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Catterick Lamp Swinging
It was the basics first oil fire and they had to put it out using 2 gall DS Foam ext. Normally the 10x10 tank was used but it was under repair so the 20x20 was used. Half a 45 gal drum was the norm for the first fire, but as it was the 20x20 the supervisor let me use a full drum. Unbeknown to me or the wee Irish supervisor, the fuel bowser went in for servicing and a shed load of fuel was dumped into the tank. The basics were told that once the fire was lit they would stand fast at the edge of the bund to feel the heat generated by the burning fuel. They were warned not to move an inch until the order ‘get to work’ was given. The fire was lit and slowly kicking the empty drum down the pan I noticed the supervisor get out of the ACRT, he was gestulating frantically, pointing towards the 20x20. Turning round and saw a large flame front. The basics were standing fast but bent back some 30 degrees to keep away from the heat. As we both ran back he was shouting at me, ‘Was that AVPIN?, ‘Was that AVPIN?. Dragging the basics back from the bund wall, their jackets and slickers (old black type) had crinkled up with the heat, shrunk & looked like old prunes, the black domestic helmets looked decidedly brown and their faces the colour of ripe cherries! The wee man went ape, ‘How the feck are we going to explain this’. ‘Sun tan!’ was the only immediate response I could think of.
One of the instructors KD had the habit of creeping up behind you hooking his leg around yours and humping you like a dog. This would happen when you least expected it. One day he was admiring my pointer and asked where the end bit came from. I said off a throttle lever in the Canberra cockpit in the hanger. Later that day when walking across the hanger I saw his ample backside sticking out of the a/c cockpit. Making sure nobody was about I crept up, hooked my leg around, arms around his waist, started to hump him saying, ‘ I got you now KD’ along with more suggestive phrases. As he wriggled his way back out of the cockpit with me still attached, I then noticed not Sgt’s rank slides but two bars! A face appeared, we met eye to eye, it was Captian Pugwash ( Flt Lt) from Trade Standards. Still attached, my opening gambit was, ‘I think I have made a mistake’. ‘It appears so’, he said. ‘Please explain’. We all know you cannot b*llock anyone when they can’t stop smiling. Never saw him on the hanger floor for a while.
MT was leaving us, it was tradition to give a domestic axe mounted on a wooden plinth. However, for MT the alleged founder of the Rubber D1ck Club we thought, axe - no. Off went the intrepid duo TS and SS to Darlo to purchase a real rubber d1ck. At the sex shop they were told to sign in (SOPs in the early days). The names in the book were the usual Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck etc, so TS writes SS real name and grins at him. SS then enters TS last three, rank, name and Fire Fighting & Special Safety Squadron RAF C******k! They came back with a great big black one with a pair of balls that could hold ‘liquid substances’. Come the day the ‘present’ was brought out, the Regt Sqn Cdr took a shufti and remarked, ’Different from the usual domestic axe’. As he looked at the brass inscription a hand appeared (Spanners I think) and squeezed the balls - an arc of white fluid, diluted carnation milk, spurted out of the end. The Regt Sqn Cdr carefully put the offending object down and moved on. MT was seen in the locker of a Domestic truck looking for an axe to take home to show his wife.
Down the wet area watching TS give a lesson on Pump Ops. It involved adding a length of hose, burst hose, dividing a line etc. TS walks up to the basic on the pump and says, ’burst length 2nd hose in the line’. The basic, a Brummie, was having a Wadsworth moment (in vacant or in pensive mood), looks up the line and says, ’Which one Cpl?’. TS, ’second length’. Basic, ’don’t see no water Cpl’. TS, ’remember it’s a drill’. Basic coming away from the pump and says, ’looks all right to me Cpl’. TS, ‘it’s a fecking burst length drill!’ Basic, ‘but I don’t see any water Cpl’. ‘Water, you want fecking Water’ shouts TS. Storms off to side locker of the machine returns with axe (felling), walks up the line of hose and attacks 2nd length. Hose bursts. TS to basic, ‘burst length!’. Basic, ‘Cpl look at you, you’re soaking wet’. Me, exit stage left p1ssing myself laughing.
