Dispersal: recollections of the 69th in the wider RAF
The purpose of the No. 1 School of Technical Training was to create trained personnel who would then, hopefully, go out into the wider RAF. Many of them did, and these are a few of their stories.
"My father had died and I was in Malta - We'd only just arrived, two days I'd been there when the boss called me and said your father's passed away, which I'd expected as I'd been to see him in Leeds the day before I left for Malta.
Anyway, I got home but couldn't find a flight back. My mother worked at the RAF station at Church Fenton and she said "I'll have a word with the wing commander", and she came home and said "he wants to talk to you - get on the bike and go and talk to him".
So I went and said I was trying to get back to Malta. He said "leave it with me" and later "I think I might have it solved how to get you back". I'd tried everything; I couldn't even get on a BA flight as they were all full.
A Jet Provost - a side-by-side two-seater trainer - at the Flight Training School, RAF Valley, Anglesey, 3rd September 1967. Photo by RuthAS, licenced under the Creative Commons Attribute 3.0 Unported licenceI got a message the next morning saying "bring your kit over, I've found a way to get you back". So I got to the RAF station and he said "I will fly you across to Yorkshire, and a Beverley is coming through from Germany with an aerobatic team, and then going down to Lyneham. I'll fly you across", and I said "what in?", and he said a Jet Provost. So he gave me some flying kit and off we went.
We landed there and sat there for about half an hour then this Beverley came in for refueling - they wouldn't go very far, the Beverleys - anyway he said goodbye to me and I ended up in Lyneham trying to get a flight back to Malta. No, nothing going and I was there for about three days, kicking my heels.
I walked in one morning and they said "we've got a flight going through Malta. "Great", I said, "[but] you'll be the only person other than the crew on it. They'll be a check crew" - the RAF used to have crews that went round checking things, checking other crews out - they were a pain in the neck, I got caught with one once. They said "be there at 6am - a Beverly going to Cyprus is going through Malta", and I got on this bloody thing. You had to climb up inside the aeroplane into the boom - it was terrible, this engineer showed me and sat me down and said "OK?". "yep", I said, expecting at least a cup of coffee.
Got nothing - we landed somewhere in France, got some fuel on board and then Malta, got off in Malta - I was parched, dying for a drink, and nothing, no-one even spoke to me or told me what was going on. I was pissed off. Anyway, got to Malta, went to work next morning and the boss said "how did you get on? how did you get back?", I said "a bloody Beverly - it was being checked out by a crew, I didn't even get a cup of coffee, nothing!". He said "what?! leave that with me - they don't treat my air crew like that" and got in his car and shot off to sort them out."
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The Beverley cropped up a few times in various editions of the Haltonian Magazine. Although not directly related to the 69th, these articles provide some interesting additional context about this aircraft.
Beverley XM110 in the sand
From the Haltonian Magazine, Summer 2010 - author unknown
When passing through RAF Muharraq (Bahrain) did you ever wonder why a Beverley airframe was perched on a bed of sand? If so, this is why.
During 1961 the government of Iraq decided to rattle its sabres at Kuwait, so every available aircraft in Aden went up country to Bahrain and Kuwait.
A Beverley, XM110 from 84 Sqn, had a bomb placed on it whilst on the ground at Bahrain and the explosion wrote it off. So, as part of a team from 131 MU, RAF Khormaksar, I found myself tasked to carry out a spares recovery.
Beverley XM110 on the sand in Bahrain
The airfield was full and so was the accommodation. We were housed in a large single storey building that seemed to have only a handful of electric lights and so was pretty dark inside. The beds were built up into two tiers with a camp bed in between. If you had the camp bed you were in great danger of being trodden on in the night or even worse.
To start the spares recovery, the aircraft had to be moved from near the main airfield buildings to the far side of the airfield. The position was indicated by the station STO marking the exact position of the nose wheel in the sand with his foot and pointing out the direction in which it was to face. All went according to plan and we started to prepare the aircraft but before we had gone very far the STO returned and informed us that it was all to be changed.
