in a mad language but essentially says that everywhere is going to be "Scorchio".

This reminded me of a trip we once made across the Atlantic with some Tornado F3's. We were working on the Towed Radar Decoy that was fitted to the aircraft which was to undergo a trial in the vast deserts of Nevada. (Unfortunately this meant that we had to stay in Vegas...but into each life some rain must fall. But I digress.)

The Tornados couldn't make it all the way across the Atlantic and so we had to stage through the Lajes in the Azores. The engineers put the aircraft to bed and we raced to the hotel where we were to spend the night.

Here we arrived and were allocated rooms all along one corridor and we ruched to the rooms for a shower and to get changed so we could go out for a beer and some food. As is the RAF we, all the doors of the rooms were left open as we set about checking out the facilities. Each room had a TV - unfortunately with only one channel. Almost as one people turned the TV on and of course the local Azores weather forecast was on - in the local language of Portugese, presented by a young lady.

And as if as one...all that could be heard shouted from each room was "Scorchio!".

That night turned into a very, very long night...so long in fact that I didn't get back to my room until about 5:30am - having been to a very nice club on the beach, and made sand angels with a couple of locals who were quite friendly. The only thing about getting back at 5:30 was the fact that we had a call for the aircraft at 6:30. So a shower and a change and I was in the lobby of the hotel with my bag - and the bed unslept in.

The bonus was that we were flying across the Atlantic in a VC10 tanker which only had sbout 30 seats and the rest of the cabin was empty...enough space for me (and my room mate Mike - who'd been out with me all evening) to stretch out in and get a lot of sleep. I don't remember anything of the rest of the journey to Bangor in Maine, where our next stop over was.

And that night involved a newly opened bar. A baseball hat tucked into my back pocket and a very grumpy couple of bouncers who seemed to think it was a gun. But that is another story...

A Seasonal Wish...

As it is Christmas Eve, I would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone for spending time reading this blog and to those who have helped to contribute to the content by asking questions or engaging in great conversations over on Twitter.

I'd like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and Prosperous New Year.

Finally, as we all tuck into our festive food and drink, I'd like to ask you all to spend just a moment thinking about all members of the British Army, the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy who are not able to spend their Chrstmas at home with their loved ones, and particularly to think about the 107 men and women who died this year and will never spend another Christmas with their loved ones.

These 107 are:

Sjt Christopher Reed
Marine Travis Mackin
Cpt Tom Sawyer
Cpl Danny Winter
Cpl Richard Robinson
Cpl Daniel Neild
Marine Darren Smith
L/Cpl Stephen Kingscott
Cpl Tom Gaden
Rifleman Jamie Gunn
L/Cpl Paul Upton
Marine Michael Laski
L/Cpl Christopher Harkett
Cpl Greame Stiff
Cpl Dean John
L/Sgt Tobie Fasfous
Cpl Sean Binnie
Rifleman Adrian Sheldon
Sgt Ben Ross
Cpl Kumar Pun
Lt Mark Evison
Marine Jason Mackie
Fusilier Petero Suesue
Sapper Jordon Rossi
L/Cpl Kieron Hill
L/Cpl Robert Richards
L/Cpl Nigel Moffet
Cpl Stephen Bolger
Rifleman Cyrus Thatcher
Pte Robert McLaren
Lt Paul Mervis
Major Sean Birchall
Trooper Joshua Hammond
Lt Col Robert THorneloe
L/Cpl David Dennis
Pte Robert Laws
L/Cpl Dane Elson
Capt Ben Babbington-Browne
Trooper Christopher Whiteside
Rifleman Daniel Hume
Pte John Brackpool
Cpl Jonathan Horne
Rifleman Daniel Simpson
Rifleman Joseph Murphy
Rifleman William Aldridge
Rifleman James Backhouse
Cpl Lee Scott
Rifleman Aminiasi Toge
Cpl Joseph Etchells
Capt Daniel Sheperd
Guardsman Christopher King
Bombardier Craig Hopson
WO2 Sean Upton
Trooper Phillip Lawrence
Craftsman Anthony Lombardi
Pte Kyle Adams
Cpl Kevin Mulligan
Pte Jason Williams
Capt Mark Hale
Rifleman Daniel Wild
Lance Bombardier Matthew Hatton
Pte Richard Hunt
Sgt Simon Valentine
Fusilier Louis Carter
L/Cpl James Fullarton
Fusilier Simon Annis
Sjt Paul McAleese
Pte Johnathon Young
Fusiler Shaun Bush
Sgt Lee Houltram
Pte Kevin Elliot
Sgt Stuart Millar
L/Cpl Richard Brandon
Pte Gavin Elliott
Cpl John Harrison
Kingsman Jason Dunn-Bridgeman
A/Sjt Michael Lockett
Pte James Prosser
Senior Aircraftsman Marcin Wojtak
Guardsman Jamie Janes
L/Cpl James Hill
Cpl James Oakland
Cpl Thomas Mason
Staff Sgt Olaf Schmid
Sgt Matthew Telford
A/Cpl Steven Boote
Cpl Nicholas Webster-Smith
Guardsman Jimmy Major
WO1 Darren Chant
Sjt Phillip Scott
Rifleman Phillip Allen
Rifleman Samuel Bassett
Cpl Loren Marlton-Thomas
Rifleman Andrew Fentiman
Sgt Robert Loughran-Dickson
A/Sgt John Amer
Rifleman James Brown
L/Cpl David Kirkness
Cpl Simon Hornby
L/Cpl Michael Pritchard
Unnamed from the Parachute Regiment
L/Cpl Christopher Roney

RIP

Merry Christmas.

A Little Bit of History...

The footnote at the end of my last blog post about the history behind the blue uniform that we in the RAF wear led to a short Twitter conversation about a few bits of history and traditions we have.

One of those is why RAF bases are officially called Stations. For example Royal Air Force Station Benson.

Why are they called Stations and not Bases, or even Barracks?

The history - as far as I know it - behind this is this:

Lord Trenchard (the so called "Father of the RAF") spent his early years in the Army posted in India, where the military bases were often called Stations simply because they were alongside railway stations.

When he returned to the UK and set about the establishment of the Royal Air Force in 1918 he wanted to make the newly named RAF bases clearly different from the Army and Navy bases...and so he remembered his time in India and the Stations he had been posted to.

And so Royal Air Force Stations were established...

By they way, if you have any more questions then please ask away!

What to Wear...?

This news story about the new uniform to be issued to British Armed Forces got me thinking today.

It got me thinking about the amount of clothing I have been issued over the years. In my years in the service I've been issued the following:

No 1 Dress Uniform.
No 2 Working Dress.
DPM CS95 Combats.
Desert DPM CS95 Combats.
Tropical DPM Combats.
Khaki Drill (KD) Uniform.
(Oh and I bought my own No 5 Mess Dress.)

Now that's a LOT of stuff.

And a lot of kit. At a lot of money for each set of clothes, because the No 2's is, if I recall correctly, three pairs of trousers, two jumpers, 5 shirts, two ties, two belts, one pair of shoes and several pairs of socks. Added to that, there is a General Purpose Jacket (GPJ) - like a Bomber jacket as well as a Gore-Tex raincoat.

The CS95 has a similar range of kit - a lot of stuff...which means I need a big locker to store it in.

Now I had a thought about the range of sizes that are needed. And the amount of kit that there needs to be for 42,000 members of the RAF. And the stroage space for it.

It all adds up to a lot of clothing - and a lot of money spent of just clothing the RAF.

For what?

Why do we need so many different items of clothing. Why do we need so many items of clothing?

What for? Those who work on aircraft also have a set of working dark blue shirts and sets of denim coveralls to protect their uniform. What's the point of all this kit?

Why not get rid of the No2 working blues? We don't need them. Everything we do can be done in Combats. We could save a huge amount from the defence budget by binning the blues, and just wearing the greens.

CS95 is more comfortable and hardwearing. It woud also remind some people that the RAF is a deployable fighting force. We would all be wearing the same - and to add a bit of spice we could differentiate between trades by having trade badges on our greens (a bit like the RAF Regiment do with their "mud-guards").

I see the need for the Blue No1's Dress Uniform. This could be our link to the past - out tradition and our heritage. But modern day operations mean that No2's are just an anchronism of the past and do little but waste our time and the taxpayers (and we are taxpayers too) money!

So I say for one last time. Let's get rid of the No2 Working Dress and have all members of the RAF wearing CS95 Greens or the new stuff when that comes in.

(Oh and by the way, do you know why we in the RAF wear the blue that we do? Well, the RAF was of course formed in 1918 from the amalgamation of the Royal Naval Air Service and the Royal Flying Corps. It needed a Uniform. There was a pre-made uniform available sitting in a warehouse. The Tsar of Russia had ordered a new set of clothing in Russian Blue for his armed forces, but of course the Tzar had been deposed in the Russian Revolution in 1917.