It was the basics first oil fire and they had to put it out using 2 gall DS Foam ext. Normally the 10x10 tank was used but it was under repair so the 20x20 was used. Half a 45 gal drum was the norm for the first fire, but as it was the 20x20 the supervisor let me use a full drum. Unbeknown to me or the wee Irish supervisor, the fuel bowser went in for servicing and a shed load of fuel was dumped into the tank. The basics were told that once the fire was lit they would stand fast at the edge of the bund to feel the heat generated by the burning fuel. They were warned not to move an inch until the order ‘get to work’ was given. The fire was lit and slowly kicking the empty drum down the pan I noticed the supervisor get out of the ACRT, he was gestulating frantically, pointing towards the 20x20. Turning round and saw a large flame front. The basics were standing fast but bent back some 30 degrees to keep away from the heat. As we both ran back he was shouting at me, ‘Was that AVPIN?, ‘Was that AVPIN?. Dragging the basics back from the bund wall, their jackets and slickers (old black type) had crinkled up with the heat, shrunk & looked like old prunes, the black domestic helmets looked decidedly brown and their faces the colour of ripe cherries! The wee man went ape, ‘How the feck are we going to explain this’. ‘Sun tan!’ was the only immediate response I could think of.
One of the instructors KD had the habit of creeping up behind you hooking his leg around yours and humping you like a dog. This would happen when you least expected it. One day he was admiring my pointer and asked where the end bit came from. I said off a throttle lever in the Canberra cockpit in the hanger. Later that day when walking across the hanger I saw his ample backside sticking out of the a/c cockpit. Making sure nobody was about I crept up, hooked my leg around, arms around his waist, started to hump him saying, ‘ I got you now KD’ along with more suggestive phrases. As he wriggled his way back out of the cockpit with me still attached, I then noticed not Sgt’s rank slides but two bars! A face appeared, we met eye to eye, it was Captian Pugwash ( Flt Lt) from Trade Standards. Still attached, my opening gambit was, ‘I think I have made a mistake’. ‘It appears so’, he said. ‘Please explain’. We all know you cannot b*llock anyone when they can’t stop smiling. Never saw him on the hanger floor for a while.
MT was leaving us, it was tradition to give a domestic axe mounted on a wooden plinth. However, for MT the alleged founder of the Rubber D1ck Club we thought, axe - no. Off went the intrepid duo TS and SS to Darlo to purchase a real rubber d1ck. At the sex shop they were told to sign in (SOPs in the early days). The names in the book were the usual Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck etc, so TS writes SS real name and grins at him. SS then enters TS last three, rank, name and Fire Fighting & Special Safety Squadron RAF C******k! They came back with a great big black one with a pair of balls that could hold ‘liquid substances’. Come the day the ‘present’ was brought out, the Regt Sqn Cdr took a shufti and remarked, ’Different from the usual domestic axe’. As he looked at the brass inscription a hand appeared (Spanners I think) and squeezed the balls - an arc of white fluid, diluted carnation milk, spurted out of the end. The Regt Sqn Cdr carefully put the offending object down and moved on. MT was seen in the locker of a Domestic truck looking for an axe to take home to show his wife.
Down the wet area watching TS give a lesson on Pump Ops. It involved adding a length of hose, burst hose, dividing a line etc. TS walks up to the basic on the pump and says, ’burst length 2nd hose in the line’. The basic, a Brummie, was having a Wadsworth moment (in vacant or in pensive mood), looks up the line and says, ’Which one Cpl?’. TS, ’second length’. Basic, ’don’t see no water Cpl’. TS, ’remember it’s a drill’. Basic coming away from the pump and says, ’looks all right to me Cpl’. TS, ‘it’s a fecking burst length drill!’ Basic, ‘but I don’t see any water Cpl’. ‘Water, you want fecking Water’ shouts TS. Storms off to side locker of the machine returns with axe (felling), walks up the line of hose and attacks 2nd length. Hose bursts. TS to basic, ‘burst length!’. Basic, ‘Cpl look at you, you’re soaking wet’. Me, exit stage left p1ssing myself laughing.
Okay I'm not a Fireman but I did spend a few days at Catterick in 1977 getting some training before deploying on the Fireman's strike of that year. I will never forget having to climb a ladder up the side of the hangar and then lean back when about 50' up with the hose................scared me sh!tless and now bores my son sh1tless every time we drive past Catterick and I mention it.
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Yep, I did that too. It was Op Scarab Minor. We were 'accommodated' in the disused upstairs dining room of the airmen's' Mess - in long rows of camp beds, iirc we were issued them to take with us.