Confrontation - Know your enemy, was it Soekarno ?

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XP358 on a hillside in Sabah...

Lauriebe,

Mentioned in 1972, hey ? Well I guess that it would take that long a time to repair the beast since November 1967. The fuselage frames must have been bent and the underfloor structure deranged afterthe belt it took on attaching itself to the hill. After I dragged the driver out (he had his shoulder harness on "relax" and had knocked himself out on the coaming)...quite dazed he was...more like threw him to the ground...I pressed the fire switches just to make sure and that was the last interest I had in XP358.

The trees were about 35 to 40 foot high on that hillside and XP358 chopped them down as she went it. She also chopped her own tailboom off in the process and as I had told the driver to put it down hard to stop us rolling back off the hill, the front legs were broken off as well. There were no blades left, just stubs. It all happened in seconds from the run-down of the turbine which I called, to being a repository on the side of a hill, ten seconds at the most....the driver was in a daydream.

I saw him years later at Gutersloh, never acknowledged him at all. Very poor show. If he's reading this, he will know.

A personal observation:

We started getting some real cowboys through in the last year that I was on 110 Squadron, the R.A.F. was scratching for pilots and what we got were not what we expected. The learning curve was high but being young junior "officers" they did not take too kindly to being told what to do from old hands on the Squadron especially from SNCO's who wanted to remain "alive". This led to some conflicts.

When today we talk about CRM and managing a flight properly, that was unheard of in those days in the R.A.F.. Class distinction got in the way quite often and on another forum I have seen a term used by a Royal Air Force Officer who calls himself "Pontius Navigator", which is demeaning, degrading and everything else which gets peoples backs up.... the term is "Airman Tendencies" which I never heard in my time in the R.A.F., so it must be one of those "secret" terms used by officers.

I recall that the last totally demeaning term that I heard was at Seletar on a parade where the C.O. of Seletar (a Group Captain) addressed the assembled parade and all the assembled ladies who had come to watch on the occasion of the Royal Air Force's 50th Anniversary..... a joyous occasion....

As he welcomed the crowd, he said in a stentorian voice:

"Officers and their Ladies, Senior NCO's and their Wives, Airmen and their Women..... welcome to this 50th Anniversary..." etc. etc...

My then wife was disgusted and rightly so, it spelt the end of the relationship with the Royal Air Force..... The man was an idiot but that is the way that Officers used to carry on. Maybe they still do, I don't know. If you took them to task then, you were said to have a "chip on your shoulder"...what rot.

In those days, "Know your Enemy" meant the Air Force itself for the disharmony that there was...I read that it is still there so what have they learned ?

RPM, Fuel Flow, TGT...
www.electranewbritain.com

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I can see that you might have had problems with the Officers you met, but you can't generalise about people. I have met some really good Officers, aircrew amongs them, old and new.
Conversely I have met some 'orrible NCOs amongst the decent ones.
As in any walk of life, there are good and bad people.

Just looking back through Postfade wonderful pics, interesting to see that the RAF were air handling Landrovers in the most awkward way possible. I thought the Dakota way of doing things would have been phased out by the early '60s!

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16 years 5 months

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Amazing--never understood all till now.

Hi Folks,
Just like to add some more to this long and very interesting thread.

I have mentioned My escapades before with 4 JSTU ( Blue Steel ) ( Hi Postfade, you still sending in stunning pics,--Good on yer. ) And my passing through Changi in Transit in Oct. 62 and back again in 65, took in all that was going on and never really understood what was happening till now , would you believe.:D

Down the years since then , little things still stick about that era and that time. In 1961,or early 62, Valiant Photo Aircraft from 543 Sqdn, RAF Wyton visited An RAAF Station in Queensland, Aussie, ( Name now escapes me-well it was many yrs. ago ), for a month long detachment, It went off well and all returned to Wyton OK. I was a lowly J/T working in the Tyre Bay at that time, but never found out the reasons for their visit, as everything was top secret.

So some 47 yrs + on, and looking in here, I now realize it was the Indonesian Confrontatian that must have been the prime reason for 543's visit.

Also, in 1966, I was a Cpl over at F.C.M.P.C. RAF Valley, as part of the support network there set-up for visiting Fighter Sqdns. of the RAF to carry out there bi- annual, Missile firing training out over the Sea- in conjuction with RAE Llanbedr.

