Jr i IP / :||l =mm ... ■I ^ *4- '«• ■ ;S.:'i ■ ■i .................................■*• 1 ^ }' jj'^ . ■ ■ . * * HHH " : ■ * m r' m m ■■#j 1 ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ * ■ 'mMm m ■ ■i 1 ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ Gordon's Guides V *►■...... ^ ■1 < - M- '..... ' .] M •' m m ■ *- / ■ ■ mm ■ j - ■ .1 ■ ■ ■ L * The Journal of the AVIATION HISTORICAL SOCIETY am of AUSTRALIA Inc. A00336533P, ARBN 092-671-773 Volume 33 - Number 2 - June 2002 EDITORS, DESIGN & PRODUCTION EDITORIAL Bill and Judith Baker We present another fine spread of Australian aviation Address all correspondence to; subjects, most of which you will not see anywhere else. I am The Editor, AHSA, particularly fond of Roger McDonald's article on Gordon's P.O. Box 2007, Guides, perhaps because it takes me back to my youth South Melbourne 3205 Victoria, Australia. when as a young chap I would go up to McGills newsagency 03 9583 4072 Phone & Fax in Elizabeth Street, Melbourne and buy a copy. I would then E.mail: [email protected] spend hours planning trips that I would never take. www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/ahsa.html 1 keep on harping about the need to grow membership, and Subscription Rates; I have thought often about our NSW Branch which does not Australia A$45. contribute many members to the total membership. If you Rest of World A$68, have friends in that Branch please tell them about what they Overseas payment to be in Australian are missing. currency by International Money Order or I must confess a twinge of alarm about the talk of postage Bank Draft. Overseas personal cheques increases. If it is the same percentage for postage of AH as cannot be accepted. is for the increase of standard letters we must expect an increase of about 11% which will really impinge on our Articles for Publication; costs. Are to be on an Australian theme. The Editor reserves the right to edit any Editors wish list; article accepted for publication. Priority 1: First to Fly in Australia^ Still waiting, waiting.) Payment is not made for articles. Any facet of Australia’s aviation history, Malaya, GAF Please include sufficient postage for the Nomad, Korea, Vietnam, anything that interests you and can return of originals if that is required. be printed. How about the history of Airbus in Australia? Or A - H and the Computer; Contributions for some photos out of your collection for the Members Photo the Journal are most welcome in any form, Page? Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Islands come but if you have a computer, exported on a under our banner also. Anything!! 3V2" disc in ASSCII format (plain text), or Cover: An unusual picture (for AH), a view of the Qantas WIN 6, would be just great! (Include hard Constellation crash at Mauritius, told in the first hand report copy also). However Macintosh discs can be by Len Sales. translated. All photographs submitted will be copied and the originals returned within 5 Next Issue; Volume 33 Number 3 will be in your letter-box days of receipt. in the first week of September 2002. Disclaimer; Contents; 1. Whilst every effort is made to check the 47 Len Sales Greg Banfield authenticity of the material and advertising 52 Out of the fog and into the sea Bill Baker printed, the Publishers, Editors, and the 58 Aeroplane fatality at Port Melbourne Aviation Historical Society of Australia and its 59 Not so skinny and small now Jim Dunstan Office Bearers cannot accept responsibility 61 Gordon's Australian Air Guide Roger McDonald for any non-performance. 78 WA's DH 84 Dragons Edward Fletcher 2. The views expressed in 'Aviation 87 Return to Darwin Ken McDonald Heritage' are not necessarily those of the Meetings of the AHSA; AHSA or its Editors. Melbourne Branch: The fourth Wednesday in every AVIATION HERITAGE month, 7:30 at the Airforce Association, 4 Cromwell Street, ISSN 0815-4392 South Yarra. Further information - Keith Meggs 9580 0140. Print Post Approved PP 320418/00017 NSW Branch: The first Wednesday in every month 7:45 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Studio 1 at the Powerhouse Museum, enter from the © 2001 by the Publishers; Macarthur Street end. Further information Warwick THE AVIATION HISTORICAL Bigsworth 02 9872 2323 SOCIETY OF Queensland Branch: The last Friday in every month 7:30 AUSTRALIA INC., at the RQAC Archerfieid. Meals available. Contact Richard A0033653P ARBN 092-671-773 Hitchins, 07 3388 3900 P.O. BOX 2007, SOUTH MELBOURNE, VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA AHSA Aviation Heritage LEN