COMBAT AND COMPETITION.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

COMBAT AND COMPETITION
too, a feeling for the needs of others. An ideal man to introduce you
to ops.
Seen from above, on my first sortie, the beachhead was an
awesome sight. The narrow coastal plain, looked like a vast
construction site, littered with dumps - tanks, guns, bridging
equipment, ammunition and fuel - the whole paraphernalia of war.
ALGs5 added to the congestion, their open dispersals and makeshift
runways visible for miles. Huge highways had been bulldozed across
the countryside, swathes of bare earth swarming with traffic, each
convoy throwing its curtain of dust high in the air. Until, as they
neared the battle area, the vehicles slowed and the telltale clouds
subsided.
To port through the thickening haze a brief glimpse of Caen,
shattered buildings open to the sky, the flicker of distant fires, and as
suddenly the bocage countryside below was empty, devoid of
movement, threatening.
A brief command, a swift formation change, that familiar rolling
entry to the dive and our target lay below. Cannons thumped - and
thanks to those training sorties at Aston Down the rest came almost
automatically - pull through, pause and press the tit. A quick glance
back to check the bomb bursts, then it was over, and we were climbing
steeply away.
What an anticlimax. There had been no sign of the enemy. No
fleeing soldiers, no flak, even the bombs looked puny. I felt cheated.
All those years, waiting and training, just for that. Later I would see
more, but never much. Enemy skills in camouflage and concealment,
except on rare occasions when they were forced to move by day, were
too good by far.
Such had been the pressures to move the squadrons to France that
the landing grounds were operational within range of enemy guns and
sometimes under fire. An advance party, flown in by Dakota, was
reduced to living in foxholes for more than a week. Eventually the
Huns were pushed back, the rest of the Squadron arrived, and they
became aviators again.
As the situation improved 146 Wing and its four Typhoon
Squadrons (193, 197, 257 and 266), soon to be joined by a fifth (263),
settled in at St Croix sur Mer. B3 had a single PSP6 runway, laid across
the stubble, and an orchard where our tents were pitched amongst the
apple trees.
The shattered casemates of the German beach defences, beside the
44