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Did anyone know Len Morgan?

Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2018 8:07 pm
by boing
Probably a pretty closed pilot community in SA so someone might be able to help.

Len retired from the RAF and I flew with him in Saudi Arabia with their military. One day, much later, I was sitting in an airliner as pax, pre-taxi, and a travel movie was on the video. I wasn't taking much notice until I saw the military aircraft -- and then some footage of Len flying a JP on pleasure flights. If you think he is still around please PM me and I will see whether I can get in touch.

Authentication story. Len and I had rooms opposite each other in the unaccompanied pilot accommodation on base. We were going to get the evening meal together. I knock on Len's door and he joins me and closes his room door which action was followed by a loud explosion. Len had been making beer and he had apparently added too much sugar before capping the bottles and they were in a state of incipient detonation - which state was removed by him closing his room door. Since the brewing beer was kept in his clothes closet you can imagine the mess.

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Re: Did anyone know Len Morgan?

Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2018 7:34 am
by Cacophonix
The only Len Morgan I know of who flew warbirds and trainers and the like was an American pilot and ex Braniff 747 Captain Len Morgan, who used to write regularly for Flying Magazine in his monthly Vectors column. I didn't know him personally but everybody who read his stuff felt they did. Sadly I see he and the editor of Flying magazine Richard Collins, have both gone west, Mr Collins having passed away this year!

I assume when you write SA you mean Saudi Arabia and not South Africa so I won't witter on about ZU-JPR but can relate to your Len Morgan's home brew experience as my brother in law and I were also school mates and ran a clandestine home brew setup in his cupboard while still at school. We also took the sugar turning to alcohol thing to the extreme with exactly the same experience of bottles exploding and the smell of alcohol pervading his house, leading to the confiscation of the apparatus by his mother and a temporary cessation of our alcoholic quest. I am happy to say that he qualified as a chemical engineer and after a long successful career in the oil industry, ending up with BP, he has partly retired and now teaches chemistry subjects part time at Oxford University, so his commitment to the subject paid off in the end.

Caco

Re: Did anyone know Len Morgan?

Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2018 9:42 am
by Cacophonix
I assume when you write SA you mean Saudi Arabia and not South Africa so I won't witter on about ZU-JPR
But if he was based in South Africa, then ZU-JPR was based at Cape Town International as was the Garlick Strikemaster so your man may be in the Cape somewhere.

Caco

Re: Did anyone know Len Morgan?

Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2018 10:26 am
by Boac
Talking 'home brew', when I were among the fine body of instructors at the RAF College of Knowledge, two ex Hunter mates brewed 'Wonder Beer' in a bath in the Officers' Mess (on a semi-'commercial' basis) - and a 'wonder beer' it was too. =))

Re: Did anyone know Len Morgan?

Posted: Sat Jun 23, 2018 2:30 pm
by boing
Sorry, was not very clear.
As far as I know Len had no connection with South Africa until he moved there sometime after his Saudi Arabia period. The video most certainly showed him flying a JP type aircraft from one of the major coastal South African cities since it was a South African tourist promotion movie.


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