Transfer to instruments was made before entering cloud with instrument lighting set to maximum. Turbulence was mild in the climb to 11,500 feet where we levelled off. For some time I could not understand why we had not accelerated to the cruising speed I was expecting and it took a while before I realised that I had not raised the wing flaps after take-of. M Jose had not spotted this at all. With flaps up the speed stepped up nicely.
Not long after settling in the cruise, the rear-engine rpm started to hunt and I could not settle it down. M Jose’s response to my query was the typically continental one of screwing the face and raising both hands and shoulders. John Barnes, flying eighth in line, told me to do something or other, I cannot remember what, and the problem cleared. From then on both engines purred in perfect synchronisation for the rest of the fight.
Halfway to Victoria Falls we cleared the cloud that, though dense and dark in patches, had been relatively smooth and had given me no difficulty. I searched all around but could not see any of the other aircraft. From there on it was a matter of working out our exact location from the limited information printed on the 1:1,000,000 -scale maps. M Jose shook his head when I confidently pointed to our position on the map. To him everything on the ground looked flat with all vleis (wetlands along river-lines) running almost parallel to our course.
Fifty kilometres before reaching the Victoria Falls we could already pick out the vertical pillar of spray from the falls illuminated by the setting sun. Once over the Falls, M Jose was amazed by the sight of this great wonder and took many photographs as we made one wide orbit. I have no idea how well the photographs turned out because the sun had just set below the horizon.
Even before we reached the Falls I heard the seventh and eighth aircraft broadcast that they were leaving Victoria Falls on course for Salisbury. Only then did I realise that both of them had passed me in the cloud, because of my flap selection error.
The Rhodesian weather forecast received before take-off warned of the ITCZ storm-line we could see running eastwards from Wankie. I had no desire to fly the direct route to Salisbury in such rough weather. Instead I chose to fly to Sinoia in clear skies, and then turn southwards for the shortest possible run through bad weather to Salisbury.
M Jose and I flew just south of the Zambezi Gorge to the headwaters of Kariba Lake, which was barely visible before it became totally dark. Flying conditions were smooth with absolutely nothing to see below us. M Jose pointed to the sky and my schoolboy French recognised sufficient words to understand that he had never seen so many stars in his life. The conditions were perfect and I had to agree that the brilliance and multiplicity of the stars was awesome.
Whilst we were enjoying our smooth ride and admiring God’s heavenly firmament, we listened to transmissions between the other pilots who were having a very rough ride down the ITCZ storm-line that we could see continuously illuminated by rippling lightning flashes way off to our right. Why the other pilots had not taken our ‘soft option’ route I cannot say, but I know that flying Trojans had taught me a thing or two about avoiding bad weather whenever possible.
All the other aircraft had landed by the time we eventually entered the bad weather about ten minutes’ flying time from Salisbury. We passed over the city in cloud and rain that was illuminated all around us as we descended towards the airport. Salisbury Airport controllers had no idea of the aircraft types arriving that night because one of our Air Force ATC officers, I think it was John Digby, sat with them to assist with what he had said was ‘the recovery of 4 Squadron aircraft returning from an operation in the Wankie area’. Approach Control expressed some concern because no one had heard from my aircraft until the last of the others had landed.
My French companion had been completely lost without the ILS-VOR assistance he relied on wherever he flew in Europe. On the other hand, I had never used such aids before. Under his guidance I learned how to interpret the instrumentation that brought us in for a bad weather landing which was so smooth it surprised me. After such a good let-down and smooth landing, M Jose made it clear that he was sure I had lied to him about never having used ILS-VOR or flown a Cessna 337 to before.
When we taxiied into dispersals at Air Movements Section, there was not a single Cessna 337 to be seen. M Jose and I climbed out of our machine into soaking rain and ran for the Air Movements Section. As I entered the building I looked back and saw our aircraft being towed away to a top-security hangar where the other aircraft already stood dripping water onto the concrete floor.