So it made sense to use this set of uniform that was sitting gathering dust for the new service that was the Royal Air Force.)

Every Day is a Learning Day...

In my last job I was an instructor at a training camp. It was the very best job, as the post gave me freedom to do pretty much what I wanted. Well I say that, but what we had to teach was strictly set down - but HOW to teach it was not, and my post was all about teaching trainees to be "better" airmen. The technical schools did their job at making them good technicians, but it was my job to get them to be good airmen; to expand their soft skills - teamwork, communication, common sense...

I did this through running a 3 day exercise at the end of their training course where as well as doing their primary role of working on aircraft or tele-communications equipment (or even as combat photographers!) they had to pretend to be deployed to a Forward Operating Base in a made up country in Africa.

This deployment was in reality to the far side of the airfield, but it was to a purpose built campsite that was "austere". This meant that there were no home comforts. Just tents to sleep in, a mess tent for cooking rations for food and a command bunker made from the same materials that they will find when they go into theatre - Hesco-Bastion. At the two entrances to the camp there were also Hesco guard posts that provided protection against “mortars” and such like. Here mobile phones were banned and they stayed on site for the three days working long days (from 6am-midnight) rotating between providing security for the site (guard duties and patrols) and working on the aircraft.

Anyway, to make the deployment more realistic, we as instructors would throw in scenarios for the trainees to respond to. These would be, at times, quite realistic...from vehicle patrols that would drive over a "Improvised Explosive Device" (the now infamous "IED") to foot patrols to recover "pilots" who had ejected from crashed aircraft.

One that I came up with was an extended one that ran for a couple of hours and relied on one of the trainees to help me out. This was a "Proxy-bomber" scenario.

In this I would wait until the night and take a section out on a foot patrol, having primed the last man in the team to go missing as we patrolled through a particularly dark area. The section would invariably not notice that he was missing until we returned to the safety of the base...

(He himself was primed to make his own way to a nice safe portacabin - with the luxury of a real toilet and a proper heater. There he would find a set of combat body armour (CBA) with the kevlar removed and stuffed with rolls of paper. These inside the CBA would look like sticks of explosive. Wires and an "aerial" would complete the gear - to make it look like he was wearing a "suicide bomber" jacket.

Now this is serious stuff. One of the things that has happened in the past Northern Ireland and Vietnam and a few other places) is the idea of a proxy bomber. The "enemy" would capture someone and strap a bomb to them and then send them back to the place that they want blowing up. This way maximum damage for minimal losses.

So. Our stooge, Paul, straps himself into the CBA and, at the pre-determined time, leaves the safety and warmth of the portacabin and walks across to the main gate of the FOB, where, by matter of chance is one of his course-mates.

As he gets close to the gate, he then starts to shout and scream for help, as he had been told to in his briefing earlier. I told him that he must scream for help and tell the guards that he had been captured by the enemy, who had strapped this jacket to him and then told him it was a bomb. He then was released and told to "go home". The enemy were watching him and the bomb jacket was remote controlled and would explode it when they were ready. His task was to gain entry to the camp anyway he could – to push past the guards, anything, short of actual physical violence. However, should the guards be calm – he was to calm down, basically he was to the guards in the way they reacted to him. Finally, if he was told to go into the Hesco’s by the gate then he was to do so.

This is actually the best outcome for this situation. If the poor lad was wearing a bomb then the best thing for him is to be calmed down and brought onto the camp but placed in a location that will cause as little damage as possible if the bomb detonates. Whilst in this location he can then wait for Bomb-Disposal (or EOD) who will come to save him!

Back at the FOB…Our lad came wandering up to the gate shouting. The guard does exactly as he should do and issue a warning along the lines of stop or I fire. The lad stops and puts his hands up, but carries on shouting “Help” only this time he adds the name of the guard (who we’ll call “Jonesy”).

Jonesy asks his course mate what is going on and the lad replies exactly as he has been told. “I’ve got a bomb strapped to me! The bastards are watching and say they are gonna blow it!” (He must be commended for his acting.)

At this news Jonesy takes a step back. And pulls out his radio. But the other guard shouts at him not to transmit…IED’s can explode if a radio is used near to them. (Tick, very good, to that lad – he’s learnt something on his training!) Jonesy tells him to run to “get someone – anyone!” which he duly does…this leaves poor Jonesy on his own.

Paul starts to move forward again…”Come on mate, let me in…I don’t want to die!” But Jonesy stands firm. “Paul, mate stand still. Sit down there and be cool…” (Well done Jonesy; trying to calm the poor fella.)

Jonesy tries to talk to Paul and calm him, but as he does so, starts to panic a little and so Paul does as instructed and starts to do the same. Paul stands up and walks towards the gate…Jonesy steps back…and Paul gets up to the gate line. He goes to step into the camp and this sets Jonesy into a real panic.

Now Jonesy is “armed” with the standard issue L85A2 “SA80” assault rifle, with two magazines of 30 rounds of blank ammunition. As Paul steps forward one more time, Jonesy cocks the rifle and then as Paul takes one more step he takes aim and fires the rifle…AT HIS MATE PAUL.

Now I had been watching all this, without stepping in at any stage, but at this dramatic turn of events I had to.

Paul stood and looked at Jonesy. Then, rather comically, down at his chest, where he’d just been “shot”. Obviously there was nothing there and he was perfectly alright, but…but…it was what it meant.

I stepped forward. “Jonesy, put the rifle down and step back. What the hell…What did you just do…What the hell, man…SHIT YOU SHOT HIM!”

“I, I, I, didn’t know what to do…”

“So you thought you’d shoot me!” said Paul.

“I, I, I, er….shit. I…errrrr...”

“Right. Seriously Jones. Put the rifle down and go and sit down. You SHOT HIM!” I said. I honestly couldn’t believe what had happened. And to be honest I was a bit lost for what to do next.

I mean Jonesy had just “shot” hit mate. Someone who he had been with all the way through training, some 7 months. This was mad, crazy. How the hell do we…I…deal with this, and what it meant.

It meant that Jonesy and Paul’s trust had just been seriously attacked and diminished. It meant that Jonesy needed to think a bit more about what he might be faced with in the future. It meant that in 6 months time when Jonesy is deployed and on guard at a gate somewhere hot and dusty and scary…well how would he cope if this happened for real.

“Jonesy. You shot your mate. Can you imagine what the hell this would have meant if this was for real? Can you imagine the front page of the newspapers? ’Cos I tell you what, mate, something like this would make page one. Big time!”

“I want you to go and have a cuppa in the Mess Tent, and have a chill out and think about this event. Don’t worry about it, nothings going to happen over it – it’s why we have training, so we can make mistakes where the outcome doesn’t really matter. But you still need to  have a good think about it.”

And I did too. It made me think about what our young lads have to go through. How would I have dealt with that scenario? What would I have done? How would I have coped with Paul shouting and screaming? Would I have been a calming influence? Or would I have panicked like Jones and done something mad, crazy?

When I was a young trainee of 18-19 the biggest thing that we were faced with were the big bad Russians who were going to come across and bomb us. But we knew that in reality they were never going to actually do that. We would never really have to go to war, and certainly would never be face to face with the enemy.

But these lads…they have to go out to Afghanistan or where-ever the hell we are sent to next, and are faced with seeing and doing things that I would never have imagined. And it made me a bit scared, but also a bit proud. What I was doing was helping them to be prepared for such things…in a way I had never been prepared for. Maybe because of this incident – Jonesy for certain – would be better aware of himself and of what he may have to do in the future so that he doesn’t make a mistake like for real, where it may actually cost someone their life.

After a good sit down and a bit of banter and a good cup of tea, Jonesy was ok. He had learnt a bit about himself and maybe matured ever so slightly. He certainly had learnt a few things that might help him in his future career. Paul forgave him for shooting him…saying that if the shoe was on the other foot then he had no idea how he would have coped.

And again it made me think. How would I have dealt with it in real life? But for the moment I am lucky and I don’t have to think about how I would do it for real.

And to be honest, I hope I don’t HAVE to think about it for real and never have to face it.

Getting the Goat...

Conversation here in the office often can get a bit "sandbaggy".  This is when we tell our respective "war stroies" about things we've done in different jobs in the past, and I was reminded of a story that happened on a detachment back in the 1990's.

We were over in Wittmund on a Tactical Air Meet.  There were several nations of NATO countries there, UK, USA, Germany, Spain, Holland, Portugal, Denmark...and probably a few others.

Anyway, the best thing about this det was the social side of the deployment.  It was actually based at Javer (where beer lovers will recognise a brewery making Javer Pils) where there was a sponsored beer tent, but our accommodation was in Wittmund.  Several other nations also had stayed on that base too.