It seemed that the station were trying to send signals to Cyprus but they were bouncing off the Beverley to be received elsewhere. It was moved and we eventually started work. Each morning we would decide which items had been "liberated" by the UK Beverley squadrons and then waste an hour or two trying to get them back. One morning it was the APU which had been taken to power a boat being made from drop tanks! We eventually completed the recovery and left XM101 on the man- made sand bank where it was used by the Parachute Regiment to practice jumping out of an aircraft.
"Out of Africa" Beverley Style!
More stories of the Beverley, from Tony Jones of the 79th, as published in the Haltonian Magazine, Winter 2009
The Blackburn and General Aircraft Beverley was a huge lumbering freighter, the largest in the UK at the time. It had a fixed undercarriage, high aspect ratio wings high on the fuselage, and four oil guzzling Bristol Centaurus engines, but with amazing STOL capabilities.
It is said that an aircraft designer was reputed to have said that he thought he saw "A Dutch Barn blow past in a gale" whilst a USAF captain remarked, "It's a fine machine but will never replace the aeroplane!" A test pilot was reported to have said to his co-pilot on take off , "My side's airborne, how about yours?"
My relationship with this "Dutch Barn" came when I, along with three other brand new ex-79th J/T's were selected to go on tropical trials in Africa with one of the Abingdon based aircraft. Later in life I discovered that the C/Tech i/c the project, Bill Overton, was also an ex-brat although we did not know at the time. Also with us was the Chief Design Engineer of the Beverley. Our team consisted of me, airframe, Sid, engines, an electrician and a radio/radar chap from Locking. As I was to find out later, our trades meant nothing to the real working practices down the line.
Our first night stop was Gibraltar but I cannot remember much of the stop probably as a result of the noise and vibration I had endured in getting there! I do remember being unimpressed by the de-salinated water, the first I had ever tasted. No time for sight seeing as we took off early next morning for Kano in Nigeria what a beautiful country, if not ruined by man! It was quite scary to see vultures waiting for a tasty morsel or two.
Here in Kano our "adventure" really started. Sid found signs of metal in the No 2 oil filter which in normal circumstances would have meant an engine change, However the Flt Lt captain decided he didn't like Kano and opted to fly on to Entebbe in Ghana where there was a nice hotel and we could all enjoy the wait for spares. As we were almost empty we made a very successful three engine take-off and arrived at Entebbe without further incident.
The "giant" aircraft was parked out of the way and became the subject of much speculation by not only the locals but also the British Embassy staff who wanted to hold a dance in the freight bay! We booked ourselves into the Lake Victoria Hotel at Entebbe airport, where us four J/T's were deposited well away from the 'real' guests at the end of a long corridor, all in one room. Whilst we were there, other guests were Miss World 1958 and her "runners up" from South Africa.
Our main entertainment, apart from quenching our thirst at the bar, was playing the locals at football. Our team lost every match, possibly due to the fact that not only was it hot but we were also at 2,000 feet above sea level. The KLM Ground hostess asked to be shown over the aircraft and I was "detailed" for the job.
All went well until she insisted on going onto the tailplane. This entailed going through one of the toilets, between the two tailplane servodynes, and then clambering out of the overhead hatch out onto the large expanse of tailplane. Being the budding gentleman I made the mistake of opening the toilet door and ushering her through into the darkened area beyond never thinking that she would not know how to open the hatch! The result was that she got stuck between the servodynes and I had to crawl over her to open the hatch. A rough job for a nineteen year old, but somebody had to do it.
Eventually the spare engine and equipment arrived. The biggest crane in Uganda wasn't anywhere near high enough for the job so we ended up putting it on the back of the largest lorry available. Any communication when fitting an engine of this size can be difficult but the driver spoke no English and we no Swahili. Difficult! Dropping the old engine was not too bad but fitting the new one turned out to be an excellent experience for us new aircraft technicians. It was eventually installed, started up and tested Ch/Tech Bill Overton had done a good job. Not only did he successfully repair the Beverley but also taught us "rooks" a little of the real world.