Inside Air Movements Section, Air Marshal McLaren and his senior staff officers were celebrating with the other crews. Eight Cessna 337s were home. Ten to go!
For the second ferry, Chuck Dent’s special HF aerial was erected at New Sarum to provide communications for Wing Commander Keith Corrans and Squadron Leader Mike Gedye.
This is Keith’s account of the second ferry:
The second ferry comprised 10 aircraft (2 sections of 5 aircraft led by Mike Gedye and me, the only Rhodesian pilots on this route). To minimise the risk of compromise Mike and I had been “kept back” as even the most simple en-route immigration official might have wondered, from our passports (false as they were) why we had been in West Africa, heading south, only 10 days or so before we were in their area heading the same way. The second, but shorter, route down through central Africa was, as a result, largely rejected to ensure additional distance between East and West Coast ‘tom toms’. In retrospect the ploy worked and we routed across North Africa and down the East coast departing Europe on 27 January 1976. The first leg to Las Palmas (3 hrs 40) was a ‘swan’ although we left departure point a little hurriedly ahead of an oncoming snowstorm. Leg 2 (6 hrs 30) was east across the Med and the foot of Italy (intercepted by a section of Italian Air Force F104s) and on to Ikaklion in Crete after an unplanned 1-hour dogleg to avoid a weapons range on the west coast of the island.
The next legs were to be the longest and potentially most dodgy. We departed Ikaklion before dawn on leg 3, penetrated Egyptian airspace west of Alexandria, routed up the Nile to Aswan and were provisionally flight planned to land at Port Sudan, assessed to be potentially the highest-risk location. Fortuitously, by cruise climbing to Flight Levels around 120 we were able to pick up a favourable tail-wind and, by “rationing” 6 1/2 hrs oxygen to cover an extended flight time, managed to stretch the leg for eventual landing at Djibouti in Afas Isas (formerly Somalia in the late 1950s). It would seem that the in-flight destination change (plus perhaps the number of aircraft in the 2 section ‘gaggle) generated “agitated” RT. transmissions from Ethiopian Military ATC (all totally and studiously ignored) who seemed to be attempting to drum up aircraft to intercept us. As the leg had been intentionally planned for Saturday, and it was late afternoon, they did not really have time to get their act together and we departed the area hastily, descending to low level on the Red Sea Coast somewhere near Massawa Island. After a 10 hrs leg we eventually arrived at Djibouti after dark in the “Mother” of all thunderstorms, and had a most magnificent meal at a local Shebeen in the town square (probably camel steaks) with copious quantities of Stella Artois and French wine, before kipping in primitive conditions—on bare mattresses—in a local downtown Djibouti/Somali “hotel”.
Leg 4 was to Mombassa, the next high-risk point. After a flight of 6 hrs 30 east and across the Somali Desert to the coast (Indian Ocean) and then south, at a comfortable altitude down that attractive coastline, we landed (in old stomping grounds) and were surprised by most efficient and courteous arrival procedures. Overnight accommodation was at a superb coastal/tourist hotel; we did however have to wait until almost midnight for the resident German/Scandinavian tourists to vacate the rooms and catch their flights north before we could take occupation! And then we found that the water supplies to the hotel had been on the blink for about 2 weeks and there was no hot or cold running water and the toilet had to be flushed by bucket using water stored in the bath! The breakfast next morning on the verandah did however partially offset the hassle and the lack of sleep.
The next leg started in superb weather; the scenery down the coast was fantastic. The colour of the water on the coral at Pemba and Zanzibar Islands has to be seen to be believed; shades of Bazaruto and Paradise Island, Mozambique. And then one of the French crews, who had consistently failed to maintain any semblance of formation discipline—dropping out of formation to low-fly down the “mile-long” beaches, declared an emergency/instrument panel fire and made a precautionary landing at a disused airfield a little north of Mtwara on