After having a few beers in the tent, we hit the town and, again in the spirt of international union and friendship several groups of different nations decended on a bar in the middle of town.  Songs were sung. Beer was drank. Friendships were made.

It was a themed bar with lots of (for want of a better word) toys - dolls, nik-naks, cars and so forth -  all about the building. We called it the Noddy Bar because of a small Noddy car that was one of the center-piece displays hanging from the ceiling.

And there was also a goat. A paper-mache goat. Life-size. Which stood by the door.

It would have made a great "gizzit" for our squadron bar back home.

An excellent gizzit.

So.

The Lineys stole it. They distracted the bar staff by dropping a load of drinks and making a fuss and someone else did a runner with the goat under his arm.

And the bar went mad! The owner of the bar had a real fit. She hopped up and down and screamed and threw everyone out of the bar!  We all moved on, or else drifted off home.

The goat made it back to the block we were using on base and was hidden under a bed.

Next day, the whole detachment (some 40-odd people) were called together for a briefing. The Detachment Commander - a lovely chap, who's name I clearly remember but don't want to use as he is still in the RAF - and in quite a senior post now - gave us a briefing.

"It's about the goat" he began.

"I am not blaming YOU, but if anyone of you has got this bloody goat, then if you take it back nothing more will be said. The owner of the bar...her husband is something big on station here and she is not happy, and so HE is not happy. It's got the potential to be an international incident.  Each nation here has been told to breif their troops with the same message. Give the goat back."

One of the Lineys spoke. "I saw the Yanks crowding round the goat last night."

"No," said another "I think they were Canadians."

"Nooooooo, it was the Cloggies. You know the Dutch, they're right animals when they've had a beer."

"Wasn't it the Belgians?"

And so it went on. Every other nation with aircraft there were mentioned as possible offenders for stealing the goat.

Apart from ourselves of course.

Needless to say the Goat didn't get returned and the day we were to fly home we all sat on a bus waiting to get on the C-130. With a blanket over the goat. And when the Loadmaster signalled for us to get on board, we ran across the pan with our bags...and of course the goat under one mans arm.

It made it back to Base without incident and right away it was installed in OUR squadron bar. By the door.

Each beercall the Goat was toasted by the groundcrew, and those of us who'd been on the det were hailed as heroes. And the tradition grew that the Goat be tapped on its head as people entered the bar.  BUT the only people who could actually tap the head of the goat were those who'd been on the det when it had been...errr...liberated.

Questions, questions...

I recently asked for some questions - that would need answers on this blog (Hey! it's not easy coming up with things for me to witter on about you know!) and I got a Tweet from @sperryuk who asked a couple of questions in one go. I've split them up to answer them...

"Why the RAF?"

Hmmmm. Well.  I blame my family.  My Dad was in the RAF (although he completed his 22 years just as I was being born - he left as a Sgt (as I am now)) and my brother joined the RAF back when I was 8 in 1977.  So I just kind of wanted to be in the RAF.  They seemed to enjoy it, and it was a forces household so I was kind of used to the way of life before I was in, with regards to the humour and understanding the lifestyle anyway. So joining the RAF was something I wanted to do ever since I can remember wanting to do something - if you know what I mean. There was a short time when I was thinking about trying something else (oddly enough being a history teacher) but this quickly passed and I joined the RAF as soon as I could  when I passed the, minimum age - 17 and a half as it was then.  I originally wanted to be an engines man, but that option closed on the day of my interview and I had the opportunity of joining as a Radar Techie. Which I took.

Now I am in, I am glad I joined, and there haven't been many days when I have not been glad to have been in the RAF.  I'm not saying that everyday has been fluffy bunnies and pink flowers everywhere, but the dark and bad days have been fairly few in number.

"What's the hardest role?"

I can only answer this from my own background.  I have said in my FAQ what jobs I have done - and the most enjoyable was when I was a personal development instructor at RAF Cosford...but the hardest one I have done has to have been when I was working "first line" on 29(F)Sqn.  Here I had to service the jets - from putting in the oils and fuel to checking the airframe and tyres for faults and then I had to be able to work on all the avionics equipment as well. 

This meant I had to have a working knowledge of the Radar system, the Comms/Radio systems, the Auto-pilot, the Flight Systems and stability equipments as well as the Missile Warning Receivers and the cockpit displays. Some of which were really easy systems like the radios...quick box in box out stuff...and some that were a nightmare to work on...like the Command Stability Aumentation System (CSAS) or the Main Radar, which at that time, back then, was really, really, really unreliable.

"How does history impact on postings (bases etc)?"

Well, the short answer is it doesn't! The posting system of ALL the armed forces are a strange and dark art, practised by strange and dark people, who's main aim seems to be to fill posts as quick as possible, without really listening to the needs, wants and desires of the individuals themselves.  (And THAT has guarenteed me a posting to Machrihanish...)

Once upon a time the RAF had loads of bases all over the country where people could get posted to, and you could move relaitively easily between them.  But now the number of bases is falling and so postings are more difficult to sort out as there are simply less places in the country to go.  I was being a bit harsh above, the drafters have a bloomin' hard job to do to try and keep everyone in the RAF at their preferred location AND then have to weigh this up against the needs of the service. In general they do it OK.  I could have been posted to Marham when I got promoted - and this would have been really the wrong location for me, but a bit of sweet talking got them to post me down here to Benson instead.  So they DO listen and they do help out when they can.  After all, grumpy airmen not at places where they want to be means airmen more likely to want to leave the service...

"Who are the posers?"

This one made me laugh. There are different answers to this; but the first ones that spring to mind are, obviously, the aircrews.  Particularly fast jet pilots.  There is a standing joke in the RAF: "How do you know if someone's a Harrier pilot? Don't worry, he'll tell you..."

But there are others who can "pose about". NCO aircrew get a lot of flak, as do the PTI's - the Physical Training Instructors.  But in the end it's all down to stereotypes.  People in different trades and specialisations have stereotypes of the others.  Techies take the mick out of PTI's and Suppliers. Suppiers and MT drivers take the mick out of Techies...EVERYONE takes the mick out of aircrews...but in the end it's all just harmless banter.  Everyone does their job and the aircraft fly and the bad guys get what is coming to them.

I hope these answers help in some way.

If anyone has got anymore questions for me, about anything to do with me or the RAF then please don't hesitate to get in touch either on this blog, or like @sperryuk did via Twitter.

The Big Breakfast...

Just a moment ago over on Twitter the subject of breakfast came up...and I was reminded of a time when I was out on deployment in Italy in the 1990's.


It'd be about 1995-6 and the RAF was providing air cover over the former Yugoslavia to stop the Serbs bombing, well, pretty much everyone in Bosnia and Kosovo.  This basically meant that our aircraft went up onto a Combat Air Patrol over the sea near to the former Yugoslavia, ready to be vectored in by an AWACS should the Serbs ever decide to put any aircraft up.  They occasionally did , but not very often.  Anyway the RAF's timeslot to provide a CAP (of two or sometimes four aircraft) was about 6am.  But there was a 40 minute transit time to the CAP station, and with the faff that launching jets entails it meant that we were normally in work for an "early shift" at about 2am.


In this time we'd do the Before Flight (B/F) servicing, and check for faults.  We'd prepare the aircraft for the aircrew and then we'd wait for them to arrive and carry out the "See Off" to litterally see the jets off to carry out their patrol.


By 6am, we'd be starving though.  And the RAF had provided what they call a Feeder for us - basically a mess hall for us to use whilst at work.  And in the mornings the Feeder staff - also RAF personnel - would put on a fantastic breakfast for us.

We were out there during the southern Italian winter in the moauntains around a place called Gioia Del Colle, which was quite high up and often got a good covering of snow.  Spending 3-4 hours outside working on the aircraft in that sort of weather, and at that time of the morning made for us to be hungry bears...and I, being a bear with a small brain, but big appetite, used to enjoy having the breakfasts out there.  In fact I have to say that the Breakfasts was the best thing about going to Gioia.

I have always enjoyed breakfast and the Feeder provided the opportunity to have a really good fast broken!  I used to make up a big breakfast sandwich.

Firstly the Feeder made their own bread...so I would cut two thick doorsteps for the sandwich.

On the base I would get a couple of sausages and cut them open.

On the Sausages I would layer a slice (or two) of bacon.

Then I'd put a cheeky layer of fried mushrooms.

On the top of this would be a tasty RUNNY fried egg.

And to top it all off would be a spoonful of baked beans - and of course the final slice of bread.

And this would see me through to the late afternoon when we'd knocked off shift and driven back to our accommodation (about an hours journey away) where we'd take a trip to the local cafe to have a latte...and then either go to bed, or have a trip out somewhere to do a bit of shopping in the local town of Monopoli or a little further afield in Bari (where oddly there was a fantastic Chinese restaurant).

