Tales from Halton

Stories and anecdotes from the 69th's time at RAF Halton, between 1951 and 1954, and outside in the wider world. Dates shown refer to when the story appeared in the 69th Association's newsletter.

An Eider Ducking, by Barrie C - December 2002

The helicopter hit the water with a thump. Water surged through the door and windows. Slowly it sunk and rolled over. It grew darker and the water rose up to my face. The man in the next seat looked shocked, his eyes bulged like saucers. Suddenly he shot past me in a cloud of bubbles, legs waving wildly and disappeared through the window. Well that's cheating I thought; we had definitely been told to count. I took a breath, undid my seat belt and started to count. As I reached seven I followed him, inflated my lifejacket and struck out for the surface. As I reached it there were shouts of encouragement from the side of the pool and I swam to the ladder. Behind, the helicopter hull was already being hauled out.

We were about half way through the offshore survival course in Teeside. Later we were to undergo the fire-fighting portion which I thoroughly disliked. Afterwards I had to have several showers to rid myself of the smell of burnt straw, caused by making my way through a succession of darkened rooms filled with smoke, first with breathing apparatus and then again without.

My boss suggested I meet him in a pub in Aberdeen the night before we were due to fly out to the Shell Eider platform, half way between the Shetland Islands and Norway. He was reluctant to go offshore that day as England were playing Scotland at rugby. As I walked into the pub rather late, there he stood somewhat the worse for drink. Moreover three large grim Scots surrounded him. He was poking one of them in the chest with his finger and assuring him that the only chance Scotland had of winning was if the English didn't turn up, and even then they would struggle. It took all my diplomatic skill to extract the old crumb and myself from the pub without some severe contusions.

There was a considerable amount of clag and low cloud as we approached Eider. I saw it on radar and then as we slowed, there it was, lit by a huge flare, turning the surrounding clouds yellow. North Sea rigs are impressive, they are enormous. TV seems to have the effect of diminishing them. As we slowly descended, successive storeys of the brightly lit main office block rose past my window. We landed and crouching made for the reception block, against a freezing strong wind. The landing platform was over two hundred feet above the surface of the sea.

Inside it was very warm. Heat is a waste product on a platform, so there is as much of it you could ever wish for. Once into a routine I enjoyed it, there was just work and sleep basically. The food was really good. There was never any limit to what you could eat or when. That counts with crusty old salts like myself who believe it keeps scurvy away. The restaurant was open 24/7. Not everyone liked the life on a rig. There had been several suicides. Smokers hated it, as even to be caught with a cigarette, a light, drink or drugs was an instant sacking offence, rigidly enforced and backed wholeheartedly by the unions; Piper-Alpha was still in everyone's mind.

I sometimes went out on to the decks, for which you had to get dressed up in all the safety gear. The number of birds everywhere astonished me. This was October and they were using the platform as a staging stop between the UK and Scandinavia. There were rows of them peering anxiously down as I made my way along. Sometimes they were blinded and flew into the flare. The crews were pretty good, doing their best to rescue the injured. About ten miles away there was another platform and on the horizon smudges of smoke indicated others.

One night the weather was really terrible. Outside the safety boat was pitching and tossing. I wondered how those on it could stand it without getting really sick. It made me ill just to look at it. Later that night the weather got even worse. As I lay on my bunk it was rather like being on the tip of a tuning fork as successive swells hit the platform legs. The next morning the weather office assured me that it had been the second-worst storm in the North Sea's operational history and a number of rigs, barges and ships had been in trouble and some were still drifting without power. The radio was chatting urgently all day and only emergency duty helicopters were flying.

During my return to the Shetlands it was a nice day, and I remember being impressed by the flocks of birds skimming along the waves, totally out of sight of land. To read about their navigational abilities was one thing, to see it demonstrated quite another. The helicopter had several panels of navigational equipment; the birds' equivalent is the size of a split pea!