From Lightnings to MiGs

From Cold War to Air Speed Records

Russ Peart

• Publisher: Air World
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781399007481
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Storia militare e marittima

It was supposed to be just a training flight. The two Soviet-manufactured MiG 21s, each with two practice bombs and four air-to-ground rockets, were lined up on the runway in Bangladesh at the height of the Cold War, when air traffic control suddenly reported an incursion by Indian Air Force Jaguars. Though ill-equipped for combat, the two MiGs were scrambled. One of the MiGs’ pilots was an RAF officer – Squadron Leader Russell Peart. On a seven-month loan to the Bangladeshi Air Force, Peart suddenly found himself at the centre of the simmering hostility between two neighbouring nations. By the time they reached the area that had been threatened by the Indian pilots, the Jaguars had gone. Later, when Squadron Leader Russell Peart spoke of the incident to the British High Commissioner, he was told not to shoot down any Jaguars as the Indians had still not paid for them! Russell Peart flew many other aircraft in his varied career, including the MiG 19, and while a test pilot at Boscombe Down trialled such designs as the Tornado GR1. But it was whilst he was seconded to the Sultan of Oman’s Air Force, particularly during the so-called ‘Secret War’ in Dhofar, that he saw the most action. In that theatre the author flew some 200 operational sorties, 180 of which involved live fire, during which he was hit many times. He was also hit and wounded by a 75mm shell. Russ Peart has written in detail of his exciting RAF career, from flying Lightnings in the Far East to winning the top prize in the International Tactical Bombing Competition against a handpicked team of United States Air Force fighter pilots and being awarded the Sultan Of Oman’s Distinguished Service Medal. Supplemented by a selection of previously unseen photographs, this uniquely original memoir throws new light on the operational flying undertaken by some RAF pilots during the tense years of the Cold War.

Chapter One

Pre-Royal Air Force

I was born in the small village of Holmes Chapel in Cheshire, in my grandparents’ house. My father, Ken Peart, had spent the war in the RAF Regiment. He met my mother, Marion, at a local village dance while he was serving at Byley Airfield nearby. He was posted away, and among other adventures he drove a truck onto the beaches of Normandy, via the Mulberry floating harbour, on day two of the D-Day landings. By the end of the war, he had reached Berlin.

He returned to Holmes Chapel, married my mother and became a baker in the village. I joined the local Wolf Cubs and then moved on to the Boy Scouts. The nearest scout group was in Chelford, a short journey by steam train from Holmes Chapel. The meetings were once a week. In particular I enjoyed the trips we went on, camping at Alderley Edge near Manchester and visiting the Boy Scout International Jamboree at Sutton Coldfield.

The railway line going through Holmes Chapel was one of the main routes to the north. Friends and I would stand on the bridge to watch the express trains hurtle underneath us and through the station at what seemed tremendous speed. The smoke, noise and flames were an inspiring sight. I wanted to be a train driver. From my grandparents’ rear garden which faced north, I sometimes saw a white, delta-shaped aeroplane. It was a prototype aircraft flying from Woodford and was the forerunner of the Vulcan. I now wanted to be a pilot, as well as a train driver. My father became a marshal for the Mid Cheshire Motor Club at Oulton Park race track. He was a friend of Trevor Williams, who also lived in the village and who raced motor bikes. I remember going to see him race when my father was marshalling, and the time that my father went down to London with Trevor to help him to collect a new racing bike, a Gilera. We also went to watch car racing at Oulton Park and I remember seeing Stirling Moss race there, along with many other famous racing drivers of that era. After one of the race meetings my father, because he was a marshal, was allowed to drive us around the circuit in our black Ford Zephyr Mk 1. I wasn’t interested in riding motor cycles, but I did now want to become a racing driver, along with being a pilot and a train driver. (I didn’t know at the time but I was to drive myself around the track about forty-eight years later while racing a Caterham 7 there.)