When I returned home I told my wife of the breakfasts that we'd had - and she'd rightly refused to make anything like it...but now...

Now I'm divorced, I live in the Mess.  And each morning I go down to the Dining Hall for my breakfast...I have a bowl of cereal - some Fruit and Fibre with a few Crunchy Nut Cornflakes on the top.

All very healthy.  But you wouldn't beleive the temptation to go through to the hot servery to try and re-create those belly buster breakfasts that I'd had out in Italy...it'd be so easy to go and pile up my plate.

Hmmmm, I wonder if I should treat myself, just tomorrow morning...I mean it wouldn't hurt JUST the once...

Would it?

Learning To Fly...

In a recent blog post I wrote about a normal day for mer (not that I have one), I thought I'd do a post about an abnornal day I once had.  But it was one of the best days I have ever had...I was reminded of it by a Twitter post about low flying...

Anyway.

Myself and "Milburn" (a lovely lad from 'oop north' who reminded us of the dim one from Last of the Summer Wine - all muscles and accent) were standing at the Radar trade desk in work. A normal Tuesday, we were both Junior Technicians, and we were both fairly keen and both looking for the next job to do to pass the time, when all of a sudden on of the controllers came up to the desk and said...there is a back seat trip going this afternoon...and it was the radar desks turn...was there anyone who would want to go?

Back seat trip. Yeah. That's right. A trip in the back seat of the two seat Tornado F3 fast jet fighter.

My Chief was standing with us both and said, "Well you two are here...do you fancy it?"

Of course we flipping well did! We both looked at each other...who would get it. I'd been on the sqn the longest out of both of us, but that would be a crap way to decide, so the Chief made the decision. "Heads or tails?" Milburn called tails, but it came out HEADS! I was going...

Off I went to get my head measured - yeah - head measured...so my bone dome helmet would fit, and then over to the doctors to make sure my ears and bits were ok and that I could safely fly without the internal bits of me popping out of places that they shouldn't if we were to pull a high G turn. I am talking intestines and ear canals and eyes and stuff like that.

So I passed that test and it was reassuring to know, that at that time, my insides were not likely to become outsides and went back to the sqn for briefings.

Briefings on how to use the ejection system. Briefings on how to use a parachute. Briefings on how to use the intercom system. Briefings on how to use the oxygen system. Briefings on how to use a sick-bag. All really reassuring stuff again.

And then about an hour before the flight I went to get dressed. Now you may think that a pilot looks really cool with the helmet and the jacket and the jump-suit and the boots and the G-suit...what you may not know that the cool stuff is just on the outside.

Under all that cool gear, about as far away from a pair of Raybans as you can get, are the long-johns, and the big thick woolly socks, and the polar necks. In white. So not cool. And all this I had to put on before the jump suit. I was then measured for the G-suit; basically a pair of inflatable chaps that are designed to keep the inside bits inside when pulling high-G, their other role is to push down on the delicate bits when pulling said high-G to force the blood away to the extremities - in particular the head so that you don't blank out. The effect is rather like being placed into a vice...

Anyway. After being suitable dressed (and made to wear a head-cap that a lad at a Bar-Mitzvah would be jealous of) I was pushed through to meet my driver for the trip. Now I knew all the pilots. I worked with them day on day, I took de-briefs from them on the faults that the aircraft had picked up during flight, and I hoped for a particular one, and thankfully I got him. A guy called Lee Fox. A great pilot, who I had once seen do the best bit of low-flying ever. In Cyprus he participated in a "beat up" of the air base, by flying up over the Line (where we parked the aircraft) around the Tacan Navigation tower, and then the swinging round the other way behind the hanger, and then across the taxiway at about 50 feet...

But I digress. Lee asked me what I wanted to get out of the trip. I wanted to go fast. I didn't care about aerobatics, or going over my house or anything. I just wanted to go FAST.

So after more briefings about the flight, off we went to the aircraft. These were parked in individual hangers or Hardened Aircraft Shelters (HAS) which were supposed to withstand the impact of enemy (read Russian) bombs. These had a fundamental flaw. Whilst the building could withstand a blast. The effect of the blast inside them would kill everyone inside simply by the blast wave itself. Oh well. We only found this out after the First Gulf War...and by the time we had, the Russians were our friends anyway.

So into the HAS, and then into the cockpit. I was strapped in by one of my colleagues and told how to avoid airsickness (keep looking at the horizon), but given a couple of sick bags anyway.

The jet started up...first one engine and then the ladder was taken away and the cockpit canopy was lowered and the left engine was started. This all made me feel like I was in some sort of MASSIVE roller coaster ride. You know how you get that nervous sickly feeling in your stomach as the coaster goes UP towards the first drop, with the click, click, click, click of the ratchet pulling you up...and you KNOW that any moment the ride will kick in.

But this lasted longer. The click, click, click, click in my head got worse as we taxied down the road towards the end of the runway...all the time Lee in the front seat was doing his pre-flight checks and talking to the Air Traffic Control Tower, and my nerves were getting worse...and then we made the last turn onto the end of the runway.

All of a sudden we were still. It was surprisingly quiet in the cockpit. The final "OK to go" was given and Lee asked me one last time "Are you ready?"

I nodded. My mouth was to dry to speak. The thing was it was pointless me nodding at the cockpit on an F3 was a tandem one - me behind Lee, and so there was no way he could see me nodding. "Alex? OK to go?" one more time.

This time I rasped a "yea"...and then I looked down. The version of F3 I was in was a two seat trainer, so I had a set of controls in the back as well as all the usual Radar gizmo's that were usually there for the Navigator - or more rightly Weapons Operator to use.

So I looked down. The throttles moved forward very quickly and the noise intensified. All of a sudden the fields and buildings by the side of the runway started to move fast. They started to move very fast. Very, very fast. I was pushed gently, but firmly back into the seat and we gently lifted off. There was a clunk as the wheels came up and Lee's voice broke through. "You want us to do a high-G?"

By this he meant do what we called a high-G take off. By this they meant flying low along to the end of the runway, and then the stick being pulled back quickly and hard, the throttles pushed forward fast and the jet flips up onto the vertical and we go straight up. By this I knew that I would be sick. "NOOOOOOOOO" I said a little too loudly.

Lee giggled and we slowly gained height over the Lincolnshire countryside. The clouds were angry all about us with a summer thunderstorm brewing. "We need to find a hole in the clouds, 'cos flying through those is not fun."

We skirted about for a bit and gained more altitude and we flew up through a gap. The clouds were forming the classic anvil of a thunder storm, and were very dark...someone was going to get a soaking, but then almost instantaneously we punched out into glorious sunshine above them. It was absolutely glorious up there. "Do it then" I said "Let's go fast."

We were flying over Spurn Head - clearly visible below.

"Oh noooooooo" said Lee. We can't yet. We need to get 12 miles out to sea. We can't go supersonic over land...we'd shatter too many windows, and generally piss people off, with the sonic boom."

For those 12 miles I got the click, click, click, click, back again in my head...and then...

And then..."Ready?"

"Yes" I replied without thinking.

And the throttles moved forward again. Lee banged them forward quickly and we jumped forward. It was the biggest kick in the pants I ever had. But it was an odd kick because as I knew we were going forward I was pushed back into the seat. I was pushed back like some bouncer firmly taking hold of both shoulders and PUSHING me firmly and quickly out of a club. Like a BIG bouncer was doing it.

We leaped forward quickly and I could see on the screen in front of me a representation of the speed. We went from a couple of hundred knots to fast. BLOODY FAST. Within seconds we were up to Mach 1. A second or two more I saw the throttles rock over into the reheat position and the speed really kicked in. Mach 1.3...1.4...1.7...1.9....MACH 2. Curiously there was silence. We had left our sound behind us. Travelling twice the speed of sound, over 1400mph...there was no sound, no roar of the jet engines, no sonic boom. Nothing. Whilst I knew there was noise and chaos behind us, around us was only sky and calm and the sound of both Lee and myself breathing slowly in my headset.

Outside, the sea was a blur. The clouds swept by like a crazy speeded up sequence in some natural history television programme. It took just 3 minutes to travel the 60 or so miles. And I was blown away by the feeling of the speed. I was still pushed back into the seat, head forced back and stiff, unable to move my arms or legs. I tried to raise them, more out of curiosity but was unable to do so. I couldn't move...and then the throttles were pulled back and the air brakes came out and we slowed rapidly...so rapidly it was like the bouncer had disappeared and my whole body moved forward in the seat until the straps took hold and pulled me back.

I looked up and could see the fuel gauge. As we speed across the North Sea, the coast of Norfolk grew larger by the second and the gauge had dropped by almost half.

"It uses up the fuel going that fast, so we don't really have long left in the flight, Alex. About 15 minutes...before we have to turn back. Let's go back out to sea and do a bit of messing around."

