50 Years of Operation
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50 Years of Operation
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If you wish to add to this document please contact me via corkish@manx.net
Please note that some names have been changed, I guess those of you who were
there will identify the individual(s), culprit(s) involved etc.
May 2015,
Some memories from John Millington,
27Sqn RAF Marham, Mar 84 – May 87
BAE Warton, May 89 – Oct 92
King Khalid Airbase Jan 93 – Apr 94
I joined the RAF in late December 1975 and after initial and trade training
found myself posted to RAF St Athan as a fresh LAC air radio mechanic working on
Vulcan major servicing. I did this for the next 2 years.
After further technical training (back at RAF Cosford), followed by 4 years at
RAF Sealand as a JT then Corporal LTechAC I was posted to 27 Sqn at RAF Marham
in March 1984.
27 Squadron, having previously been a Vulcan squadron, had reformed at Marham on
Tornado GR1, becoming operational in September 1983. Our more famous colleagues
of 617 Sqn were also at Marham, but based on their own site on the eastern side
of the airfield, while we were based towards the southwest corner.
After my initial introduction to Tornado ground handling and flight line
maintenance, baptism as a HAS (hardened aircraft shelter) corporal, I then
attended the relatively short CODA (Communications and Defensive Aids) course at
RAF Cottesmore.
I then returned to 27 Sqn for a short period, before going back to Cosford for
cross training in Radar and navigation systems, prior to returning to Cottesmore
to attend the 10 week ANAC (Automatic navigation and aiming complex) course. For
some reason anything associated with Tornado was chock full of abbreviations and
acronyms. On return to 27 Sqn there was a period of exercises at Marham, as
usual in the dark wet winter months. I guess the USSR and Warsaw Pact would
never attack in summer.
Then 27 Sqn entered an intense 2 year period of overseas detachments, which
found me as a newly qualified Q'd Coda / Anac-ist joining most of these
'jollies'. April 1985 found the squadron at USAF Nellis in Nevada.
The majority of the ground crew (self-christened Panavia Pantrash), flew to
Nellis from Marham by VC10 via Goose Bay (still nippy in early April) and Dulles
airport, Washington DC.
Three crazy weeks were spent accommodated in Las Vegas but operating daily at
Nellis for Green Flag (ECM exercise). The Tornado with its integral radar
warning system, wing mounted ECM and BOZ pods, (the latter being a chaff and
flare dispenser) and terrain following capability performed extremely well.
Upon the squadron's return to the UK it was then involved in a Germany based
exercise, so spent a hectic fortnight at RAF Laarbruch and RAF Bruggen.
The squadron then settled down at Marham, but was involved in the preparation
and training for an up and coming major detachment to USAF Ellsworth in South
Dakota for the late summer & autumn of 1985.
The majority of the squadron left for the 9 weeks at Ellsworth with personnel
accommodated in Rapid City. 57 Sqn with their Victor tankers supported 27 Sqn
both on the transit, and during the many competition sorties.
I was fortunate to top the list to occupy the '6th seat' on one (if I remember
rightly 6 hour flight) of the many Victor tanker sorties. It was amazing to
watch the Tornados form up and refuel.
I wonder if any of the crews that day knew that a 27 Sqn ground crew member was
watching them through the periscope?
This is the detachment and period of competition that is referred to in your
timeline when the squadron almost swept the board of trophies. The squadron
returned to Marham for a period and then in July 1986 spent 3 weeks at Goose bay
for low level training before a return trip to Nellis for Red Flag during
November.
My bags never seemed to get unpacked, and how my wife and very young son coped
with my many long absences I often wonder?
In May 1987 I was finally posted from 27 Sqn to RAF Valley (SARTU) on Anglesey,
on Wessex helicopters. Quite a change from Tornado and the hectic squadron life
on the HAS site at Marham.
My association with Tornado did not end there. I left the RAF in April 1989 (By
then a corporal for nearly 6 years! What do you have to do to get promotion?),
and took up a civilian job at BAE Warton in Lancashire.
Initially as a training officer in the Systems and Support school. I mainly
concentrated on the Tornado Recce system. At that time Tornados were still in
full production at BAE Warton.
After 2 years I applied for a flight test engineer position in Flight Test at
BAE Warton on the EFA team. As far as flight test was concerned EFA, before it
became EFA2000 and Eurofighter was not yet a flying project. There was still
much planning to do. During this period the technology demonstrator aircraft EAP
was still undertaking its final test flights.