We had a visit from the last Javelin Squadron still operating and they flew in from Cyprus, during the summer, still in their service KD shorts,etc, did their weeks flying , left and were disbanded shortly after.
( I cannot now recall that Sqdns. Number either--Duh !!! )

The pilots were all older, grizzled guys and I now wonder If any of those Aircraft and Aircrew were ones that operated out of Seletar in early 1960's with 60 and 64 Sqdn's.

We did have an ex-Seletar Javelins Groundcrew man working with us at that time, and he loved getting to grips with the Javelins again. He fitted the role of , Sqdn. " Liney" very well, and was all you would expect of a beer drinking, smoking card playing, P**** taking Scotsman, who shall remain nameless.--:D A typical SAC, backbone of these Sqdns. the likes of which I never come across now. ( But he knew his Javelins )

I do then wonder if any of those Seletar Javelins now still exist. So I'll turn that over to you guys.

Whilst at Edinburgh Field, Oct. 62 to April 65, I used to see Quite a Few RAAF Sabres come and go to and from the RAAF Heavy Maintenance Hanger there, this was the first Hanger on your right as you came in through ( Old ) Airfield Main Gate. They did look nice pieces of kit these ones I saw must have been the ones you folks are talking about now. I did even get to sit in one once.

As a Flight Simmmer nowadays, via Micro-Soft CFS3, ( On-Line mostly ) I can actually get into a South African Sabre in an SOH add on called " Korean Skies"and the one Plane that is a delight to fly is ----The Sabre. Yes !-- The traditional long take off run is still apparent to get airborne and you can feel the lightness of controls and how quickly she gets up to speed. Marvellous.

But Landing these aircraft requires a fantastically long Run, even with Airbrakes full out and Full Flaps, down the Sabre consumes all of the runaway length to land and I still run onto grass at end, :D Not sure if this is me or were the Sabres actually like this to fly, The Guys who put "Korean Skies" together were meticulous in setting their Aircraft performances and handling qualities to within 10% of original, but is there any one out there who can confirm or deny these Flight Sim. Sabre qualites. Would love to know.:) And what a performance trying to shoot other Aircraft down, the closing speeds make for a 100% concentration required.

I salute you guys who flew them, In some small way, I feel privileged to be able to "Dabble" in this world of 47--60 yrs. ago again.

My apologies to moderators if I've strayed off Thread a bit, but it's nice to link up with those times again, keep this thread going guys, there has to be a fund of stories and pics. still out there.

Bill T.

ps:-- And RPM-FF-TG, I completely understand where you are coming from in personal Observations.

There were some right B****** s around, but because of the Rank business, you could not hit back so to speak, which then resulted in " Civil Disobedience" as only means of getting some say. Or Getting " P*******D when ever. Don't even think about going down road of complaints procedure, Complete waste of time.

Folks who weren't in RAF or Forces at those times will find it difficult to understand and wonder why we can be grumpy now and out spoken, so humour us guys. We all stuck at job in hand though and got it done. Being a SNCO was a lot of unnecessary stress, as we had to prove our efficiency at all times through the monitoring system.

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RPM FF TGT:

Thanks so much for the info on the 110 sqn Whirlwinds...it's great to find out aircraft 'histories' after all these years.

Regarding the RAAF Sabres- they didn't call into to Changi very often but I did manage one trip to Butterworth, their base in Malaya. We flew back from a week on Penang island (in a 52 sqn Valetta).
Here are two pics from out of the window.

http://www.davidtaylorsound.co.uk/share/Aircraft%20pics/2%20Sqn%20RAAF%20Canberras%20at%20Butterworth-S466A.jpg

First we taxied past the 2 Sqn RAAF Canberra Mk 20's lined up at 90 deg to the runway.

http://www.davidtaylorsound.co.uk/share/Aircraft%20pics/77%20Sq%20RAAF%20Sabres%20at%20Butterworth%20Aur63-S468A.jpg

And then the wonderful sight of the 77 Sqn Sabres lined up alongside the runway as we took off in the noisy old 52 Sqn Valetta. There was an RAF Britannia in as well.
This was August 1963.