"Its a twin stick Alex. Do you want a go? Just concentrate on the stick...I'll sort the throttle and the pedals."

"Yeah...yes please!"

"Ok. You have control!"

My hands flew to the stick and grasped firmly.

"Try a roll, just push the stick over to the ri......ugh"

As he said "right" I pushed the stick hard and fast. We corkscrewed through the air like a fly spiralling out of an air conditioning outlet..."Next time move the stick very gently, mate. It's quite responsive up here...

"Pull back, gently, gently, gently"

The nose lifted, slowly. The sea disappeared. The horizon went. The blueness of the sky was all there was, and then Lee told me to hold it. "Look up" he said.

I looked up. But my brain couldn't comprehend it. It should have been sky. But it was sea. I was upside down! My arms went strangely floppy - for a very brief second I was weightless...and then Lee broke my reverie. "Roll and then push forward."

I rolled - gently this time pushed forward and we dived. We lost altitude rapidly and I felt Lee's hand through the feedback on the stick...and we levelled out. "Well done, mate. Not many people do a full roll on their first flight. I have control!"

I let go of the stick and Lee took over. Some gentle aeros. We swept. We soared. We dived. We looped. At one stage we dived really fast and then pulled up sharply over a fishing boat.

We swung around a gas platform and Lee took us up high and we turned back in the direction of Coningsby and home. And as we did all this, that click, click, click, click was gone. Long gone. And replaced by a soundtrack. For some reason a Pink Floyd song came into my head. "Learning to Fly".

Over and over I heard this lyric:

"Above the planet on a wing and a prayer,
My brother Haley, a vapour trail in the empty air
Across the clouds I see my shadow fly
Out of the corner of my watering eye"

and I felt the exhilaration. I felt what the pilots feel each and every time they go up there. I felt the ecstasy. I understand why they did it, and why they do it day on day even though everything about it is danger and fear and worry and potential disaster. The freedom. The control. The ability to do anything and go anywhere and anyhow. It was just...just...words fail me. I wish I had the ability to say exactly how it felt and what I felt.

But I can't.

But the last lines of Pink Floyd's song manage remind me. Everytime I hear it I get the hairs on the back of my head standing up and an odd tingle in my arms...and I am reminded of one of the very best experiences of my life.

"There's no sensation to compare with this
Suspended animation, a state of bliss
Can't keep my mind from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted just an earthbound misfit, I"

And then I think on. I think about this verse. It is true for me now. I often look to the sky when I hear a fast jet fly over...and I think about that trip and I think that Dave Gilmour was right. I am just an earthbound misfit. But for 30 minutes one Tuesday afternoon I was a flyer.

Out of Area...

I was recently asked this question on Twitter:

"When you get deployed, what is your role within your team? I know you are an AV Tech, but what does it entail?"

Well.  This is an ace question.

Of course in my CURRENT role there isn't much call for a Deployable Continuous Improvement facilitator, so I wouldn't be deployed in THAT role, I'd go "Out Of Area" (OOA) as an AV Tech.

Or at least you'd think I would.

I think now is a good time to explain just what the RAF does with regards to deployments and how it deploys people.  And it does so in one of two ways.  Either as part of a "Formed Unit" - Say 617 Sqn getting sent away somewhere - or as part of a "Non-Formed Unit" - where we just get sent out to fill a post out "there".

Formed Units go out and do the job they train for when they are back at home.  Lets look at the Merlin Force who are in the process of building up out in Afghan right now (and as I type I read that they have gone operational out there).  The Engineers will travel en-masse in groups to theatre, and go through the theatre arrivals processes together (I won't bore you with that, but essentially a LOT of briefings), and then go about doing their normal job - fixing helicopters - but just deployed. So the Avionics guys will work on the Avionics of the aircraft, the heavies will look after the engines and airframes; Armourers looking after any weapons equipment that may be fitted to them, and so on.  As I say, they'll be doing their normal jobs out there.

For ME...I am not part of a squadron and so would go out as Non-Formed Unit personnel.  In this case I might go out in my role as an Avionics Tech - but as far as I know there are no avionics bays out there for me to work in - and so I would very probably go in an "any trade" post.  These are the more interesting jobs such as assisting in managing the Helicopter operations, or acting as a Guard Commander, or just doing general administration of the sites out there.  I could even go out and do one of the Military Stabilisation Team jobs, or act as a trainer to the local forces.  The list is pretty endless.

So it's quite difficult to say what I'd be doing if I were to go out of area.  It's fairly easy if you are working on the aircraft on the flying squadrons, but more complicated if you are not.  When I went out to Saudi in the 90's I was in a Formed Unit working on the Tornados or the equipment fitted to them but now.  What I end up doing if...WHEN I go out there (as I know I surely will at some stage) will be down to the sort of job that I am in, and what jobs they need doing Out Of Area.


As an aside - if you've got ANY questions about life or work in the RAF, then please don't hesitate to contact me either as a comment on these pages or via @RAFairman on Twitter.

The Longest Journey...

I'm not smart enough to remember who said it but, "the longest journey begins with the shortest step."

I'm sure lots of people have made long journeys.  But have you made difficult journeys? What is your most difficult journey?

Mine was a delightful trip across to Goose Bay in Canada.  At Goose Bay the fast jets could use the vast wilderness of northern Canada to practise their low flying without disturbing anyone, and hence it was a popular destination for us to travel to.  (Popular with the pilots actually - but only when flying, not really any other time as Goose Bay is a bit of a one horse town. If I recall correctly it has about 12 miles of tarmac-ed road which just stops, two or so bars, and just a couple of shops. Oh and a fantastic pizza place.  But I digress.)

One particular trip out there I was selected to fly across in a C-130 Hercules.  These may look graceful and if you see them flying about in the UK they are often at low level and tonking along at fairly high speed, but the one I was on this time was loaded down with over 50 people and a LOT of kit.

How do you imagine the seating to be on a Herc? Well, it's certainly not very comfortable.  The seats for passengers are all along the side of the aircraft, leaving the main floor space free for pallet loads of kit to be secured down.  Occasionally if the Herc is configured as a "trooper" then there are a second row of seats put down in the middle of the floor - but the narrow width of the body of the aircraft mean that there is not quite enough room for legs and knees and such, and you find that your left leg is between the knees of the person sitting opposite you, and his right leg is between yours...and so on. Legs are alternated along the length of the row of seats, which are a single bench-like effort.  The only way you know where your "seat" is, is from matching up a pair of seat belt ends to form a single belt which secures you in...almost safely!

Anyway, this one had a combination of the two - a short trooper, but with pallet space to the rear.  The next important thing to know about travelling on a Herc is the position of where you sit dictates how comfortable your flight will be.

Not that it is ever REALLY comfortable.

But for the sake of it. If you sit at the front - the journey will be noisy, but warm...but if you sit at the back then the reverse is true...its relatively quiet, but it can get very cold.

In this case, to fly across the Atlantic, I was fortunate to sit at the back of the plane. This meant that I would be able to take advantage of the spare space that the ramp offers - I had come prepared you see - with a sleeping bag.

Because I knew that the journey would take 13 hours.

Yes. 13 hours.

So I want you to imagine the scene of being on a C-130.  You get to sit, during take off and landing, with your knees between the legs of someone else...and their knees are between yours.  If you are lucky you may be able to stay warm for the trip, but you will end up deafened...or else you might be in the situation I was going to be in, able to get some sleep, as long as you are well wrapped up.

Every so often you will get stepped on by the Loadmaster, who for some reason wanders about the cabin with a torch looking at things. I think he's just doing it for something to do, he doesn't need to do it. He just does it to spook people out and to keep himself busy.

A few other times you will find yourself dripped on by what you hope is water...you are never quite sure it is...but you hope so.  One thing you know it isn't is that you know it hasn't come from the toilet.  Oh! The toilet!  This is a posh, stainless steel bucket with chemicals in.  With a fabric curtain around it to preserve your dignity.  You never, NEVER, ever, sit down on it...

The best thing you can hope for is to get yourself out of the seat as soon as you can, find a comfortable place to spread out (if possible) and to SLEEP. Sleep for the entire duration of the journey.

If you can sleep. Because there is one thing I forgot to say.  It's the vibration.  It's like strapping yourself to a 1950's washing machine which has developed an ability to wander across the kitchen when left on. Now do that for 13 hours.

But you know what. I loved it. I love travelling. But as some people like travelling to get to places, I like travelling for the sake of going there. And it is journeys like this one that really pique my interest...and I love them.