When reading his published book, The Blackburn Beverley, some 50 years later, I searched for our adventure but it was not to be found. Perhaps Bill was a little coy about the fact that we took off on three engines. Can't think why because it was no small achievement. However, our "holiday" was not yet over. Surprise, surprise, some trouble blew up in the Middle East and, as we were the only serviceable Beverley in the area, we had to fly to Eastleigh, pick up some soldiers and take them to Aden.
After our beautiful sojourn in Africa, with budding Miss Worlds, we knew it was over when the front door of this un-pressurised "bomber" was opened and we were hit with the typical wet heat of dank, filthy Aden. It didn't improve when we went off to the Army transit hotel two large dirty smelly tents!! Hey ho, it was character forming but please Ernie don't start another argument about that.
The First Beverley Crash, near RAF Abingdon, Oxfordshire, 1957
Out of 49 Beverleys built, nine were written off, including two due to bomb damage. The first actual crash occured on March 5th 1957, when Beverley XH117 tore through a caravan and a house and ended up upside-down, killing twenty people in total. The eventual cause of the crash was established to be a fuel pump no-return valve which had been put in backwards. The Bureau of Aircraft Accidents Archives reports it thus:
As the aircraft climbed, the engine number one developed a fuel leak. The flight crew responded by shutting down the engine and feathering its propeller. The flight crew declared an emergency and requested a blind approach to RAF Abingdon. The controller alerted emergency services on the ground. A short time later, cockpit instruments alerted the flight crew to a large loss of fuel from No. 2 fuel tank, the second of four such tanks in the port wing. In an effort to stop the leak, the crew de-activated the fuel cocks and boosters for the No. 2 tank, but left them on for the No. 1 tank. As the Beverley turned on to final approach for RAF Abingdon the crew attempted to increase power from the remaining three Bristol Centaurus engines but No. 2 engine – also on the port wing – failed to respond and the aircraft began to lose speed and height. Knowing he could not reach the airfield, the captain tried to land in a field. However, the aircraft became uncontrollable and struck a number of high tension cables and a group of elm trees that tore the port wing from the fuselage. On impact with the ground, the aircraft destroyed a caravan and a prefabricated house before somersaulting and crashing upside down. Eighteen occupants were killed, among them three crew members, and two people on the ground.
The crash had a connection to Halton, as some of the wreckage was salvaged and returned to the station to be used for training. This process was reported in the Halton Magazine:
An Excellent Achievement
The salvaged Bristol Centaurus engineAfter the release by A.I.B. of the much publicised Beverley crash in March, 1957, several instructors visited 71 M.U. at Bicester in the hope of obtaining any items of equipment which would assist in the training of Apprentices. The party came back empty handed because the damage was so intensive but Senior Technician Hyde of the Engine Fitter Flight considered the Centaurus 173 from the starboard outer nacelle could be sectioned and volunteered to undertake this arduous task in his spare time. After negotiations with a most co-operative Maintenance Unit the engine, very battered and bent, arrived at Halton and was secreted in the sparking plug bay away from prying eyes and adverse comment by inspecting officers.
Work commenced with no special tools or equipment and after four months of intensive spare time effort an excellent training aid was produced. In addition to adequate sectioning of all components the engine, which is motorised and illuminated, also gives very full facilities for the observation of the sleeve mechanism and the OTTO cycle of operation. The latter is also indicated by lights on a facia board. Provision has also been made to simulate feathering and braking of the propellor and this additional refinement will be incorporated when spares from de Havilland Propellors become available.
The engine, restored as a training exhibit, on display at Sentech of HydeThe whole project is very much to the credit of a most determined and conscientious technician and is an admirable example of the potential of items of equipment which would otherwise be relegated to the salvage yard. 582613 Senior Technician Hyde is an ex-Apprentice of the 51st Entry and on graduating was posted to No. 32 M.U., St. Athan. He served with the P.R.U. at Benson (2 years) and 2nd T.A.F. (22 years) before re-turning to Halton as an Engine Fitter Instructor.
A Jet Provost - a side-by-side two-seater trainer - at the Flight Training School, RAF Valley, Anglesey, 3rd September 1967. Photo by 
The salvaged Bristol Centaurus engine
The engine, restored as a training exhibit, on display at Sentech of Hyde