Things got pretty tense during 1963 with the Indonesians and the Vietnamese wear developing.
My father was a Warrant Officer in Signals at Changi and he was sent with the 'detachment' that went to Cheng Mei in Thailand...I guess that was 1963.
He sneaked some photos for me:

http://www.davidtaylorsound.co.uk/share/Aircraft%20pics/Cheng%20Mei-20%20Sqn%20Hunters-L&M-010As.jpg

Hunters of 20 sqn with some USAF Super Sabres.
I loved the F-100's almost as much as the F-86's, having spent a couple of years 'hanging over the fence' at Lakenheath in 1959/60!

http://www.davidtaylorsound.co.uk/share/Aircraft%20pics/Chank%20Mei-20%20sqn%20Hunters%20and%20Super%20Sabres-CM-1962--001As.jpg

I bet some of you remember those heavy RAF tents like the one just appearing in the last shot.
I also ...remember my father came home once with a Sten Gun..his official 'weapon of war' if things ever got really serious!

David

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Dayglo, Zobbits & Mapping....

Lauriebe, Pagen01 & WV-903....

We did not have dayglo on the Whirlwinds used in Borneo on either 103, 110 or 230 Squadrons. Yes it would be handy to see the chopper if you went down and even though the Army Scouts carried the big orange balloons that you could inflate by pouring water on chrystals, the R.A.F. never saw fit to place those on their choppers. I did a rescue of an Army Scout crew and a District Officer who had been counting Punan heads.... Punans had the dreaded lurgi and at that time they were dying out. The first thing I saw up on a large plateau while we were searching for this Scout was the orange balloon above the treetops. It stood out like a dogs hind leg.

Yes, Pagen01, you can't lump them all together and I agree with what you say. The Groupies greeting at the 50th Anni at Seletar went down like a lead balloon , I can tell you. He wern't very well liked that man. However, as regards the later drivers that arrived, we "Crewmen" got a bit twitchy towards the end of the two and a half year tour on choppers. You had to keep an eye on the fuel guage, tell them to open the filter when it was raining, make sure they didn't shut down with the blade stops out and worst of all you had to keep an eye on the ASI for those beasts were limited to 85Kts at SL and it decreased as you got higher. My actual second helicopter flight in the interior of Borneo was a night pick-up from a place called Kapit, where I had been flown in by a Single Pioneer. The flight to Nanga Gaat was not pleasant as he oversped the machine and I had to tell him and believe me, he did not like it one bit. 103 Squadron had three attempts to curtail a driver who "breached airspeed" before the individual was posted to another place on ATC duties. Bad things like that did happen. I recall an argument when returning to Labuan one day, ahead was a very wide storm front and lashing rain....you could see it was bad before you got into it. The cloud cover was 8/8ths and we are talking about the "tropics". The driver wanted to climb above this stuff (not knowing how high it went) and do a homing onto Labuan instead of my suggestion to land, shut-down and wait for it to pass, either that or follow the river to the coast. He had been there about 6 months. I ask you, fly above 8/8ths, above a storm, above total jungle with huge trees in a single engined helicopter with your No.1 enemy as power ("The Bristol Gnome") and with very, very scratchy HF which often did not work. Would you want to do that ?

He stayed low level over the river after the bunfight but said he was going to report me.... The outcome of that was that when we got back to Labuan he went running to see the Flight Commander about me, blurted out what he had in his mind as I strolled leisurely in after him.... The Flight Commander (from Rhodesia) signalled me to stay out and as I shut the door, he smiled at me and said, "I'll look after this...[and used my first name]". He was definitely one of "the" good ones.

I can recall the PR Canberras coming into Labuan in late 1960 and early 1961 while I was detached there from Changi and them doing mapping runs over the interior of Borneo. As early as that, somebody must have known what the British Government policy was going to be with Sarawak and Sabah and the likelihood of subsequent events. Even so, most of our Operational topographical maps of the border areas in 2nd and 3rd Divisions had "white gaps" where topo information was missing. They tried "shadowing" the valleys in a darker green where there was topo info but it didn't help much.

Know your enemy: "inadequate maps"......

RPM, FF, TGT...
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RPM ...

A Whirlwind outclimbing a tropical storm? That I would truly like to see; but not from onboard!!

Re the day-glo panels. I have seen several photos, supposedly of 110 Sqn aircraft, including XP303 & XR456, wearing panels just like those in DT's photo of XR480. The photos were taken in Borneo but I am not sure of the dates or locations. Visual aid in a crash, yes, in some circumstances. However, the jungle canopy soon closed again after anything had penetrated it. So not really much use there unless the aircraft came down in relatively open countryside. Those photos, IIRC, were posted in the Day-glo thread on here somewhile ago.