I've done the 13hours across the Atlantic. I've been on a Herc flying out of Al Kharj to Turkey where we had to divert into Amman, Jordan (due to a lightning strike in Turkey).  I've flown on a Tristar where half the cabin space was an open floor - open enough to be able to have a game of football. I've watched Tornado F3's carry out Air-to-Air refuelling with the VC-10 that I've been flying in. I've watched us leave the Tornado's standing as that same VC-10 cruised away from them after that refuel has been completed.  I've been on a Herc where the underfloor heating (such as it is) had broken and had ramped up to the maximum and our boots were melting as we tried to walk around...

But I've had some great trips. Difficult trips. Long trips. Short trips. But there is one thing I have learnt from flying with RAF air transport is that invariably the getting there is always interesting.

Operation Comete...A Photo Story...

If you are over 40, OR are unfortunate to be at home during the day and have satelite TV, then you may be familiar with the TV programme "The Secret Army".

This was the original programme that "'allo 'allo" went on to take the micky out of, but was based on the factual expliots of the Resistance to the German Occupation during World War 2.  The notable feature of BOTH programmes were the downed airmen who's aim was to evade from the Germans and escape back to Britain by being passed along a chain of helpers to get them out of Belgium and France and across the Pyrenees and into Spain.

(As an aside, I have spoken to ex-RAF aircrew about the programme 'Allo 'Allo...and they are not very complimentary of it. They didn't like the idea of the Germans in it being portrayed as stupid and bumbling.  In fact despite some 60 years passing there still was a great animosity towards the Germans - understandably I guess.  But I think that if Harry Patch could forgive after 90 years...maybe...but then, who am I to judge? I have no idea what those guys in that war went through - I despite taking part in events to re-create several things from the war and talk to people involved originally - I cannot imaging what it must have been like to do those things for real.)

This was called the Comete Line and was originally set up by the fantastic Dedee de Jongh, and was successful in some 4000 aircrew making their escape from the Germans.

This is a bit of an un-known part of RAF history and so to raise a bit of awareness as part of our Leadership and Personal Development training a party of some 30 of us from RAF Cosford undertook the task of recreating the route of the escape line - From Brussels through to Hernani in Spain.

The first part was cycling across France, where we biked for about 9 hours a day in shifts with people always biking and the others resting in the support van. Ours was Team Pasty...Don't ask why, but maybe by the look of some of the bellies in the picture above you may be able to guess...Some of the cycling was fairly easy through picturesque fields of France, although it got harder as we got closer to the Pyrenees. Not exactly Tour de France stuff, but it certainly tested our fitness...

After a week of this we transfered to foot where we were to spend two days walking across the Pyrenees from France into Spain. This was a fairly difficult route that was exactly the same as they had done in the 1940's.  That house in the background was the last staging post in France. It was also the place that Dedee was arrested by the German Gestapo.  It was, er, quite wet for the walk, which given the heat, made things to be a bit uncomfortable.

It involved a river crossing, which marked the border between France and Spain. It was remarkably smelly and remarkably cold! In fact my trainers for that have never been the same since. The evaders back in the war made exactly the same crossing as we did, wearing a pair of cork plimsole type shoes.  The original guide was a Basque smuggler who by all accounts was a bit of a man-mountain. His name was Florentino Goicoechea and it was his grave where we laid a wreath (see below).

Once into Spain we met up with a modern day local guide - a moutain runner who was using our event as part of his training for the next mountain marathon he was to take part in and who decided to take us up some difficult and fairly big hills.  In fact thinking back, he guided us across the mountains, through woods, and across country...but I don't remember him actually having a map.

As you can see I am carrying a Union Flag. This was a great honour for myself, as this flag was the property of an ex-RAF Prisoner of War, and it was the only such flag to have been inside Colditz Castle Prison during the war. It was pretty amazing to be able to hold something with so much history behind it, with so much memory attached to it, with such importance.

It was an honour to take part in that event and to do so with two ex-RAF aircrew who actually did it for real in 1943, Bob Frost and Gordon Mellor, who were an absolute inspiration to us.

For more details on the Evaders Story have a look at The ELMS web-page

As a Post Script to this I met up with Bob and Gordon a year later when I was fortunate to be the RAF Cosford representative at Dedee's funeral in Brussels. You can check out her amazing story at this wiki page.

I thought it was a fairly important event, but I didn't realise JUST how important it was until I actually arrived in Brussels airport.  I was asked why was I visiting Belguim and I told the police woman that I was there to attend a funeral. "What funeral?" I was asked.

"Oh, errr, Andree de..."

I was interrupted as she said "The Comtess de Jongh? Mouisour, please go through. She was a national hero for us.  Thank you for visiting to attend her funeral and for paying respect on behalf of your country."  I was taken aback.  It was a HUGE deal in Belguim, with the funeral being attended by Belgian Royal Family. And me.

It's not always pretty...

Here's another one that was a request from Twitter...*

Bird Strike.

It's not a good thing.  In fact it's one of the very worst things.  A bird strike is when an aircraft and a bird collide - either on the ground or in the air. The very worst sort of bird strike is an "injestion" where a bird gets sucked into the jet engine, or a close second is a "cockpit breech" where the bird strikes the windscreen of the aircraft and goes into the cockpit.  (Some of the latter of these are quite horrendous to see pictures of.)

My bird strike story is not so dramatic. But it was fairly gross, and is an example of some of the less glamourous stuff that we can do in the Royal Air Force.

Again it was when I was back on 29F(Sqn) and we were on a trip away for a short detachment to Spain - near to Seville actually.  One of the jets called in on the way back to the base after a sortie saying that it had suffered a bird strike.  And it was the jet that I was servicing...

We all went out to watch it land, and from the distance we could see no damage, which was a real relief, and I went out to see the jet in and do the servicing.  We began to think that the pilot had got it wrong and the bird had not hit, but rather it had been a near miss.

As I marshalled it into the parking slot though, it became clear that there had indeed been a strike, although the damage was minimal...

What had happened was that the bird - some sort of big gul - had hit the  windscreen of the Tornado F3 with a glancing blow and it had splattered all the way up the screen, and then had smeared itself up over the canopy.  From here it had got caught in the air stream over the jet and had been dragged over the top of the fuselage.  Halfway down the upper fuselage were the Homer Lobe aerials - two antenna that stuck out upwards for about 8-10" high. The bird had hit the aerials, leaving a lot of debris behind, before it had been sucked into an Intercooler intake.

Where it had got stuck.

It was quite clearly very, very dead. What was left of it.

And it was my job to get it out and to clear it up.  And it wasn't nice.  The memory of trying to wash and wipe the blood and the guts of the bird of the windscreen will stay with me forever...and the smell of the slightly cooked birds remains, as I pulled the various bits of it out of the Intercooler intake, will live with me for a long time.

At times, it's a glamourous life in the RAF.  But never a dull one.








*I think the requester was after something else, but this is what I got ;-)

A day in the life...

I was recently asked to describe a typical day for myself.

That's pretty hard, to be honest as I don't really have a typical day, I don't think that any one in the RAF - or indeed the Armed Forces - has such a thing.  No two days are the same, things change and everything is different.  Certainly, if you want a steady job, doing the same thing day in-day out then the Armed Forces certainly isn't for you.


I can get up to lots of different things during a typical day - from the boredom of trawling through emails, to doing some research for the next Continuous Improvement Event I will be running.  I could be busy in meetings or I could be giving a presentation to new arrivals on station.  I could even be delivering some personal development training to station personnel. 

I might be actually running a CI Event - where I am leading a group of up to 20 people looking at the processes they have in their workplaces and looking to solve any problems they have, or develop plans to solve future problems.

If it's an exciting day I could be over with the RAF Regiment doing some Force Protection training - firing rifles or first aid training.  I might be visiting sections to see how they work - and getting to try out some of the things they do.

I could be sitting in the mess for lunch, and reading the papers and having a coffee after it.

I might be busy sorting out some paperwork for the station ideas and suggestions scheme that I assist in administering.  I could be sorting out the affairs of the people who live in the block I look after - from making sure that any outstanding maintenance jobs are chased up to sorting out who is moving in or out of the block or even dealing with their personal problems.

I could be down the gym, spending time on the running machine or bike. I could be having my fitness test, or I could be having a game of badminton or squash. I might even be in the weights room.

I could be doing some personal training of my own - from IT based courses through to a PRINCE 2 project management course.

I might be spending time briefing the boss on what we have been doing or writing a report for the Central RAF CI Team. I might even be just surfing the net for a while, whilst having a cup of tea. Occasionally I might have a biscuit.

But my point is that what I do depends on what I have to do.  And like I said there is no typical day. And that's what makes the RAF such a great job for me.  I never know what the day may bring until it is underway...it certainly stops me getting bored with the job, and keeps me on my toes.

A little bit of Robbie...

Back in the late 90's I spent a fair bit of time (although not enough for a medal it would seem - grrrrrrrrrrr!) in Saudi as part of the Coalition effort to police the UN no-fly zone over southern Iraq.  I was based at the Saudi Air base of Al Kharj, not too far away from Riyahd.

