Taking to the Skies

by Jim Eames

  Wing Commander Eric Read was a permanent RAAF officer who had joined the air force in 1935. Posted to RAF College Cranwell in the United Kingdom in 1939 to undergo signals training, Read returned to Australia to fly Wirraways and Hudsons with No 23 Squadron. Until he took up his appointment with 200 Flight in mid-April 1945, he had served on various air-force stations on Australia’s east coast.

  Read, regarded by his men as a hard but fair taskmaster, would turn out to be a popular commander of 200 Flight, although he, too, would have to meet the challenges presented by a newly established unit still struggling with inadequate facilities. Even such basic necessities as aircraft tow bars for the unit’s tractors were in short supply, although on at least one occasion opportunistic quick thinking by one ground crew member paid dividends. After Read’s aircraft had completed a 300 hourly check at Tocumwal, Read told his flight engineer, Tommy Shand, to run up the engines prior to departure back to Leyburn. When Shand noticed the tractor tow bar used to park the aircraft had been left on the hardstand directly in front of the B-24 he released the brakes and rolled the Liberator forward until the tow bar was under the open doors of the bomb bay where it was quickly latched to the bomb racks.

  Read’s initial monthly reports remained critical of the lack of accommodation for ground staff and the problems caused by the isolation of the Leyburn unit, pointing out once again that even rations had to be drawn from Toowoomba, 69 kilometres away. Added to that he was still awaiting the arrival of the two C-47 transport aircraft the unit had requested, which would be used to bring in supplies and essential equipment to keep the Flight operating efficiently.

  Not all Read’s problems were homegrown, however. Right from the initial Pockley and Ball mission in March, communications failures between RAAF and American commands had caused difficulties for 200 Flight. The problems lay at the feet of the RAAF’s 1st Tactical Air Force (1TAF) on Morotai and its failure to pass on signals outlining the accommodation and maintenance requirements 200 Flight would need when operating out of the US base at McGuire Field, Mindoro.

  Crews on 200 Flight Z Unit missions, often up to 50 in number, would arrive at McGuire Field to find no prior notification had been given to the Americans, with the result that some ground crew members would struggle to even find a meal. Usually, flight crews managed to locate meals and accommodation in an officer’s mess, but ground crews occasionally missed out.

  In one instance a ground crew member was even refused a meal at a sergeants’ mess and another had to be content with a bag of onions he found outside one mess, several of which he ate raw that night while he watched the base’s outdoor movies. He later managed to scrounge up a cup of coffee and a biscuit at a Salvation Army hut. Even the basic 200 Flight requirement for the provision of a single jeep for transport seemed difficult to arrange.

  Read set out early to solve the problem, but it is doubtful he would have known the reasons which may have been behind 1TAF’s failures. In the early months of 1945 1TAF was in fact in the middle of a crisis which would shake the very foundations of the highest echelons of the RAAF. The 1TAF had been formed in late 1944 as a large, mobile force of fighter and ground-attack squadrons in support of allied army and naval units moving towards Japan. At one stage numbering more than 20 000 personnel, by early 1945 it was under the command of Air Commodore Harry Cobby and was in the grip of serious morale and leadership problems, the origin of which had much to do with General MacArthur’s decision to relegate Australian units to that of a minor player in the advance towards Japan.

  Frustrated at being left behind while the real action continued to their north, bitterness had begun to set in among the more senior officers in 1TAF, as highly decorated fighter pilots like Australia’s top-scoring ace, Group Captain Clive ‘Killer’ Caldwell reacted to being relegated to mopping-up operations against the dangerous, largely unnecessary missions they were forced to fly, often attacking now bypassed but well-entrenched Japanese gun positions which could have no further impact on the outcome of the war. Within weeks of Pockley and Ball’s first transit through Morotai to Mindoro, a series of events would take place on Morotai which would become known as the ‘Morotai Mutiny’ in which Caldwell and several of his colleagues resigned their commissions, a decision which would lead to the dismissal of Cobby.