Perhaps these panels were removed when the shooting started. They would certainly have drawn attention to any aircraft sporting them.

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This is a wonderful and interesting thread - Postfade's pics are marvelous and the recollections of the people involved in Confrontation are great.

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24 years 2 months

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WV-903, IIRC, the Jav sqn on Cyprus was 29.

You also asked if there might be any surviving FEAF Javs. Unfortunately, I think not. There seem to be 5 surviving Jav 9/9Rs and, although one, XH892, did serve with 64, I think that was before they deployed to the Far East. It finished its days on 29. Could have been one of those you saw at Valley.

I was an SAC radar operator and did not get out to the Far East, Butterworth, until the beginning of May 66. By that time, most of the action was over. However, working on an air defence radar unit, we were still on a war footing. The QRA aircraft, normally 4 Sabres by day and 2 Javs at night, were ready to launch if anything unidentified showed itself. There was only one actual launch while I was there.

In Feb 67, I was posted to work on the mobile radar, a UPS 1, that had been setup during the conflict to plug a radar gap along the mid section of the Malay peninsular at Terandak Camp, Malacca. The unit was still operating although 'Konfrontasi' was officially over. It disbanded on 1 Apr 68.

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Couple of funny stories from Borneo

I posted these after Corporal Frank on the thread "Argosy Pictures wanted" thread mentioned supply dropping "gone wrong", read on:

Yes, just watched that (it was video clip) and it reminded me of Borneo and at a place called Long Jawi.... two stories...

1. A Beverley airdrop onto the "A" missed the DZ entirely and went through the roof of the longhouse at Long Jawi and narrowly missed a supposed paraplegic who (I am laughing while I type this...) had laid on his kip for some time (years) being waited on hand and foot..... The MSP (Medium Stressed Platform - 2 Tons) went straight through the roof and the paraplegic was last seen running into the jungle. I suppose there are false benefit claimers in all walks of life, even in the Borneo Jungle...!!!

I didn't witness the above example but I certainly did see this "No. 2"....

2. 110 Squadron on the day had positioned two Whirlwinds at Long Jawi ready for a re-supply run up to the Sarawak/Kalimantan border but the supply drop was late. Long Jawi was in a river valley and we positioned the choppers well up on the side of the slopes out of the way of the "A" (just in case....).

When the drop packs used to be made up, the Ice-cream always went on last, at the top of the packs. We didn't know when we got there at Long Jawi that the Beverley had gone U/S at Kuching but the MSP's had already been positioned at the apron ready for loading at Kuching, had been loaded, and been taken off again.... but the frozen Ice-cream had already been stuck there on the top of the MSP's.

Long Jawi was remote and the Ghurkas based there were waiting "eagerly" for the Stores and Ice-Cream that they knew would be coming in on the airdrop.

The Beverley after an hour or so was declared serviceable again and the Supply (ie: Catering) stuck some flat boxes of Baked Beans on top of the Ice-cream, re-loaded and the Beverley departed for Long Jawi which would be about 2 hours away from Kuching.

The upshot was that as I watched (from a safe distance up the side of the hill - "Chicken Me") the Beverley approached on his run-in which seemed O.K., as I'd watched these drops before....MSP's always came out in singles... 1-Ton platforms would come out in multiples.... Anyway, he dropped the first one which landed close to the "A".

As usual the Ghurkas who always stood in a leaning attitude in a large circle, poised to race in; they raced in, stripped the platforms, threw the boxes into a Landrover and waited for the next MSP. The eager looks on their faces had to be seen to be believed, believe me...

Round the cicuit went the Beverley, rolled out of the turn close in and dropped the second MSP... which candled.... Oh, dear....

One shute opened, the other two did not, so the MSP is hurtling to the ground, off the "A" and the Ghurkas race in to be enveloped in a circular horizontal sheet of now liquid Ice-cream which hits all of them at belt height as the Baked Beans crush the Ice-cream packets. Well, you have never seen anything like it in your life ! Grinning and laughing Ghurkas, wiping their trousers and shirts, white with melted Ice-cream, licking their fingers and rolling around on the ground in hysterics.

One of the more pleasurable and very happier moments from a little known but very dirty little conflict.

P.S. I have some B&W pictures of Long Jawi and if I knew how to post them I'd put them up. Clues anybody ? Just use the "insert image" button ?

RPM, Fuel Flow, TGT...
www.electranewbritain.com

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RPM..