There things weren't too bad.  After a while the old Tent City was demolished and we moved into a nice new set of accommodation blocks, with proper messes and other entertainment facilities, such as a fantastic gym, a shopping area and a superb swimming pool.

This was a fantastic place to go to chill out and get a great tan as well as be able to cool off in the water.  The only problem was that the place also had a superb sound system where people could ask the "DJ" to play CD's they had brought along.  Given the vast majority of people at the Base were American - on a scale of almost 10-1 in their favour, it meant that the music that was played at the pool tended to be very American inspired.

But not really in a good way.

Well from the Brit's points of views, as quite often the music would represent the type of people populating the pool.  At times it was heavy duty, hard core Rap. sometimes it would be R&B soul, one particularly bad day it was country.

Actually it was two types of music that day. Country. And Western.

And that day it went on. And on. And on. And there were a lot of Brit's getting, well, fed up of the stuff.

And eventually I'd had enough of it too. I'd been trying to blank out the C&W music with my own CD discman (remember THEM?) but failing when I decided I'd had enough.  I flipped through the CD wallet I had and spotted Robbie Williams' "I've been expecting you."

That'll do.

Off I stomped to the DJ...and asked him...pleaded with him to put it on...I showed him the CD and he didn't recognise it. I said "It's Robbie Williams. It's good. People will like it."

"ohhhh Robbie Williams.  I've heard good things about them" (Yeah, he said "Them") "I'll put it on next."

I plodded back and lay down in the sun again. The Country still played until the end of the song.  Then there was a gap.

Then. The acoustic guitar of "Strong" by Robbie started and the song kicked in...and the 50 or so Brits there by the pool all cheered...just for a short while a little bit of Saudi Arabia, and the Little America that it had become, changed to become a little bit of Britain, with all the RAF there that day singing for all their worth.

Yes. Robbie Williams saved my sanity.

An officer is never wrong...

Just a quick post, as I was reminded of this incident last night from a Twitter message to me from a follower who told me a relative of his had once also been at Coningsby.

Back in the day - when people arrived at Coningsby - they had to do a weeks worth of "gash jobs" the so called "SWO's Marines". This was basically doing any jobs around the station that was no dedicated manpower to fill. It was fair, it was simple, and you were based in the Guardroom where you were delegated a task as it came in. I remember my task was acting as an assistant to the Housing Officer when it came to laying carpets in Married Quarters.

The guardroom is a busy place. Passes and permits were issued there and it was the major focal point for people arriving at the station. In addition people on "duties" were based there - the Orderly Corporal, Orderly Sergeant and Orderly Officer. The job of these people was basically to be a focal point for problems and issues arrising "out of hours". Things like dealing with problems in the Blocks, minor discipline problems, anything all the way through to being some of the first on the scene if there was a crash or if the "balloon went up" (this WAS the Cold War!).

One of the less difficult tasks, but one that was a tradition - and one still kept up - is that the RAF Ensign outside the Station Headquarters was raised and lowered by the duty team. The Sergeant would blow a whistle, everyone about would halt, turn and face the Ensign and stand at attention as the flag was lowered and the Orderly Officer would salute. Once the flag was down, the Sgt blows the whistle with two blasts and people continue on their way. It's just a quick 30 second ceremony (but one where some embarrassing problems can arise - but THAT'S a subject for a future blog!) but at that time at Coningsby it was done in the morning at 8am to raise the ensign, and at either 6pm (in summer) or 5pm (winter) to lower it.

Anyway, I was sitting in the office on this particular afternoon at about 4pm on a drab February afternoon. When a rather flustered looking Flight Lieutenant burst into the guardroom.

"I'm here" he gasped.

"Yes you are, Sir" said the Guardroom Sgt "But WHY are you here?"

"For the Flag! Where's the Orderly Sgt?"

The guardroom staff looked quizzically at each other.

"Sir," said the sergeant in a rather soft - some would have said condescending - voice "Sir, the Ensign isn't lowered until 5pm today. It's only 3:58, Sir." (Some-how he made the last "Sir" sound like a real insult.)

The Flight Lieutenant looked at his watch. Realisation dawned. He'd got the time wrong. But he was now faced with being the only officer in a room of about 6-7 lower ranks - including me - a fresh-faced Junior Technician, straight out of training, all gawping at the way he had burst into the room.

He sighed and gave his wrist a waggle, shaking the watch.  He tapped it once or twice.

"Aaaaaaaah" he said in a desperate bid to save the last bit of dignity and respect that he could, "My watch is still on German time..."

Block Life

In work today, it's all been about the Block.

Junior members of the Armed Forces who are single (or separated or living away from their wife/husband) mostly live on base in what we call Single Living Accomodation.

Or what is known as "The Block".

And each block has a management team that is charged with looking after the block - in terms of the repair and maintenance, cleaning, general day-to-day management. I am lucky to be in charge of one of the oldest here at RAF Benson.  Today I have been checking up on works outstanding, updating room lists, checking for future inspection dates, general admin sort of things.

Built back in the 1930's when the station was first constructed, it is a classic "H" block, with four wings of accomodation with a linking corridor containing "Ablutions" (such a military word) and Utility rooms.  Originally the wings would have been open plan, housing about 15-18 men in each, with an NCO's room at the end for the Block Cpls to live it. Now each wing has 7 rooms in it meaning that a block originally for more than 100 now has about 50 in it.

To be honest, back then - with that many people in it, it must have been a bit grim - certainly by todays standards.  And it got me to thinking about the sort of accomodation I've lived in over my time.

When I was back in training I lived in an open plan multi-man room; some 17 of us in a large room at Cosford, and it certainly made for an interesting time. It had hard wood floors, with little brass screws holding the wood down. The windows were original 1930's single glazing - again with brass all over them. We had to clean the room every Monday night - polishing the floor to a nice gloss shine, and Brasso-ing all the screws.

Eventually we moved into 4-man rooms with CARPETS! Very modern for 1988. And after I graduated from training I moved to RAF Coningsby into a single room.  This was about 20 foot long by 10 foot wide (Give or take) but had a sink. This was a major step up for me. I still had to use shared showers and toilets, but it wasn't a bad place. It did me well for what I expected at the time.

I moved out of the block shortly after to get married and live in my own house.  I spent the next 15 years in either my own place or in a Married Quarter but I ended up moving back into the Block when I was divorced and working as an Instructor, back at RAF Cosford.

This was about 4 years ago now and I moved into a fairly new "Superblock".  This was a fantastic room with loads of storage. Still about 25 foot by about 12 foot, it also had it's own en-suite shower/wet-room. It was a fantastic little place, showing how far the services had come. It was well maintained and we all had responsibility for our own space. It wasn't much - but it was my own space. I could decorate it how I wanted. Put in what furniture I wanted. Have it how I wanted it...as long as I put it back to the standard magnolia walls when I left.

I had a phone line in the room, with fast internet, and although I thought about it, I never went as far as a couple of the lads did and get Sky.

I loved that room. I loved that place. It was a good time - and I had a good time in it!

The problem is, that I was spoilt really. Whilst a lot of units DO have Superblocks, a lot don't - and the block I look after at Benson certainly isn't . I knew it wouldn't last and eventually I would be promoted and posted away and my accomodation would change.  That happened last year and I am where I am right now.

I moved out of the Superblock and into the Mess...into a room 20 foot by about 10 foot...with a sink. But in this case it is not my home - it's just a crash pad for four nights - because at weekends I am back home with my family so I get the best (and worst!) of both worlds!

(As a bit of interest, I was visiting Coningsby recently and when I arrived on camp - I noticed my old block had been demolished and a nice new huge super-superblock has been built on where it stood...)

When I knew...

So as you may have read, I have been in the RAF for 22 years now. Why have I spent so long in the service? The pay? The pension? Not having to worry about what clothes to wear to work?

Well, actually it is all back to a day in 1989. I had just graduated from my training course and was posted to 29(F) Sqn at Coningsby.

Here, until I had done my equipment courses and got a bit of expereince, well, I was pretty much useless to them at fixing aircraft...so I was given over to an experienced Corporal to do stuff. The sort of stuff that makes a squadron work, like ohhhhhhh I dunno, sorting out the spares locker, sorting out tools, and sorting out the communications between the Hardened Aircraft Shelters (where the jets were parked) - the phone lines, the radios and so on.

So there I was checking out phone lines and I found that HAS 2 wasn't connected to the exchange...so I went out and followed the wire and found it had been cut by some contractors doing some digging.

It was a gorgeous Tuesday afternoon in April - and I spent the next hour sitting in a hole looking for both ends of the wire, splicing them together, sheilding the cable and then filling in the hole.