  Back at Leyburn the most pressing requirement related to the continuing delay in providing hard standing for the servicing of aircraft which were now fully committed to the demanding long-range missions required by Z Special Unit. Despite these difficulties and the early loss of his predecessor, Read reported that the missions being undertaken were successful. He had no way of knowing that that was about to change dramatically.

  May 1945 was set to be a busy month for 200 Flight. In addition to continuing supply drops to the SEMUT ground parties and the insertion of further AGAS parties into North Borneo, orders had come through for Operation SUNFISH, which required the insertion of two ground parties into Timor. While Read was engaged on the AGAS supply mission, Liberators of Flying Officer Arch Clark and Flight Lieutenant Keith Emmett left Leyburn together for Darwin early on the morning of 15 May. Neither was to return.

  Emmett’s mission, out of Morotai, was to drop 1587.5 kilograms of stores and two reinforcement personnel in to the Kudat area of North Borneo. Emmett, who had flown Atlantic convoy escort missions with RAF Coastal Command, had joined 200 Flight from Tocumwal only five weeks before. This would be his crew’s first operational sortie.

  Emmett’s B-24 arrived over the drop zone shortly before 6 o’clock on the morning of 21 May. The weather was fine and there was no wind. What happened next was later recorded by a British army major, a member of the party waiting on the ground who watched as the Liberator made five circuits of the drop zone and successfully dropped ten storpedoes. According to the British major’s estimate, the aircraft was extremely low, never more than 300 feet above the clearing. On the fifth circuit the port wing struck a tree a little over 200 feet above the drop zone, tearing off the wing and causing the aircraft to crash into a nearby clearing and burst into flames.

  All on board died instantly, including two Z Special Unit operatives who were to be dropped as reinforcements and another Z Unit officer who had hitched a ride as an observer. For the teams at Leyburn it was to be a crushing blow. They were already awaiting news from Darwin of the results of a search for Arch Clark’s aircraft, which had gone missing over Timor.

  Because SUNFISH operatives had limited knowledge of Timor, it was decided that Clark first would do a reconnaissance flight over the area to check out the layout of the region. In an attempt to hide the actual reason for the mission from the Japanese, they would drop propaganda leaflets over villages in the area while taking a look at any proposed drop zones from the air.

  Clark’s Liberator, with a RAAF crew of ten and four Z Special Unit men, left Darwin at 10.30 a.m. on 17 May, with a plan to carry out the recce mission and leaflet drop over Timor and return to Darwin via the Flores group of islands. The aircraft was not heard from again, and despite a wide-ranging search by air-sea rescue Catalina flying boats out of Darwin and numerous shipping alerts, no trace of it was ever found.

  Arch Clark’s crew was 200 Flight’s most decorated group, with three Distinguished Flying Medals between them. Its disappearance meant that 200 Flight had lost three aircraft in the space of three months and the aircrew to fly them reduced from seven to four. While in crude numbers terms this would hardly compare to the massive daily aircraft losses in other theatres of the war, for a small, operationally stretched unit it was a heavy blow, especially for Read, hundreds of kilometres away to the north on his own mission and being kept informed via brief signals.

  Fortunately, Emmett’s and Clark’s aircraft were to be the last lost on operations by 200 Flight, although, even as the following months passed and the Pacific war headed towards its conclusion, their operational activities hardly eased. Through June, July and early August ground parties in Borneo wer
e supported, sometimes in terrain which left little margin for error. Typical was a mission by two aircraft flown by Flight Lieutenant Don Winch and Flight Lieutenant Jock Wallace to drop supplies to a Z Special Unit on the banks of the Tungud River. Insufficient smoke from the signal fires below prevented both pilots from reading the wind direction on their first dummy runs into the drop zone. The difficulty of manoeuvring their aircraft at low level in tight terrain forced Winch to make nine runs over the target before all his storpedoes could be dropped. Wallace made five.