I went to the local primary school, until age 11, and then on to Sandbach Grammar School. My parents moved to Southport, where I attended King George V School, played rugby and cricket, and was made the house rugby captain. But I never made the first fifteen. I joined the local Air Training Corps, learning drill with and without a Lee Enfield .303 rifle. We also got to fire the .303 on the nearby rifle ranges at Altcar.

My first flight was in an Auster aircraft, a pleasure flight taking off from and landing on Southport Beach. I remember the final turn and landing in particular… I was hooked from then on. I knew then what I really wanted to do in life, if I got the chance. A little later I had an air experience flight in a Chipmunk from RAF Woodvale, courtesy of the Air Training Corps. For the next couple of years I helped my father in his bakery, especially during busy periods such as Christmas – I remember making hundreds of mince pies. I also played lead guitar in a local rock and roll band. This was at the time the Beatles were just about to become famous.

A group of us in the ATC visited RAF Topcliffe and RAF Leconfield in Yorkshire. While at Leconfield we young cadets were allowed in turn to sit in a single seat Hunter, which was chained down on the engine running pan, and allowed to throttle up the Avon engine to around 6,500 rpm. The memory of this had implications later.

I, and two good friends of mine, William McCain and Ian McConnochie, were very keen aero modellers. We built, flew and crashed many balsa wood and tissue-free flight and control line models. We built some gliders – quite big ones – which we towline launched. We flew our free flight models from a disused open area of land near to Hillside railway station and Hillside and Royal Birkdale golf courses. Sometimes a model would stray over and land on one of the courses, we were often shouted at by the greenkeeper when we ventured to retrieve it. One of my free flight models (obviously with the benefit of hindsight) had too much fuel on board. It was last seen as a speck in the distance at about 300 feet, heading over to the town of Southport. It was never seen again, so I lost not just the aircraft, but also my little .8cc ED Pep engine.

We progressed to radio controlled models, but only with very basic single channel control. However, it was amazing just what type of manoeuvres could be achieved with just a crude left/right rudder only system.

The secondary effect of rudder being roll was a great help here. Sometimes, when we were flying our models, we would see the English Electric P1 across the Ribble estuary. It was flying from their factory and airfield site at Warton near Blackpool. I didn’t know then that I would be flying a fast jet out of Warton in the future. The P1 was a supersonic research aircraft which was eventually developed into the Lightning. More of Lightnings later.

At the age of 18 I applied for pilot training in the RAF and attended the Aircrew Selection Centre at RAF Biggin Hill. The selection process took around five days and included written tests (maths, science etc.), interviews and outside leadership-type exercises.

For those exercises we were split into small teams of about five and given ropes, wooden poles and empty oil drums and such and given various tasks to complete, such as crossing a narrow river. A leader was nominated for each exercise. We were all being assessed on how well we could take orders as well as being able to plan, organise and lead and give orders. After three days some applicants were sent home and the rest of us continued on. During one interview, one of the interviewers was Wing Commander Brian Mercer, who had been the leader of the RAF aerobatic team, The Blue Diamonds – the equivalent of today’s Red Arrows. The Blue Diamonds flew blue Hunters. It perhaps helped my cause that I remembered the fact that the name of the pilot, written just below the cockpit sill of the Hunter we had sat in at RAF Leconfield, was Wg Cdr Brian Mercer. I recalled and mentioned this during the interview. I was to meet Brian Mercer again many years later in civilian life.

Several weeks after the Biggin Hill visit, I received an invite to join the RAF for training as a navigator. I was, of course, pleased to be accepted, but disappointed that the invite was not for pilot training. I wrote back asking why I was not selected to be a pilot. The next communication I received gave me the choice of joining almost immediately for navigator training or waiting about ten months to join as a trainee pilot. It was a no brainer. I chose the latter option, and eventually signed on for nineteen years, until I was 38 years old. My friends all thought I was crazy to do that. It was, I think, the best decision I ever made.

Chapter Two

RAF South Cerney

The Initial Flying Course

I joined the RAF at South Cerney near Cirencester on the Direct Entry Scheme, along with a number of new entrants.