Now those of you in the know will be able to say that as well as the Tornado F3's, that were based at Coningsby, the vintage aircraft of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight are also based there and in April they shake the dust of the aircraft in readiness for the display season of airshows to come in the summer.

So there I was in a hole, digging, on a glorious sunny spring day...and there over my head was a Spitfire, doing it's first practice display of the year.

And that was when I knew. That was when I thought it couldn't get any better. This is how and why I want to earn my living for as long as I can. Every so often an F3 would start up and taxi and take off and still the Spitfire flew. Old and new on the same airbase. 50 years seaparating them but flying still. And me there too.

And I was part of that. I was a part of putting those new aircraft in the air...I had no idea where that would take me and what I would do. But I felt part of it.

I think that we ALL want to feel part of something. It's what makes us human. We have a desire to have attachments...friends, teams, clubs, lovers, marriage. We want to be associated with others and what others have done.

In my case I wanted to feel part of an organisation that had done something. That was doing something. That still does something.

That organisation was and is the Royal Air Force. I am proud to be a member and I intend to stay in it for as long as I can.

The RAFairman Competition

To celebrate the launch of this blog, with the help of 7644(VR) Sqn RAF, and Character Options Ltd the RAFairman Blog would like to announce the @RAFairman competition.

The prize has been kindly donated by Character Options Ltd, and is quite frankly far more than I had ever hoped for.

It's your chance to win your own RAFairman!*

Not only that, you can win his Harrier Fast Jet VTOL aircraft as well.  This prize is worth over £50 and will make you the most popular member of your family this Christmas - if you have kids (or even if you don't!)

To win this amazing prize you need to be able to answer this simple question:

In what year was the Harrier first introduced into RAF service?

(As a bit of a hint you could have a read about the Harrier here.)

To enter the competition you need to email RAFairman at this address with "RAFairman Competition" in the subject line. In the body of the email you need to put your name and (if under 18 your age - you also MUST have your parent/guardians permission to enter) and the correct answer.  If you have a Twitter account you should also include your username. The competition closes AT MIDNIGHT on SUNDAY 15th NOVEMBER.

The rules:

1. The winner will be pulled at random from an RAF Beret by my Boss on Monday 16th November. The Winners name will be posted on this blog shortly after.
   
2. To enter you must supply your full name. Twitter usernames/nicknames will not be entered into the draw.  Only one entry per email account is allowed.
3. The competition closes at midnight on Sunday 15th November.  Emails received AFTER this time will not be entered into the draw.
4. If you have supply a Twitter username - you agree to being "followed" on Twitter by @RAFairman.  If you do not wish to be followed on Twitter, please don't supply your username.
   
5. If you are lucky enough to be under 18 then you must have your parent/guardians permission to enter.
6. The Winner will win the "HM Armed Forces RAF Fast Jet Pilot Action Figure and the H.M. Armed Forces RAF Fast Attack V.T.O.L Jet" as supplied by Character Options Ltd. 
7. The winner will also be notified by email as a reply to the competition entry email.  No other accounts will be used.
8. Sorry, but due to the size of the prize entry is limited to UK (and BFPO) residents only.
9. The winner will be drawn at random and no correspondance will be entered into.
   

Good Luck!

*Yeah, I know the REAL @RAFairman is a Sergeant, and this chap is going to be a Flight Lieutenant, but just go with it ok? I don't have a Harrier either, but I don't hear you mentioning that. In fact going home for the weekend would be a WHOLE lot easier if I did have. Mind you I don't think it'd fit in the garden...

Welcome to the RAFairman Blog

Hello, and welcome.

The reason you are here I guess is because you already follow me on Twitter and you want a bit more information.

Well, we live in an information age, so I am going to do a bit of "ego-viewing". This is an invention of my own - a fake interview done by myself - to myself (yeah, sounds a bit schizophrenic on writing that), but it is essentially a FAQ. So here goes.

So, RAFairman. Where are you based and what do you fly?

Ok, obvious one question, but sorry, I don't fly. I am, by trade, an avionics technician, but right now I am working "out of trade" in an office job, doing a type of management consultancy type job.

Oh and I am based at RAF Benson, Wallingford, Oxfordshire. Here is where the RAF's Medium lift helicopter force is based - Merlin and Puma helicopters.

Oh. That sounds quite dull. What's THAT all about then?

It's called Continuous Improvement and it's our job to look at the sections, flights and squadrons on base here and see how we can make them better. Make them more productive and to make them happier places to be. In the writing of that it comes across as a bit of a dull job, but in fact...it's interesting in that you get to go into any section on station to see what goes on there and you get to learn about things that you everyone on station does. So whilst it's not sexy...it's at least interesting and you get a feeling that you are making people's lives a bit better.

Fair enough - not everyone can be a fighter pilot...how long have you been in the RAF?

Ha ha! No they can't. I've actually been in the RAF for just over 22 years. I joined in 1987. Originally as an Electronics Technician (Air Radar), but as the RAF has merged trades over the years I have changed my trade title. I am now officially Aircraft Technician (Avionics).

That's a fairly long time, where have you been based?

I did my Initial Training at RAF Swinderby (in Lincolnshire), and then my Basic Trade Training at RAF Cosford near to Wolverhampton. From here I was posted to RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire. On promotion I moved to RAF Leeming, in North Yorkshire, and then was posted back to RAF Cosford as an Instructor. On my next promotion I moved to RAF Benson - where I am now.

Varied then - what jobs have you done?

At Coningsby I actually did two jobs. The first was working on Tornado F3's as part of No. 29(F)Sqn. I was here for seven years and did a lot, went to a lot of places, and had a lot of fun. I then moved onto a trials and development team working on an Electronic Warfare bit of kit and fixing the Tornado's Defensive Aids.

At Leeming I worked in the Radar Bay, fixing the broken boxes that were removed by the people at First Line, and as I said at Cosford I was an Instructor.

It's difficult to chose a favourite tour, but I'm lucky to have had some fantastic jobs. The Squadron work was hard but fun, whilst the EW work was fascinating and technical, and then the instructing was where I figured out I like working with people and not just bits of electronics. This job is cool though, for the reasons I gave earlier.

Have you been, you know, out there...?

If by "there" you mean Afghanistan/Iraq then no. I've been lucky and I haven't (but I have a feeling that luck will run out soon and I'll get notice of a tour there in the next year or so), but in the past I went out to the desert for the First Gulf War (1991) and then I did a couple of trips out to Saudi in the mid 90's. I also did a tour in Italy as part of the Deny Flight Operations that NATO undertook over the Former Yugoslavia.

To be honest, in a slightly perverse way, I think I'd enjoy a tour "Out of Area" operationally. For two reasons - firstly to see how things have changed since my first war, and secondly because I feel a bit of a fraud in having not been deployed for a while. I feel a little bit guilty I guess. I mean I would miss my girl-friend and my kids, but being deployed is what goes with the job of being in the military now.

Where do you live?

Right now, I spilt my time between RAF Benson in the week and my girl-friend and mine's house in Birmingham. She is in the Army, and works at Selly Oak Hospital (on the main Trauma-Orthopeadic ward that the lads injured out in Afghan return to). In the week I live in the Sergeant's Mess. I have a room that is basically a crash pad for four nights a week and then on a Monday morning and Friday afternoon you'll find me on the M40.

Why do you Tweet/Blog?

Well, I love technology and gadgets, and I love the communication aspects that they bring. And I am a people person. I think we are all looking for connections in life, and the more we have the richer our lives are. I like to learn about people and what they do, and what makes them tick.

I was an avid Twitterer from very early on (when there were very few people Tweeting!) and often tweeted what I was doing from there. I decided to close my "own" account and open the "RAF" one simply because people were interesting in service life and I found there were huge gaps in peoples knowledge of what members of the armed forces actually do. There is an idea that we spend all day either doing nothing or else marching up and down all day, our lives are much more varied and richer than that - our jobs are often like what "normal" people do, but in slightly different ways.

I'm also dreadfully proud of being in the RAF. And I enjoy the amazing lifestyle it has given me over the years. I know that people are interested and so I decided to combine all the things I've talked about in a Twitter account.

This blog...hmmmm...I'm not so sure about that, but it's going to exist to add a bit of detail to what I get upto, and to add a bit of history to what I've done and where I've been. Maybe even where I'm going. Needless to say, just like the Twitter account, I'm making it all up as I go along.

Finally, is this an OFFICIAL blog?

No. Not at all. All ideas and opinions expressed in this blog (as well as on Twitter) are my own and should not be taken as either RAF or MOD policy. In every way, this is an unofficial web-page, that I intend to post my own thoughts and opinions. But, and there's always a but, I'll be doing it in line with the MOD's Online Engagement Guidelines, which may mean that there are times when I must, and will, say "I can't comment on that". 

I hope people understand that.