  By mid-August 200 Flight’s crews had been split between Leyburn and Morotai when they heard of the atomic attacks and the subsequent Japanese surrender, but there was still much to be done and many moments of high drama. Several days after Flying Officer Tom Bridges and his crew heard about the ceasefire while at Morotai they set off to make a supply drop at the junction of the Rajang and Kanowit rivers in Borneo but were forced to abort the mission when heavy cloud prevented identification of the target. Because of poor weather and concerned about adequate fuel reserves, Bridges decided that rather than return to Morotai he would overnight at Palawan. But as he neared Palawan he was advised the airfield was closed for repair so he called another possibility, Tarakan, but was told only 914 metres of runway was available there. With the fuel situation now becoming critical and his options running out, Bridges called Labuan where, although his charts told him only 1219 metres was available, it was preferable to landing in the sea.

  Labuan had more bad news. Their strip was not yet fully open, even to fighter aircraft, which required far less runway than a B-24. When Bridges told them he was coming anyway, Labuan’s reply was terse: ‘Negative.’ Bridges’ own response was equally short and to the point: ‘On approach now—stand by.’ Bridges gave his crew the option of bailing out, but all decided to stick with the aircraft and he put the big Liberator down in a perfect landing on a strip strewn with potholes, one of which caused a tyre on the B-24 to blow out.

  With the aircraft refuelled and its nose wheel replaced overnight by the Americans, Bridges announced he was taking off again and heading back to Morotai. Bridges’ bomb aimer, Jim Banks, later recalled:

  He put all the crew aft and with the brakes full on and the motors on full power, gave her the gun. We got away on this unserviceable airfield amid an audience of amazed Yanks and landed safely at Morotai.

  There were, however, some lighter moments. The arrival at Leyburn of 3 Para CO Wooler to replace Ellis had led to an increase in the tempo of parachute training at the base. Wooler believed those responsible for the despatch of Z Special unit operatives and supplies from the aircraft should themselves experience parachute training, a decision which didn’t go down well with 200 Flight people, many of whom believed the only reason you would jump from an aeroplane was when there was little other alternative.

  Wooler’s popularity plunged even further when he extended the requirement to the aircrews, including Read, who did his first jump accompanied by Wooler. Singularly unimpressed, Read got his revenge during one of their return trips from Morotai.

  For the long flights they had installed a toilet can on the aircraft by strapping it onto a catwalk forward of the Liberator’s bomb bay bulkhead. When Read’s engineer told him Wooler was using the toilet Read ordered the engineer to take some readings on the fuel tanks so as not to arouse suspicion and, while there, reach over and open the bomb bay doors.

  Read would later gleefully describe how Wooler suddenly had a marvellous view of the Arafura Sea, 14 000 feet below, while hanging on to the guide chains, with his shirt and pants flapping in the gale. Read waved to him from the cockpit while the crew were ‘laughing their heads off’.

  Through September 200 Flight operated a series of missions which illustrated the change in emphasis as the war receded into the past. Medical supplies and food were transported to forward bases as well as into drop zones, but were interspersed with repatriation flights for released allied prisoners of war. On one such flight Read flew to Batavia to collect British POWs and then on to Cocos Island as part of their journey home, returning to Batavia with urgently needed medical supplies and food. The following month he flew twenty Australian POWs home from Morotai to Eagle Farm, Brisbane, where they were admitted to Greenslopes Military Hospital. Read was not to know that within two weeks he would join them in the same hospital.

  Playing host at Leyburn to some visiting army personnel, Read challenged one of his crew to an arm-wrestling contest, during which Read’s leg somehow twisted and snapped. Strapped in a splint he was flown to Brisbane’s Greenslopes the next day and Flight Lieutenant Frank Ball was appointed acting CO in Read’s absence. As fate would have it, 200 Flight was disbanded before Read could return.

  Others, like Les Anderson and his crew, also experienced something of a bizarre twist of war. Shortly after an airdrop in Semporna, one engine cut out and, rather than return to Morotai, Anderson decided to make for the nearest available runway at Zamboanga in the southern Philippines. Under normal circumstances procuring a replacement engine from the Americans would have been a simple matter, but the crew soon found out one would have to be flown up from Amberley in Queensland. Since the war was over, it was explained that the Lend Lease arrangement between the United States and Britain and its dominions was also over. So the crew sat there for two weeks while the replacement engine was flown in and fitted, partly mollified by a steady supply of beer and cigarettes sent over from their comrades at Morotai.