You can use the "Attach Files" option in the 'Reply' area to put photos on the thread. This will display thumbnails as per those in WL745's post, #3, in this thread.

If you want larger images such as those posted by David or myself, you will need first of all to have an account on a site like Photobucket. The images will need to be uploaded to that first and then you can place a direct link to them within a post.

If you have a problem, PM me and I will try to assist.

Laurie.

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A little more on the Javelin front, the actual one mentioned earlier XH892 still exists ! Or I should say there is a Javelin at Flixton marked XH892 ! I have several photos should anybody want to see it.

Keith.

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Just to swing the lamp a bit more; XR480 was actually shot down on the 17th November 1965,by 12.7mm Indo fire,as stated with pilot and 1 pax lost.The reason ? For 2 days previous I had taken Gurkha troops into a forward camp to mount an `operation` across the Border,and also resupply of a fwd .artillery location,then taken a Gurkha to hospital with a burst appendix,and then gone to Kuching as I had a `computer failure`,and had finished the sortie in manual throttle.I was on detachment with the Gurkhas at their area base,without full spares,so it seemed a good opportunity to go and fix the problem.As I hadn`t fully finished the resupply,I intended doing it on return,the next day,on my way back,as it was 1 Gunner and some freight.As it turned out, the computer took longer to fix and Ops re-scheduled a new -in-theatre pilot,on his first solo task to do the sortie.I didn`t know him, but saw him depart Kg,and about 45 min. later word that he had been shot down.He`d flown over the intended LZ,and carried on,probably at 1000`,and then been shot down.The Gurkhas had also seen/heard it as they were in ambush ,which they sprung a day later killing many Indos.
XP 303 was `C` on 110,XP 358 was `K' on 225/103 and was equipped to fire SS11 missiles. When 103 took over SAR in Singapore and Butterworth, the cabs were all yellow, and were XP411,XJ411,XR 482/3/4.
Edit; Know your enemy..p%^s poor communications with Army units !!

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Long Jawi aerial photo....

Hello Sycamore, still enjoy a glass of Claret ?

Picture is of Long Jawi which is at 2D 07 'N, 114D 11'E for those who like Google Earth.... This place is quite a distance from the Kalimantan border but in or about '63 it got wiped out by the Indons who travelled overland to get there and the place was overrun. They didn't get away with it though, they were trailed for days on end until they were all eliminated. There was a Malaysian Government White Paper issued on this grisly episode. I must have a look for it on the net...
http://i571.photobucket.com/albums/ss154/vinedodger/AerialViewLongJawi.jpg[/IMG]

View is looking South-East over the main river and up the creek ! Army camp at the top left, longhouses bottom left. Not sure but I think the MSP or it may have been a 1 Ton platform went through the roof of the longhouse by the creek at the north end. The roofing attap looks a bit fresher up there ! These longhouses were quite large at Long Jawi. The topless ladies used to wash in the creek under the bridge. To the right of the Sungei are the chopper pads. You can see the DZ "A", to the right of the pads. There is a Whirlwind parked up the hill middle right which means there was a drop on that day. I used to watch from further up the hill for extra safety !

RPM, FF, TGT...
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All you Konfrontasi guys that have not applied for your Pingat Jasa Malaysia do so now and wear it with pride despite what the UK Government tells its citizens that you are not permitted to do so. With Konfrontasi and The Malayan Emergency we owe it to the 519 that never made it back to our shores.........:(

See here http://www.fight4thepjm.org/home.htm

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RPM: demeaning, &tc.
"The officers had ladies, the sergeants and corporals had wives, and the men had women". Camp Followers of the American Revolution, Donald N. Moran, September 2001, Liberty Tree Newsletter. Br.Army, same perception, Q.Victoria's time. It might be that your groupuscle was trying, in his humorous way, to distance "our team", light blue openness, from hidebound brown jobs - there, same attempt at funny.

RAF aircrew-speak for X being as old as the hills is he/it has been around since Pontius was a Pilot. It's a tortuous funny on the Fifth procurator of Judea (AD 26-36), Pontius Pilate who ordered the Crucifixion. The blogger takes the Navigator webname a) as a funny, and b) to imply that a mere rad/nav is as good as a pilot. I do not read his posts as intending to be derogatory to anyone.

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An attempt at humour...a Group Captain ?

