Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

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TheGreenGoblin
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Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#1 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Tue Jun 23, 2020 10:12 am

I have been reading the biography of Air Vice Marshal John Howe which I have been enjoying, not least, because, as some here might known, I am an arch South African chauvinist, and enjoy tales of Saffers doing well in outstanding organisations like the RAF, and also because Howe was clearly an extraordinary man, who combined the virtues of a good fighting officer and leader with those of thoughtfulness, humanity and also because he obviously was a thoroughly decent man. He also clearly had a good sense of humour as this particular jape, noted below, demonstrated.

Howe resigned from the SAAF, due in part to the discrimination against English speakers or those who didn't toe the National Party line (I relate strongly to those two points), as did many others who did the same and ended up in the UK in the early 1950's to re-enlist with either the RAF of the FAA. One of Howe's friends Philip Lageson <<not Lagesen as that RAF site misspells his surname>> who went on to become an Air Marshal in the RAF and knighted for his pains, left the RAF in the late 1970's and decided to return to South Africa and Howe decided to give his good friend a suitable sending off...

"Phil Lageson was returning to South Africa. He had a friend who owned a shipping line, with whom he took a berth. John Howe got to hear that this was on a container ship sailing to Cape Town. Whilst on patrol he was able to find the ship and fly-by, photographing it in the process. Before doing so he flew behind the vessel and as he pulled round he called the Captain to inform him that one of his containers had broken loose and had broken up as it hit the water, leaving a grey Mercedes floating on the surface! This brought its owner, Phil, quickly up on deck and some of the photos taken as John flew the length of the ship clearly depict a fist being shaken at the aircraft!"

It might be an apocryphal story but is one I am apt to believe. =))

Do any other folks have similar tales, about themselves or others that might fit the title of this thread?
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#2 Post by Pontius Navigator » Tue Jun 23, 2020 10:58 am

Well Lageson was OC 12 when I joined the sqn. He was a jovial bully. Met him again atvTengah when I held the door open for him as he exited Ops and got a double fist blow under my rib cage.

At the time Tengah had a resident Hunter sqn and many new pilots were white kneed first tourists. On arrival they had to go round the station to get arrival chits and initial interviews. First off was the padre. He was VERY friendly. Had them sit either side of him, hands on knees, then told them that they would have a great time and fun buzzing the locals etc.

Next up, the station cdr. The Adjutant warned them that the CO was a right tartar and they would have to smarten up when called in. The CO called the Adjt who hustled in, door shut, lots of shouting, door opened and they were rushed in etc

If course the CO was the padre, the Adjt was Phil and the Padre was OC Ops. Mike Knight later AVM. It took weeks to straighten them out.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#3 Post by boing » Fri Jun 26, 2020 4:58 am

One of my favourites is that a 5 ton anchor was delivered to a US air force base in the middle of the country in error. Apparently the part numbers between the anchor and what was really ordered was only a mis-typed digit apart and no one actually asked the obvious logical question of why an air force base in the middle of the US would need an anchor.

On the other hand an RAF stores officer told me of receiving a Canberra canopy instead of a box of nuts and bolts for the fitting thereof.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#4 Post by ian16th » Fri Jun 26, 2020 10:17 am

boing wrote:
Fri Jun 26, 2020 4:58 am
One of my favourites is that a 5 ton anchor was delivered to a US air force base in the middle of the country in error. Apparently the part numbers between the anchor and what was really ordered was only a mis-typed digit apart
This is why self checking numbering systems were invented!
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#5 Post by Pontius Navigator » Fri Jun 26, 2020 10:48 am

boing, definitely in the cockup category was the Chocolate Bomber.

The Nimrod was painted white on top and grey undersides. As the primary cold War threat was the manned bomber (making a radar controlled) blind bombing attack it was decided to tone down the paint scheme.

You may be familiar with the green hued Hemp colour in use for 30 odd years. Well the first arrived back from the paintshop - chocolate was the polite colour, flying turd was perhaps more accurate. It was as you might guess due to a typo.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#6 Post by Pontius Navigator » Fri Jun 26, 2020 10:57 am

In fact I would say the entire tone-down process in UK was a complete waste of money. We started in 1974 after the spectacular success of the Israeli Air Force and our Fast-Jet leadership thought we ought to reintroduce earlier wartime camouflage.

Had they consulted the bomber experts they might have learnt that ASM and blind bombing do not rely on being able to see the target.

Indeed I had to write a paper effectively refuting a VSOs contention that the main threat was a Backfire bomber strafing a line of aircraft on the ground.

I pointed out that the 500kg dumb bomb remained the most effective weapon for attacking aircraft in the open; I believe that might still be true today. One missile can kill one aircraft: one bomb can kill more.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#7 Post by Ex-Ascot » Fri Jun 26, 2020 12:00 pm

PN, I was about to mention the flying turd.

Had a phone call in ops from the Royal Pavilion at LHR. Your passenger is here where is her aircraft? Royal Household staff cock up. That Household was/is very inept. We scrambled a jet whilst ops spoke to LHR. Got Benson direct to finals 10R at LHR. Forget destination but UK. With police assistance I think that she was only about 20 mins late for first appointment and picked up the schedule during the day.