  Frank Ball’s last trip was to Bougainville in November 1945. By now parachute-training facilities at Leyburn had been shut down and personnel were being discharged and they were heading home from the war. Those who still remained were at last able to avail themselves of the facilities of Leyburn’s Royal Hotel, which had been off limits for the duration of their stay. The camp was finally closed in February 1946 but not before Frank Ball, still in temporary command, at a dinner at nearby Clifton, was able to announce the awards which had been promulgated for 200 Flight. Read, Ball and Flying Officers Tom Bridges, Bob Carson and Forbes Weir were each awarded the Air Force Cross and eight others were mentioned in despatches.

  As it was to turn out, many of those involved in 200 Flight were not to return immediately to civilian life. Some volunteered for service with the British Commonwealth Occupation Forces in Japan, others remained in the RAAF. Wing Commander Eric Read went on to command No 82 Heavy Bomber Wing at Amberley in Queensland until he joined the Department of Civil Aviation as an examiner of airmen in 1947. He later transferred to the department’s Flying Unit as an airways surveyor, flying F.27 Fokker Friendship aircraft, testing navigation and landing aids at Australia’s major airports.

  Frank Ball, with more than 2000 hours in his log book, joined Trans-Australia Airlines as a pilot and became a training captain in 1949. With pilot retirement age then set at 45, Ball could see a future in management for people with operational experience so he decided to complete an accountancy course he had started before the war.

  Before he entered the airline’s senior management ranks, he was to experience a final dice with the dangers of low flying, this time while in command of a twin-engine Convair 240 airliner out of Brisbane in 1952. It was the first officer’s turn to handle the take-off and just as the aircraft lifted off, the most critical part of any take-off, the propeller on the starboard engine automatically feathered, robbing the Convair of any power on that side. Ball immediately took the controls and the aircraft managed the barest of climb rate, thanks mainly to the influence of what is known as ‘ground effect’, the invisible cushion of air which can exist between an aircraft and the runway surface.

  They scarcely cleared houses on a low hill at Hamilton Heights, to the south-west of the airport, and Ball later vividly recalled catching a fleeting glimpse of a man having a morning shave, only to see the Convair’s wingtip pass so close to his house he fell backwards over his verandah.

  But Ball had more than that on his mind as the Convair gradually
began to lose height towards the loading cranes on the wharf on the Brisbane River at Hamilton. Just as he began to contemplate ditching the aircraft on the river their efforts to restart the right engine bore fruit and the Convair began to slowly gain height to allow Ball to circle the airfield and land.

  It had been a narrow escape from disaster, later attributed to the formation of lead deposits on the engine’s spark plugs causing the engine to backfire and prompting an inbuilt safety mechanism to automatically feather the propeller. Much of the problem of the Convair’s poor rate of climb after an engine failure would be remedied by the introduction of revised take-off procedures, to ensure Convairs had sufficient speed and height to climb away should an engine fail. Ball would take a leading role in introducing the revised operations into TAA’s Convair flight manuals.

  Moving to Melbourne as the airline’s operations manager in 1957 he began to rise through the airline’s management ranks until his appointment as general manager of TAA in 1979. Through the 1970s and 1980s, he oversaw the introduction of a range of new aircraft into airline service, including the A300 Airbus, along with a dogged fight to convince the federal government of the need for further capital injection into the airline.

  Renowned for his integrity and his warm personality, Ball won universal respect among the airline’s staff and in the aviation industry generally. He retired in 1985 and passed away in 2009 after suffering dementia for four years. As for his time with 200 Flight, most of his airline colleagues knew nothing of it, nor, for that matter, did his wife, Rae.

  ‘He never discussed it with me. Neither did he ever talk about the Convair incident,’ she says, although some years later she found a personal account he had written of the Brisbane engine failure.