I was involved briefly in the telemetry room at BAE Warton, a very interesting
and exciting time as EAP might do 3 flights a day. Shortly before EAP completed
its test life it easily achieved Mach 2 in level flight accelerating away from
the Lightning chase aircraft. Though with only fuselage tanks EAP had very
restricted endurance. EAP had 2 x RB199 104 engines (as well as Tornado
undercarriage, and modified F3 fin).
Anyway I digress... after 2 years in flight test, and involved with the first
EFA ground engine runs (RB199 104's again as Eurojet engines were to fitted in
first in later development aircraft), I made the momentous decision to transfer
departments and work for BAE Systems and Services in Saudi Arabia.
This found me back on the flight line, but now in 'company clothing' at
Khamis-Mushayt working on RSAF Tornado IDS as a recce system technician. The
aircraft system being IR sensors both sideways and linescan, recorded on VHS
tape cassettes but high resolution format. I finally did my last work on Tornado
in April 1994, just over 10 years to the date of my first as I left BAE to
finally return to the UK full time and seek other work in industry.
Also, I'm not date perfect (I wish I'd kept a diary). I've missed out the many
VC10 or Hercules flights (as human cargo) to and from the USA and Goose Bay and
one overnighter at Gander, various boozy ferry crossings to and from Zeebrugge
(to undertake at least 4 West German based exercises) and also the many places
visited during free time while on detachments. Not to mention sitting in a rain
soaked 'sangar' on guard or launching or receiving a Tornado in the HAS over a
long sleepless night during exercise in full NBC!
Some images courtesy of John Millington
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TV Tab Display |
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TV Tab Display |
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End of the ramp, Nellis, 1986 |
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Tanking |
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Tanking |
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Tanking |
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Ellsworth, 1986 |
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Ellsworth, 1986 |
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Ellsworth, 1986, Hockey Stick Primary & Secondary Aircraft |
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27 Squadron Air & Ground Crew, Nellis, 1985 |
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SBC Ellsworth 1985 |
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Green Flag 1985 |
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Goose Bay 1986 |
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Red Flag 1986 |
November 2008,
Memories from Glyn R Ingram FIAP, MBCS
(Flight Test Instrumentation Computer Department, BAC/BAe Warton 1975-1985)
As a youngster at Heyhouses Junior school in St Annes I would often be out
playing and suddenly hear the double bang of the sound barrier being broken.
Above I could see the aircraft flying out from Warton on their test flights. It
seemed magical to me and it started a desire to be involved one day. I learned
later that most of the bangs were from the TSR2 or it's chase planes heading out
over the Irish sea. Years later when I had completed my O levels at King Edward
VII School, Lytham and I was still being tantalised by the aircraft flying
overhead. The sixth form and A levels didn't really appeal but the options were
a bit limited so I stayed on but started looking around for jobs in computers
which was my new passion.
Two trainee operator jobs were advertised in late 1974 and I applied for both,
but really only wanted one of them. The first was for British Nuclear Fuels
which would of been great except for glowing in the dark, the other was for BAC
Warton in the Flight Test Department. Miraculously I attended an interview and
was offered the job at BAC and started there on the 1st April 1975 as a trainee
computer operator.
To begin with I was working on the Jaguar flight test program, along with Stuart
Miller and my shift leader Mike Highton. For those of you with any interest in
computers we used two Honeywell DDP516 computers, one had 8K of 8 bit memory,
the other had 16k. Laughable by today's standards when the smallest PC you buy
has at least 512Mb (524288Kb) of 32 bit memory, BUT they did the job admirably.
After a couple of years on the Jaguars I moved over onto the Tornado flight
testing. Here we had two BIG machines. Both were Rank Xerox Sigma V computers
one with 64K the other with 100K of memory. By today's standards they were
massive, rows of Blue cabinets about 6 feet tall, humming noisily with banks of
flashing lights and whirling tape decks. At the heart of this was the telemetry
control station. Here during the test flights one of the operators would sit,
listening to the Flight Test Engineers and Aircrew whilst overseeing the
positioning of the main dish antenna on the roof of the building. Generally this
would auto-track the aircraft but at times it had to be controlled manually
using two small rotating knobs. Keeping the signal strong was quite an art and
you soon realised when the signal was fading by the shouts and insults directed
to you over the headset by the 'Boffins' in the monitoring room.
Every weekday the computer room was manned by at least 3 operators, starting up
at 6am on a Monday morning then eventually powering down at 10pm on a Friday
night. After about 5 years in operations I was promoted into the programming
side, and was trained in Fortran so that I could be a part of writing the
analysis programs for the flight testing which I continued to do for a further 5
years before leaving BAe to see the outside world.
