Radschool Association Newsletter

Radschool Association Newsletter - Vol 8

28 Feb 2001

Page 18

Post Radschool

For people who currently live in the vicinity, or for those that have recently been back, it is hard to imagine that the photo at the left was taken of the Geelong Road, looking towards Werribee, at the intersection into Radschool at Laverton in 1967, only 33 years ago. Back then you could have probably bought the (worthless grazing) land opposite for about $250 an acre, after all, back then what sane and sensible Victorian would want to live "right out here….."

Paul Walsh, now living in Vic, sent us the photo of an Air Force Base (right) that he says was given to him many years ago. He is unsure which base it is, and initially he though it might have been Ubon, but he’s ruled that out as the photo clearly shows a cricket pitch (top centre). Paul says he was given the photo by an American while he was posted to Townsville many years ago, the same time as the U2’s were there, but he doesn’t think it is a photo of Townsville. He asked us if we could identify it for him.

We put the problem to Reg Meissner of Air Services Australia (Reg used to fly Sabres and Mirages) and he put it to Jim Hanigan, also Air Services, and an old Neppy navigator, and they’ve confirmed that the aerodrome is indeed Townsville, and the photo was definitely taken sometime between ‘62 and ‘65, possibly 1965 as the operational stuff would have been done by Mirages after 1966. The photo shows a bunch of 10Sqn Neptunes and one solitary Sabre (bottom right). The runway heading in the photo is 02, but that was later changed to 01.

Competition

Well it seems that we’ve started a rush on that magnificent of wines-the Sparkling Rinegolde. The word’s finally out. It seems that one of the sleepers in the wine industry has finally been woken up, and countless thousands of wine connoisseurs are rushing bottle shops all around the country buying up big. Your association had to look far and wide to find a bottle to send to Phil Smith who won the comp before last, but that was nothing compared to the search required to find the prize for Don Cureton of Qld who, among heaps of other, correctly answered our last competition which was "What is a scope iron good for", and one of the answers was, as everyone who is dumb enough to have ever tried it knows only too well, "To melt IC’s". Don’s name was drawn from the hat, and his wonderful prize has been dispatched.

It seems that everyone had a story to tell about the mighty old scope, and a lot did, and we’ve printed a few earlier on. It’s been used for just about everything, and everyone had their own way of using it. Some used it "forehand-style" by pushing the collar with their thumb, others used it backhand by pulling the collar and most Flt Sgt’s wouldn’t let you use it at all unless you were trying to solder a joint in a bit of down pipe.

However, this edition’s competition question is:

"When was the old ‘Able Baker Charlie Dog’ phonetic alphabet changed to ‘Alfa Bravo Charlie Delta'?

Was it::- A. 500BC, B. 1939, C. 1945, D. 1966.

As always send your written answers to us any way you like, email, fax, post - but please don’t ring. Entries should be in by the end of Apr 2001, and once again we’ll announce the lucky winner in our next edition. Judge’s decision etc etc etc
Go to it…….

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