Think mentioned before I did a walk around on the wrong aircraft at Brize in front of the pax terminal and they started to push it back. The Capt waved cheerily at me as my F/O waved frantically to me from the aircraft alongside.

Battle of Britain cocktail party and the boss (a malaka) was PMC. He decided that his junior officers would write out the invitations. Obviously we buggered up a few and had to rewrite them. On the spoiled ones we put 'Bring a bottle' at the bottom and put them on the top of the pile. To say that there was a sense of humour failure is an understatement. He was the only Sqn boss I knew who was a dreadful pilot as well as an idiot. Never made it past Wg Cdr.
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#8 Post by Pontius Navigator » Fri Jun 26, 2020 12:14 pm

Another one that was a Service japes , cock up and other silly stuff, all in one, was the 1 Gp Dining in Night.

'twere the 25th Aniversary. Suffice to say the 50th passed off without a mention and 3 Gp scrubbed any thoughts of theirs.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#9 Post by CharlieOneSix » Mon Jun 29, 2020 10:18 pm

Only a small short lived cock-up but anyway........In the summer of 1966 our Wessex Mk1 helicopter anti-submarine Squadron - 8 airframes - had recently arrived back in the UK after a long Far East tour of just over a year. For some reason we became involved in Exercise Link West a few weeks later and we temporarily became a Commando role Squadron with all the anti-submarine gear removed and troop seats fitted. We flew from Ark Royal to the start of the exercise at RAF Dishforth then over the course of about 8 days we tootled at snake height around England ending up at Lavington Folly and Keevil on Salisbury Plain via Catterick, and RAF West Raynham.

It was great fun, and such a change from looking for imaginary submarines, but someone assumed we would be useless at map reading and two 72 Squadron RAF Wessex HC2s fitted with Decca were assigned to 'lead' us everywhere! One night we were camped out in a field near Catterick with 5 Wessex when we were 'attacked' at about 0200. The CO shouted to us to get the helicopters airborne and in my sleepy state I quickly climbed up the side of a Wessex but was utterly confused by the unfamiliar cockpit layout. Another pilot climbed up the same side and looked just as confused at this idiot RN pilot sitting in his RAF machine. We 'lost' our valued Squadron Uckers Board that night - maybe it's still in a cupboard somewhere on 72?

I'm not sure I would have lasted for very long in the real world as a Commando role pilot - the umpires classed me as having been shot down three times that week. At the end of the week we flew back to Culdrose against a stonking headwind - 117nm track distance which I note I logged as 2 hours.
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#10 Post by Undried Plum » Mon Jun 29, 2020 11:27 pm

Not a lot of submarines in Yarkeshire. So a good win, I'd say.

Who won at Ludo?

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#11 Post by Pontius Navigator » Tue Jun 30, 2020 8:41 am

An uckers board is all very well but for a 5-man V-bomber crew on QRA not good. Someone designed a 5 man board. Where a conventional game might last 30-30 minutes a 5 leg game lasted 2 1/2 hours.

It was amazing the skills that a disparate group of individuals could bring together.

One copilot was an artist with a soldering iron and polystyrene. Once his skill was recognised he was co-opted to create sqn badges for the Group. He was a marginally capable pilot and after his misemployment had lost what skill he had, failed a standards ride, was grounded, and left the Service.

Another had a massive artistic talent, organised the entire decoration for the Mess for a ball. He left to become a theatre director.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#12 Post by CharlieOneSix » Tue Jun 30, 2020 8:59 am

Just found this :Personalised Uckers Boards for sale - plus the Uckers Rules
In the rules if you are wondering what WAFU rules are, they are the rules played by members of the Fleet Air Arm.......WAFU = Wet and **** Useless
.
uckers.JPG
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#13 Post by Woody » Tue Jun 30, 2020 9:11 am

My late uncle, would after a few Pusser’s rums claim that he was nicknamed “ Slinger “ after nearly torpedoing a bus due to a misheard fire order during high speed trials, somewhere off the South Coast of England in the late Fifties, probably involving HMS Diana.
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#14 Post by Pontius Navigator » Tue Jun 30, 2020 10:58 am

This one's a cockup:

USS Winston Churchill paid a visit and was in the Portland Ranges for a live fire exercise. First the escorting frigate did some firing, then it was her turn. Unlike the mandraulic procedure in the RN they were going to demonstrate the fully automatic system. First though the RN had to do range safety procedures before they would allow live firing.

The Churchill duly went through the drills, the gun swivelled, elevated, tracked and did all the right things that guns do. No problem. Then they did it again. Still OK. Clearance given for live fire.

