Tales from the RAF

[Canberra Man]

We were on a six month detachment in Malaya with the Canberra B6. They had been on a bombing mission and were being marshalled back in to the dispersal. I signalled mine to turn in to the pan and brought him to a stop and open bomb doors with an armourer standing by in case of a hang up. There were no hang ups, oh no! Far worse. As the bomb doors opened a thousand pounder forced its way through the gap and crunched down on to the tarmac. The ground crew didn't know which way to run and how fast when we realised the bomb hadn't fallen far enough to arm. The aircrew must have wondered what was happening with everybody in small groups counting their worry beads! Panic over for the day.

Ken
Canberra man

[Rick Thomson]

Snicker...I can imagine...

We had something similar in Cold Lake as I was dropping the seat out of a 104 and the winch broke.

PANIC STATIONS!!! MAN YOUR PANIC STATIONS!!! errrr...never mind...

[SCEtoAUX]

When I was on the USS Paul Revere (LPA-248) we were were unloading the forward 3" magazine. The guys down in the magazine would load 16 rounds on the dumbwaiter and it would go up to a hatch on the main deck level where the work party would each grab one round and walk it out to the deck for off loading to the pier.

Well, when the magazine was about half empty a full load came up on the dumbwaiter, but when it got to the top the chain broke and the whole pallet went shooting down. I was about third in line to take a round and when the chain broke I started running, but realized that if those things went off there was no where to hide. None of the rounds went off, thankfully. Those guys that were in the magazine came up the ladder and were extremely pale and shakey. We all didn't feel very good.

The work party then had to station ourselves on the access ladder going down to the magazine and man handle all of the remaining rounds out of the magazine. The guy below you would pass a round up to you and you would pass it up to the guy above you. I was about 3/4 of the way up. Talk about a workout. I couldn't wait to get back to the engineroom.

[Jim Nunn]

I was stationed on the USS Intrepid during the last hassle in south East Asia. When we were on Yankee station off North Vietnam we would be flying 4 to 6 sorties per day and would go through a hell of lot of ordnance. We would usually go along side a munitions ship every 5 or so days and replenish our stores. A lot of the ordnance we used was leftovers from WWII and the bomb casings on the 500 and 1000 Ponders were thin and brittle. I saw several of them break open when they would hit the deck to hard. This was usually followed by the sound of gasps from every one and then the bomb would be rolled over the side.

I have read that one of the reasons the Forrestal went up so quickly was due the thin bomb casings.

On another occasion I was making sure that the railing wouldn’t fall off the ship and watching flight ops while we were launching A1H Spads. As the next Spad was revving up to 100% power just before launching the 1000 Lb daisy cutter dropped of the centerline of the aircraft. In one move 2 Green Shirts (catapult personal) ran towards the aircraft and grabbed the spinning fuse on the bomb. Then 8 or so red shirts (ordnance men) grabbed and man handled the bomb back on to the aircraft, rewired the hard points, reset the fuse. After a quick inspection the aircraft was launched. I doubt if these guys received anything more then a pat on the back it was all in a days work to them.

Jim Nunn

[birder]

Wow, I have enjoyed those yarns immensly, bravery sometimes just considered part of the job description! Thanks guys!!

[TheWebdude]

Our military issues brown undergarments for a reason! :D:D