Now after over 33 years from starting in IT I am still heavily involved as a
Database Manager for a large private boarding school.
The happiest and saddest days of my working life were spent in flight test, the
camaraderie of the entire team being a huge perk of the job, but the loss of
people you know such as Russ Pengelly who tragically died in the Tornado P08
crash being the saddest.
There were some very unusual occurrences during the years, with Warton being
right on the edge of the River Ribble and Preston docks still being in use there
were occasional times when the aircraft were suddenly moved into hangers or
generally out of site. Normally this occurred when a fishing boat loaded with
more aerials than Jodrell Bank was passing by flying a flag with a star on it.
On one occasion when I was involved in Engine Runs on a Jaguar the entire team
mooned one of these passing vessels, photos in the Kremlin no doubt.
I can't remember all of the operators and programmers I worked with in those
days but I would like to name a few: David Scholfield (Chief Computer Operator),
Dr D K Potter (Head of Flight Test IT), Mike Highton, David Leeming, Bill
Fletcher, Stuart Miller, Nigel, Dave, Stan, Norman Lowe (all operators), Carol
Lowe (programmer), Christine & Jackie (Kinetheodolite operators and card punch
operators)
There were many more but alas the memories of names fade in time, and my
apologies to anyone I have missed out from the team.
If anyone remembers me from those days I would love to get back in touch
March 2006,
Memories from Gerry Frew,
In your Tornado timeline on your very interesting site, I spotted a reference to
a TWCU deployment to Goose Bay from 10 May 1983. I was on TWCU at the time (as
an air comms/air radar technician specialising on the FGCS and CODA systems) and
went on a deployment across the pond in May 1983. However, it wasn’t
specifically a Goose Bay deployment (if I’m thinking of the same thing, and I’m
pretty sure I am – unlike our operational colleagues, TWCU deployments were
pretty few and far between). We were actually invited by the USAF to take part
in the Armed Forces Open Day at Andrews AFB in Maryland, with the purpose of
demonstrating the RAF’s latest toy to the American masses.
I think we took 4 aircraft, but I could be wrong about that. We ground crew were
transported by Hercules via Gander, where we had an overnight stop and on down
to Andrews the following day. The sky that day was crystal clear and the views
of Martha’s Vineyard and Manhattan were absolutely superb, to some extent
distracting us from the interminable noise of 4 Allison turboprops and the fact
that nowhere in the cabin was comfortably warm. On arrival at Andrews, we saw
our aircraft in and set about putting together our maintenance facilities. We
were allocated hangar space with the USAF Thunderbirds F-16 display team, whose
aircraft were absolutely pristine and made our Tornados look a bit shabby – we
had done our best to clean the soot left by the thrust-reversers off the tail
fins but hadn’t been too successful. The Thunderbirds line chief was most put
out when he saw how leaky our aircraft were – fuel, hydraulic oil, engine oil
and gearbox oil all leaked onto the ASP and hangar floors in prodigious
quantities and he didn’t want to risk any of that messing up his charges, so we
spent an inordinate amount of time clearing up spills – until some kind
individual loaned us a number of drip trays (we had omitted to take any with
us).
The next week or so was spent flying our demo sorties – not much more than 4 or
so a day – and basking in the Maryland sunshine. The natives were very friendly
and invited us to numerous parties. However, their enthusiasm for us was a
watered down a bit when the Red Arrows air and groundcrew arrived part way
through the week and stole everyone’s attention. The open day took place over a
weekend and the place was mobbed. The flying displays went very well and we
suffered no significant defects that I recall. It might have been good if we
had, as it would have given us an excuse to stay on, however it was over all too
soon and time to go home.
On the way home we staged through Goose Bay, where, having previously worked on
Vulcans and having a still-current qualification for the Navigation and Bombing
System, I got roped into helping with a radar fault on our similarly-equipped
Victor tanker. So while my colleagues were in what passed for town doing what
young airmen do, I spent most of the night beavering away in a dark, dingy and
freezing cold Victor radome. From there, it was back home to Honington to enjoy
the envious looks of colleagues who hadn’t been lucky enough to get on what was
a pretty plum detachment.
February 2004,
Memories from David Dean, Flight Trials Engineer,
"I started my 25 years on the Tornado project in March 1975 and had the pleasure
of being a Tornado flight trials engineer for the first 8 years. ( PO2 , P03 and
P06 ) I retired PO2 into RAF Honington . The original plan was to use P02 as a
weapons trainer. That didn't happen and she just sat in storage hangar for
years. P06 was retired into RAF Cosford. A small team was dispatched from Warton
to meeting the aircraft and remove the flight test instrumentation data tape.