SALES Leonard Victor Sales joined the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, serving as a Wireless Operator/Air Gunner, In 1947 he joined Malayan Airways as a Radio Officer on the start of its operations and seven years later joined Qantas. He transferred as a Navigation Officer in 1956 and was a crew member of the Super Constellation which over-ran the runway at Mauritius and was destroyed by fire in 1960. Subsequently he remustered as a pilot and flew on Boeing 747s. Today he teaches ATPL theory subjects for the University of New South Wales. He enjoys teaching, for which he has great aptitude, and he cares about his students. He recorded this interview with Greg Builfield on 6th October 2001. I was born in Essex, England, on and to set frequencies, you would Although No.37 was an English 26th November 1923, and grew up change coils. You would carry around Squadron, about 85% of the aircrew around that area. I had a fairly with you a box of little coils of different were Australians. There were also normal sort of childhood, and when I frequencies and when you changed New Zealanders, Canadians and a left school I went to work in an frequency, you pulled one set of coils few Rhodesians. They were a good engineering firm. When the war out, put the others in and tuned them mob. started, I found myself in a reserved up. It was a very primitive The living was pretty hard, occupation. Normally the calling-up arrangement. because we were under canvas for age for military service was 18, but The radio apparatus also included about six months, on and off. We early in 1941 I saw an advertisement 250 feet of trailing aerial which you were on a dispersal about half a mile one day saying that the Royal Air wound out. The aerial had 22 lead from the airfield and we were sitting Force would accept aircrew recruits at beads on the end of It. Every now there in our tents one day when a 17^2 years of age, and that you could and then on training, the pilot would Junkers Ju 88 came over and strafed also join if you were in a reserved go down and do a bit of low flying and us. It knocked over about four of our occupation. you couldn't wind the aerial in quickly aeroplanes so our operations for that I hopped down and tried to join up enough. When you went to wind it, night were scrubbed, which we all straight away. I was sent away to there was nothing there - the aerial thought was good. Weston-Super-Mare to do a three-day had been torn off on something on We had big losses on the assessment course, at the end of the ground, and the Air Force used to Squadron but my crew got through charge us two shillings and sixpence which I was classed as fit for all pretty well unscathed, Every trades. I was inducted into the Air for the loss of an aerial, which was a operation was interesting and we had Force at that stage and then I was lot of money out of our pay then. a few frights. A fighter attacked us That was most sent home, We crewed-up at Moreton-in- one night and badly shot us up, but unfortunate, because I thought I was Marsh, and I joined an Australian the crew escaped without injury. We in the Air Force, but the flying schools crew with a pilot named Ken Murray. were shot up a few other times as were full up and I had to wait until We had a slight accident one night well, but no more so than anybody such time as they called me up. when we lost an engine just after else. We were young and foolish and During the next six months, I took take-off on a practice bombing run got over it very quickly. odd jobs here and there, including from Enstone, which was the satellite When we completed our tour of field for Moreton-ln-Marsh. Ken working at the Ford Motor Company operations with No.37 Squadron, we for a few months. Naturally, I wanted Murray saw the strip at a place called finally went home to England. After a to be a Spitfire pilot (everybody Little Rissington, which was lit only by while, I was posted to the Empire Air wanted to be a Spitfire pilot) and I had goose-neck flares, and he put the Navigation School at Shawbury, been accepted as a pilot, but I was aircraft down there. The first time we where we were flying Flalifaxes. The sure the war was going to be over landed, we were doing about 140 School also had a few Wellingtons, before I started my training, so I knots. The next time we landed, we as well as the record-breaking agitated and got people to write were outside the airport and went Lancaster Aries, ^ and I got a few letters to the Air Force on my behalf through a brick wall across the road! flights in that.