Alertken,

There was no humour about it. He was speaking to an assembled throng of over 500 or so people as spectators and on parade itself . We S.N.C.O's all remarked on it and it was the first time I had heard it myself although it had been mentioned as "having been the way of the past". Here it was in 1967 being said again at an official engagement, a parade to celebrate 50 years of the R.A.F., by what I regard now as a silly old f@rt who should have known better in modern times. A simple, "Ladies and Gentlemen, I welcome you all...." would have been a greeting, what the old f@rt said was not. You see, in that kind of blinkered thinking, only Officers are Gentlemen and therefore, you can't possibly say that to a load of grubby airmen......

RPM, FF, TGT...
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110 Sqdn Base at Nanga Gaat....

Here is a picture of the forward base at Nanga Gaat, 3rd Division, Sarawak. This base was first opened up by 848 Squadron RN.

http://i571.photobucket.com/albums/ss154/vinedodger/NangaGaat0002.jpg

The river runs from right to left and is the River Rajang, the Sungei Gaat is at the left. "Nanga" in Iban means "junction". The Gaat is at 1D 53'N, 113D 27'E for the Google Earth users. There were about 30 permanent staff there, mostly aircraft trades and they did a year there with 1 break. Ugh ! I think there was some interchange of personnel from the Gaat with Sibu and Kuching just to make life a bit easier. The HQ building is to the left of the Hangar and that and the Mess hall and main accomodation for the guys were the only properly constructed buildings. There were no hot showers there until a Sergeant Pilot built them from detail in an old Army manual. Good on yer Fred ! The Army camp is on the hill on the right. First time I went there it rained very heavily and the fuel dump at left went under water as the river rose about 35 feet. Empty drums were picked up and washed away.

RPM, Fuel Flow, TGT...
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Nanga Gaat ..two more pics...

Another view of Nanga Gaat, this time looking to the South (previous view looking North).

http://i571.photobucket.com/albums/ss154/vinedodger/NangaGaat2.jpg

Looking at this photograph anybody can appreciate the amount of water it would take to fill up this river valley for two or three days if the river rose enough to be under the bashas which are closest to the river, just left of centre (one of which was the Crewmen's [my] accomodation).... Looking South the Sarawak/Kalimantan border was about 30 miles away and the Sungei Gaat headed off that way for quite a distance. As mentioned 848 Sqdn (RN) were there before us and they lost two Wessex choppers in the Rajang River just off to the right of the photo. I recall 17 or 18 lives lost, they were flying back to the Gaat up the river in formation and it was said that the rotor blades touched.

http://i571.photobucket.com/albums/ss154/vinedodger/MainStNangaGaat.jpg

This second picture is of "Main Street" Nanga Gaat, looking East. Officers basha, on the left, behind it, a second Basha which was the Staff SNCO's basha. Both made out of tree poles, woven attap walls and split bamboo floors. There was a monkey in the camp named "Charlie" who used to sit on the roof of the SNCO's basha and jump onto you as you walked past, scared the hell out of you the first time it happened. Building on the right was a more permanent structure and was the airmen's accomodation and admin office and further along at the end was the Cookhouse and Mess hall. The Chinese cook was able to produce delicious roast water buffalo in there ! That was the best meal to be had there. His sandwich packs were always of the same variety though, which one Canadian pilot, who shall remain nameless, called "Donkey something or other...." !

RPM, Fuel Flow, TGT...
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Speaking of the floods at Nanga Gaat...

When one flood happened at The Gaat, I happened to be at Kapit which was downriver from The Gaat by 40 miles. That is not the straight line distance as normal policy and for safety reasons we generally followed the rivers.

Kapit had an airstrip which could take Single Pioneers (maybe Twins too but I never saw one there) and we used to get some supplies flown into there which we picked up by chopper and also did a buy in the town as well.

The flood at The Gaat had washed away the KOSB Army Officer's Toilet basha and it floated gracefully down the Rajang with this big sign on it saying "Officers Only". We had noticed it wending it's way downstream when we flew down to Kapit....

There were four drunken "Jocks" at Kapit who had been out on the town (let loose !) and they had just boarded a hired longboat for the trip back to The Gaat and had moved off from the jetty at Kapit as the KOSB Officers Toilet basha "hove" into view. The Jocks in the longboat on seeing this "Officers Only" toilet, all stood up (swaying mind you !) and saluted the basha as it went past, whereupon, laughing hilariously, they all fell into the river.....

Another burst of humour from that time !

RPM, Fuel Flow, TGT...
www.electranewbritain.com