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Aviation History
1953
1953 - 0570.PDF
564 FLIGHT, 1 May 1953 SERVICE AVIATION . . . nounced that the award had been made were Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14, 20, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31, 39, 45) 47) 55» 56> 60,70,84,100,207,208 and 216 Squadrons of the Royal Air Force, and to these were added Nos. 9, 10, 13, 15) 16, 17, 19, 22, 23, 26, 29, 32, 33, 41, 43) 58, 99) i°i, *"> 201, 202, 203 and 205 Squadrons as also being qualified by length of service. Together with No. 2 Armoured Car Squadron and Nos. 502, 600, 601, 602 and 603 Squadrons of the Royal Auxiliary Air Force and Nos. 120 and 617 Squadrons R.A.F. which, though they had not been in existence for 25 years, had earned His Late Majesty's appreciation for specially outstanding achievements in operations. Many of the long-service Squadrons which have received the award would otherwise doubtless have qualified be cause of their operational records. The Standard is a rectangular silk flag with the squadron badge centred on a light blue background. The flag is fringed and tasselled, with scrolls added for re cording battle honours. The battle honours to which each squadron is entitled are being notified to them by Command Headquarters. The maximum number of battle honours which can be shown on the scrolls to the standard is eight, and a squadron entitled to more than this number must select the battle honours to be commemorated in this way. Out of the 24 honours to which it is entitled, the battle honours selected by No. 1 Squadron are: Western Front, 1915-1918; Ypres, 1915; Independent Force and Germany, 1918; Somme, 1916; France and Low Countries, 1939-1940; Battle of Britain, 1940; Fortress Europe, 1941-1944; France and Germany, 1944- 1945- The Duke Flying Twins IT is announced that the Duke of Edinburgh has begun training on twin- engined aircraft. An Airspeed Oxford is housed at White Waltham for his personal use. Instruction on the Oxford should complete the Duke's flying training and he will then have earned his wings in precisely the same manner as any other ab initio student pilot. Sir Charles Lambe WE regret to announce the death of A.V-M. Sir Charles L. Lambe, who retired from the R.A.F. in 1931. He will be remembered mostly as the officer who commanded the R.N.A.S. units of the Dover Patrol from August 1915 until nearly the end of the war in 1918. In 1924 he was in command of No. 1 School of Technical Training, Halton, and in 1928 took over Coastal Area. St. Clement Danes Church ONE of the provisions in the scheme for the ecclesiastical reorganization of Westminster parishes is that the parish of St. Clement Danes shall be united to that of St. Mary-le-Strand and that, following restoration, St. Clement Danes shall be appropriated, under conditions agreed with the Air Council, for use as a church for members and former members of the Royal Air Force and associated forces. The Air Council has appointed a com mittee, of which Marshal of the R.A.F. Sir John Slessor is chairman, to advise on matters connected with the restoration of the church, and the committee has begun its task. It is intended that the Royal Fine Arts Commission shall be consulted. THE CREW OF WJ338: (back row, left to right) Sgt. J. W. Leeming, F/L P. I. Radley, FltjO. J. S. Weir, W/C. E. 8. Harvey, F/L P. E. Pullan (captain), F/L £. T. Orringe; (front row) F/Sgt. R. E. Houston, Sgt. R. S. Tooke, Sgt. J. N. Fulker, FjSgt. 0. L. Bourke. A HASTINGS THROUGH THE IRON CURTAIN Continued from page 531 went out to the aircraft and were told what they wanted to know about the instruments and equipment. They appeared to the crew to be very quick in familiarizing themselves with the Hastings equipment and instruments. On the exact E.T.D. of noon the Hastings took off with the two Russians from Aeroflot standing in the cabin gangway. Once airborne, the Russian navigator gave F/L. Pullan a course which, like all other information, was passed as figures on a writing pad. Where an explanation of a figure was needed gesticula tions were employed. Wind speed was accom panied by a puff of the cheeks; for types of cloud formations the shape was indicated by the hands; and figures, when not written, were transmitted by showing the appropriate number of fingers. Place-names were spoken as the Russian navigator wrote them down, but other wise no words passed. The Hastings had reached its cruising height of 10,000ft by Frankfurt-on-Oder and crossed the Polish border exactly on time. The course