Gun swivelled, elevated, trained, and fire except at that point it swung 90 degrees and launched a shell at Dorset before swinging immediately back on target. Where it went no one knew and no complaints were received.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#15 Post by tango15 » Tue Jun 30, 2020 11:11 am

As a lad at school, (late 1950s), I was a member of the Combined Cadet Force (CCF). We had the regular 'summer camp' which usually took place during the Easter holidays (!), during which we had the privilege of a long train journey to Henlow, West Malling and in one case, St Mawgan. There was the usual CCF stuff, including groups of three being dumped out of the back of a three-tonner in the middle of nowhere with an OS map and a bag of sandwiches and told to find your way back to base. The prize for the group who got back first was a day out (about 10 hours at the time) in a Mk3 Shack. For the rest of us, it was a simulated air-sea rescue mission, involving an inshore patrol boat and a 22 Sqn Whirlwind. We were taken down to Newquay and given a briefing before boarding the boat. The weather was cloudy, but not low cloud and the wind was little more than a sea breeze. Half an hour later we were at sea, but within sight of land. However, the weather, as it so often does in that part of the world, had quickly taken a turn for the worse. The patrol boat began to wallow somewhat, to the discomfort of most of the CCF lads, myself included. Little was said, but as the rain began to appear and the wind began to freshen, it became apparent that the exercise would not take place. The matlows, determined not to be done out of a bit of fun, decided to do a bit of wave-bashing before returning to port, ensuring that we all got a second viewing of our excellent earlier breakfasts.

Upon our return to St Mawgan, discreet enquiries by one of the senior officers, (who was none too happy with the sequence of events), revealed that the Whirlwind allocated for the task had gone tech earlier that morning, but no-one had bothered to tell us. The second aircraft had to be kept available and could not therefore be used for the exercise. A re-run a few days later was threatened, but never happened, much to the relief of us cadets!

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#16 Post by ian16th » Tue Jun 30, 2020 1:06 pm

Pontius Navigator wrote:
Tue Jun 30, 2020 8:41 am
An uckers board is all very well but for a 5-man V-bomber crew on QRA not good. Someone designed a 5 man board. Where a conventional game might last 30-30 minutes a 5 leg game lasted 2 1/2 hours.
Tame I know, but on Gan for 3 weeks, we were in 5 man rooms. Managed to get 5 bridge players in together.

Many hours/days of boredom.

When one of the current players was fed up, he threw his cards down is disgust, the 5th wheel would pick up the hand and the school carried on.
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#17 Post by CharlieOneSix » Tue Jun 30, 2020 2:56 pm

PN's post reminds me of a similar cock-up back in November 1965. Ark Royal was sick in Singapore with boiler problems so I was part of a detachment of two Wessex to the RFA Tidespring for Exercise Warrior with the Australians. I was subsequently further detached for a few days to the guided missile destroyer HMS Devonshire as one of their two pilots was sick. This was off the Great Barrier Reef. The ship was going to carry out live firings of her 4.5 inch guns onto Fairfax Island and her Wessex was tasked with spotting the fall of fire. All went well until someone put in a massively wrong correction and multiple spouts of water appeared too close for comfort. I think we all yelled "Stop Firing" over the radio at the same time. I doubt whether anything came closer than half a mile of us but that was too close - 24 rounds per minute per barrel gives quite a splash show.

HMS Devonshire must have been one of the last units to use Fairfax Island as a target. I've just looked it up and its use as a bombing range ceased that year.
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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#18 Post by Pontius Navigator » Tue Jun 30, 2020 3:06 pm

A USAF cock up this time (RN next 😁).

Our range dive bomb target was close to the edge of the danger area and on the line of approach was one of the scoring quadrants, say 500 yards. As it was in the line of fire so to speak its approach face was painted in black and yellow check, it flew a red flag, and as a backup had 3 large lamps each 18 inch reflectors.

The F15 missed the dead centre of the hut by 6 feet with the bomb detonating immediately below the floor of the tower. The operator was shaken and stirred. The closest to death he had been after 22 years in the Guards.

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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#19 Post by FD2 » Fri Jul 03, 2020 3:36 am

I was told of an eastern Med encounter by a Shackleton pilot at a party in Malta about 1966. On patrol for Russian subs recharging batteries after sneaking out through the Bosphorus, they saw a small contact on radar at some distance - it was a still summer's night and the contact was heading in the right direction. A low power descent followed and a low pass over the contact with lights blazing and camera zooming revealed a couple enjoying 'Ugandan relations' on the yacht's deck.

An 892 Squadron F4 nearly bombing the wrong island (luckily with weenie bombs) in the Med (before the days of mass immigration). Probably claimed it wasn't their primary role.

Saving money at the bar- switch epaulettes on some person with deep pockets and short arms when his shirt was unattended, point out in the bar later, to an innocent bystander, that the baron in question is 'going astern' , up goes the thirsty cry and the guy is pinged for a round of drinks. Some mean buggers caught me out several times with that jape. :(( :))


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Re: Service japes, cock ups and other silly stuff...

#20 Post by FD2 » Fri Jul 03, 2020 4:26 am

A very famous signal.

A ship called in at Aden, I think, early in the 20th Century and anchored offshore. The crusty old admiral needed his laundry doing and his steward wasn't to be trusted to do the job properly. A signal was made to the naval people ashore, which accidentally (or on purpose) read 'Admiral needs woman'. On discovering this, the duty officer made another signal which read 'Insert washer between admiral and woman'.

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