Initially we had lots of classroom work and much physical training. The physical training, I found quite hard. The classroom work was a mixture of interesting lectures on basic aircraft technical subjects and, for me, quite boring and tedious subjects such as air force law and the administration and organization of the RAF. I was obviously never cut out to be a good staff officer.

It was apparent I was not as fit as I might have been. Outdoor gym exercises, including running around the airfield carrying a medicine ball or, along with a partner, a gymnasium bench, and completing an assault course, I found hard going. We spent quite a bit of time on the parade ground learning drill, with and without rifles, with our drill sergeant, Sergeant Vic Greenop.

In addition, we did parachute training by jumping off a gym horse and learning how to hit the ground properly. The most enjoyable, but probably the hardest physical exercise, was the escape and evasion training in the Brecon Beacons, in the same area as used by the SAS. A lot of the exercises were at night, including map reading and avoiding detection by the staff. During the day we were given tasks such as crossing rivers or streams with jerry cans, barrels and ropes etc. At the end of each day I felt absolutely exhausted, but there was something very satisfying about what had been achieved.

Later in life, after retiring from flying, the memory of those exercises led me to walking the 100 miles of the South Downs Way from Winchester to Eastbourne, with full camping kit and sleeping in my tent each night. Then, a year later, the 205 miles of the Coast to Coast Path, from St Bees across the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales and the North Yorkshire Moors to Robin Hood’s Bay on the North Sea coast. I later walked 110 miles of the Offa’s Dyke path, which stretches from the North Wales coast to Chepstow on the Severn estuary. I only did the 110 miles from Welshpool to Chepstow due to time constraints, but I intend to go back and do the 75 or so miles from Prestatyn to Welshpool, which includes crossing the Clwydian Hills.

A night camp in the Brecon Beacons during escape and evasion training, L to R are: Peter Smith, Alan Walsingham and myself.

A parachute, used as a tent during survival training.

The last part of the course at South Cerney, and of course the most enjoyable, was the primary flying course in the Chipmunk from the grass airfield. This was 30 hours of flying. My instructor was Master Pilot Graham Forrester, an ex-Second World War Mosquito pilot, and a really lovely guy. He sent me solo after about 12 hours. I really enjoyed those first few solo flights, typically consisting of following the Stroud Valley to the River Severn, 5 minutes of aerobatics and then the flight back to South Cerney following the valley again. It was just such a great feeling to be up there alone. The sound of the Gypsy Major engine and the smell of an old aircraft, the whole atmosphere is something I shall remember always.

The Chipmunk in which I flew my first solo.

My instructor at South Cerney, Master Pilot Graham Forrester, 2nd from the left, and who was a WW2 Mosquito pilot.

Self and Chipmunk at South Cerney.

Chapter Three

RAF Acklington

The Basic Flying Course

After passing the course, several of us were posted to Number 6 FTS (Flying Training School) at RAF Acklington in Northumberland, just a few miles north of the market town of Morpeth. Prior to heading off to Acklington there was time for some leave, which I took with my parents in Southport. During this time I bought my first car, a white Austin Healey 100/4. I purchased the car from Don McCain, the famous trainer of the horse Red Rum, and brother of the good school friend of mine, William McCain. I paid just £100 for the car.

Basic Flying. No. 182 Course and instructors. RAF Acklington.

The basic flying course would consist of 145 hours of flying the Jet Provost, the RAF’s basic jet trainer. I drove the 100/4 from Southport up to Acklington and Number 6 FTS, and joined Number 182 course in August of 1966.

Number 6 FTS had been formed by the renaming of No. 39 Training School at RAF Spitalgate. The school moved, via a stay at RAF Netheravon, to RAF Little Rissington in August 1938. It would be the first flying training unit to be at Little Rissington, and was flying Audaxes, Furies, Harts and Ansons at that time. In April 1942 it was re-designated as Number 6 [P] AFU (Pilot-Advanced Flying Unit). From April 1946 the unit was based at RAF Turnhill and was equipped with Harvards, then Percival Prentices were added to the fleet in late 1948. From July 1953, both types were replaced by Percival Piston Provost T...