continued due east to Warsaw along the corri dor which other Transport Command aircraft use on a regular service to the Polish capital. Continuing east until within seven miles of Siedlce, F/L. Pullan was given a new course due north to Lyck, where another change was made to a N.E. track which took the Hastings across the Polish border and along to Vilna, the Lithuanian capital. Russia was entered near— appropriately—Pilotsky and the course was again given, due east. North of Vitebsk the Hastings captain was directed south-east and on this course the aircraft was brought to a point some 25 miles S.S.E. of Moscow, where instruc tions were given for the landing. For some 90 minutes the aircraft had flown in 8/8ths stratus but half-an-hour from the destination conditions improved and the flight was com pleted with a visibility of two to three miles. The Hastings turned towards Vnukovo, Mos cow's civil airport, at 6,000ft, the navigator giving the pilot the type of circuit to fly and the setting in millibars. In spite of a fairly strong cross-wind the Hastings made a comfortable landing. Taxying instructions were passed by the Russian operator and, no doubt to the sur prise of many at the airport, an aircraft with R.A.F. roundels came to a halt in front of the main terminal building. The flight had taken 5 hr 40 min, nearly an hour longer than had been expected, the detour adding some 200 miles to what would otherwise have been a flying distance of 900 miles. There was a lot to do at the airport and, owing no doubt to the unusual nature of the flight, it was some hours before the R.A.F. party could be taken to their hotel. The British Embassy had arranged for accommodation at the National Hotel and on the way from the air port they passed through Red Square. Although it was after 2200 hr there were still crowds gathered around the mausoleum outside the Kremlin walls. Meals in Moscow are pro tracted affairs—and on special occasions extremely so. The R.A.F. visitors were taken to a famous Georgian restaurant where the Embassy entertained them to a full Russian dinner, including the inevitable caviare and vodka. W/C. Harvey had still to be briefed by the Embassy doctor on the physical state of the passengers, and when he got to bed at 0330 hr he had been on the go since he was called at Lyneham more than 24 hours earlier. Flt/O. Weir had the most palatial suite in the hotel; like the other rooms and even the reception hall at the airport, it was richly and ornately fur nished in almost Victorian style. The 20-mile drive out to the airport, mostly over a very indifferent road, took more than an hour. The Hastings was filled up with 3,800 litres of fuel, to which the Hercules engines took very kindly on the way back to Berlin. The Russian navigator and wireless operator re joined an hour before E.T.D. and agreed to the suggestion that, for the comfort of the passen gers, the flight should be made at a lesser height, namely, 7,000ft. The Aeroflot ground crew were most helpful in every way; the reception staff—Russian girls in navy-blue uniforms with silver epaulettes and brown high-heeled shoes —were attentive, and the met. information (again provided by a feminine staff) proved very accurate on the flight over Russia. The passengers arrived at the airport ac companied by the British Ambassador and Lady Gascoigne and a host of British and Russian officials. Two of the seven made use of two of the four stretchers set up in the Hastings during the flight and all of them were soon made comfortable by_ Flt/O. Weir. The last formality inside the aircraft was the return of passports, which had to be delivered up on arrival at the hotel and at the airport. The Russian marshaller gave the captain a thumbs-up sign to start taxying and the Hastings was soon airborne and heading off on a reciprocal course to the outward flight. Frontal condi tions, with icing, were again experienced on the return and the aircraft was in cloud for some minutes of the journey. The journey to the Royal Air Force station at Gatow was made in 5 hr 20 min. There friendly handshakes were exchanged between the British and Russian aircrew and although F/L. Pullan's thanks were expressed in English there was little doubt that they were understood. S/L. Poulter prompted F/L. Badley in the Russian word for "Cheerio," which, when called out to the Aeroflot crew, brought a broad smile of recognition and a friendly wave. And it was on that happy note that this rare Anglo-Russian co-operation in airmanship ended.
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