Thousands of staff at RAF Cosford lined up to meet the aircraft...........Bang
....splutter....Bang, the aircraft did a low pass over the airfield with the
left hand engine struggling to remain serviceable. The Pilot ( Dave Eagles I
think ) did his best to perform the planned, now very brief, flying display. Was
it safe to land on a very short runway at Cosford with only limited reverse
thrust from one engine ? .........Safety First ! ...... The aircraft limped back
to Warton to return some four days later. That's the reason for the notes in the
L/H undercarriage bay. "
"Development problems - the most visible change was to the base of the fin. If
you look at the bottom of the rudder on P02 (when it was painted red , white and
blue ) There is a gap between the rudder and top of the rear fuselage/engine...
and no vortex generators on the side of the fin ( they look like small aerials
at both sides of the fin ) Why ? We had a small airflow problem at the base of
the fin. On P02 that void was filled with the best OAK that money could buy (
yes... that oak is still in place on the aircraft all these years later ) Later
prototype / production aircraft had this modification installed into rear
fuselage ( metal this time ! ) "
"The early development years were filled with technical stories as we pushed
forward to edges of the technology , the stories that shouldn't be lost are the
people stories of those development days."
"The fuel system gave us some problems in the early days . At the slightest
provocation the aircraft would vent fuel from the top of the fin . No matter
what time of day , or the technical configuration of the aircraft , the fuel
always vented onto a gentleman called Peter X . Pete then became famous as "
Paraffin Pete "."
"The oddest story was the day we got the P03 stuck in the gents toilet ......yes
it's true ! We had a new driver on the tractor and as everybody has tried to
reverse a caravan will know , reversing a large object can be difficult
.........pushing a multi-million tornado prototype into a hanger can be a little
stressful too ! The driver was a just a little unsure that he had clearance
between the wall on one side and the next prototype on the other . He went
forward and backwards a number of times .......a small crowd of well wishers
gathered to offer assistance. The right hand wing came ever closer to the gap in
the wall that lead to the gents toilet. Two more movements of the tractor
steering wheel resulted in the wing tip being lodged in this gap !!!! The local
management team were not very amused !! Result = Knock down the wall !! "
February 2004,
Memories of a long rebuild...(F.3 ZE210 was involved in a mid air collision with
F.3 ZE733 on 30th October 1995)
"It was lucky for us that ZE210 had its mishap when it did or we would never
have got the project finished. As I remember there were over 200 items
documented as robbed from ZE250 with another 100 'undocumented' borrowings. We
would demand a spare part, it would arrive, be placed on the shelf next to the
a/c and then be nicked by one of the squadrons during the night! The main BASOV
(Bleed Air Shut Off Valve) was a favourite item, we started hiding the parts but
they cottoned on to that one."
"The canopy from ZE210 had a big scratch in it caused by the rear crew's helmet
hitting it during the collision. We managed to blend it out within limits. ZE210
sat in the hangar for a long time while they planned what to do with it, I
believe that it was eventually scrapped."
"The main damage to ZE250 was caused by a fire in the cross drive clutch which
spread through the SPS bays and as far up as the base of the fin. To repair it
the centre part of the SPS bay forward frame was cut out and replaced with a new
piece and butt straps. There was lots of wiring damage and all the hydraulic
pipes had to be removed and refitted (several years later). When we finally put
electrical and hydraulic power on it there was one small hydraulic leak and the
airbrake wiring had been reversed! In for Out and Out for In! Soon fixed that
one."
(Fragment from UK Government website (Hansard Report) Crown Copyright)
Mr. Redmond: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a
statement on the date and circumstances of the accident to Tornado F.3 serial
number ZE250 carried out on the aircraft since its accident, and by which unit;
what is the estimated additional number of man hours required to complete
repairs to the aircraft; and what is the estimated total cost of restoring the
aircraft to front line service following its accident.
Mr. Soames: Tornado F3 ZE250 was damaged on 27 March 1992 during engine ground
runs. To date, RAF tradesman have expended 9,025 man hours on the repair, and it
is estimated that a further 7,090 man hours will be required before the aircraft
can be restored to service. The labour costs of returning the aircraft to
service are estimated at approximately £800,000. The cost of spares and
materials, which have been provided from existing stocks, could be provided only
at disproportionate cost.
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