This Gallery simply highlights and enjoys those moments, whether in Aviation or the all other forms of military, past and present.
It is right and proper to commence with a glance at the KNM Fridjof Nanse, Norwegian Navy, and the seemingly easy challenge to remove the sailor’s cp from the gun mounting. That is easier said than done.
This stunning monument is in the town of Almere near Amsterdam, Netherlands. Using parts of one of the four engines of Short Stirling BK716 from 218 (Gold Coast) Sqn, Royal Australian Air Force salvaged from the crashed wreckages from the the Lake at Markermeer, It flew from RAF Downham Market, Norfolk.
It seems like yesterday. The best photos are always those when we are unaware. In the foreground is the Deputy Wing Commander Commanding, Squadron leader K G Davies MBE RAF VR, having performed his last day’s duty in uniform. The author chats away (just beyond the gun barrel) with friends, including an off-duty acting pilot-officer on a 48 hour leave pass from RAF College Cranwell (now Sqdn Ldr G P C H RAF Rtd) … and, well, every squadron has them … my two squadron warrant officers behind the Wing Co having a bit of a chin-wag. Thing is, they both run my Squadron’s stores and ordnance, and as all COs know full well … no need to ask, sir, just sign here, here … and here! That’s the ticket! The little giggle departing with the triumphant pair. Fortunately, my legal training had taught me well to skim a document and it was fun to play the role of being squadron dip-stick occasionally. Mind you, I didn’t always see something. It’s not the first time, high in the mountains on exercise, ‘moi’ was suddenly heard to exclaim, “and where the effing hell did you get that from?! No don’t answer!”
Wonderful memories. Great days.
Long before social media hit the world like a door slammed in the face…
© 2023 KTW
The Short Stirling was the furst four engine heavy bomber to enter service in 1942 with RAF Bomber Command. A magnicicet aircraft, as is too often the case, Whitehall mandarins put paid to a brilliant design b insisting that the wingspan be shortend to fit inside the conventional RAF heavy bomber hangar. When you clip the wings, you alter performance. Mandarins cannot grasp this, nor are they interested in the increased loss of life that will follow that dictum.
Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth, visiting a Royal Air Force Pathfinder Station in 1944. This photograph’s importance for me is the fact that we see here the Lancaster’s complement of Crew ~ both Air and Ground. Put it this way. Without our dedicated groundcrews, not a single aeroplane would fly.
A B17 Flying Fortress.
This evocative image is during Cpt Evans’s posting in the North African Campaign in 1942, whose duty included fying the General Officer Commanding, General Montgomery to various locations in the B17 Flying Fortress temporarily asigned to the GOC.
Ken Webb is a writer and proofreader. His website, kennwebb.com, showcases his work as a writer, blogger and podcaster, resting on his successive careers as a police officer, progressing to a junior lawyer in succession and trusts as a Fellow of the Institute of Legal Executives, a retired officer with the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, and latterly, for three years, the owner and editor of two lifestyle magazines in Liverpool.
He also just handed over a successful two year chairmanship in Gloucestershire with Cheltenham Regency Probus.
Pandemic aside, he spends his time equally between his city, Liverpool, and the county of his birth, Gloucestershire.
In this fast-paced present age, proof-reading is essential. And this skill also occasionally leads to copy-editing writers’ manuscripts for submission to publishers and also student and post graduate dissertations.
