Comments by "rob shirewood" (@robshirewood5060) on "Ed Nash's Military Matters" channel.

  1. I  used to know a man who flew these in the RAF, and he said "you don't climb into a Gnat, you just strap it on", my father was an ATC cadet at RAF Hullavington in the 1970's on Annual Camp and the Red Arrows, then based at RAF Kemble, gave a demonstration display of their program (using it as a training exercise), he said it was the finest display he ever saw them do, and he saw many later on. He said that compared to the other RAF aircraft of the time when you stood alongside the aircraft it was the only one he could look directly into with out climbing up, and he was actually taller than the cockpit, he was 6ft 4 inches tall. He loved the Hawker Hunter, and the Black Arrows display team, of Hunters, but always had a smile when he mentioned that lovely little bird the Gnat. It was one of the few to have Anhedral wings in that they went down at a steeper angle than most and it made the aircraft have a much better rate of roll. There were other display teams that flew the Gnat before the Red Arrows, my father mentioned the Yellowjacks or similar.
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  2. The Brecons have semi-wild ponies too.
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  3. Halifax had Bristol Hercules engines, some models of Lancaster's also had Bristol Hercules, and some Halifax had Merlins along with the Lancaster with Merlins. A very useful quartet of versatile aircraft.
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  4. Quite a few USAAF and USAF aircraft met their end up there too.
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  5. A lot of it is volcanic, Snowdon is an extinct volcano
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  6. No an RAF Chinook with Intelligence and Police Anti Terrorism experts from Northern Ireland crashed into a hill in western Scotland at a route roughly 45 degrees from Aldergrove, bloody insane idea putting all of them on one aircraft, sometimes "intelligence" is the last thing involved. Sad loss and terrible tragedy, they blamed the Pilot and his father fought for years to clear his name. He was former RAF himself.
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  7. I was told that the Wellington had a magnesium alloy wing spar, like the later Varsity, which would burn with intense white light and high heat, with fuel added i am guessing most of it burned up. The R101 airship met a similar fate in France.
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  8.  @briansteffmagnussen9078  Totally correct the MOD RAF RN did remove most leaving only items that were too big or problematic, there were two Anson engines at one time on the Carneddau. One of the links i posted shows the Wellington framework just as you stated. I googled AIR CRASHES WALES there are some good online sites
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  9. No the Welsh people respect the crash sites, most of the wreckage was taken away by MOD RAF or RN for crash investigation.
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  10. One RAF pilot of an Anson saw the mountain just in time and pulled back on the controls, enough to crash land flat parallel on his belly. The crew survived injured, one crewman went down the mountain for rescuers, the mist came down obscuring the site to rescuers, one of the crew released his fluorescent yellow-orange sea-marker dye into a stream flowing downhill, and the rescuers followed it up and recovered them alive. Happily not all the crashes were totally fatal.
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  11. Later they did put a beacon up there somewhere not sure of the location
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  12. Was the Bethesda hut still in use then?
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  13. i wonder if the Germans got the idea for their twin engined push pull fighter from this
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  14. B-36 was notorious for engines catching fire due to their being reversed and overheating. Do you mean the one which lost the A-bomb, most of the15 crew parachuted, most lived some drowned?
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  15.  @sealove79able  There is a good report on it on a site dedicated to B-36 losses
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  16. My father as a cadet heard voices in the mist above his head on Carnedd Daffydd, yet he was at the very top, they had been up there looking for the wreckage of an Anson and a civvy Cessna , he said it was dead silent in the mist and then they heard adult male voices above them. It spooked them quite a bit. I gave no doubt it has phenomena.
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  17. In ww2 my great aunt was working for a farmer at RAF Gaydon in Warwickshire, when a B-17 crashed on the airfield in bad weather. It had been scheduled for a raid on Bremen taking off from a RAF USAAF airfield in UK, which was cancelled and diverted by bad weather to Gaydon which was a RLG Relief Landing Ground satellite airfield for RAF Chipping Warden OTU Operational Training Unit for Wellington crews. The crew attempted to land but crashed with all lost. There were a lot of losses from Chipping Warden, Gaydon, Edgehill, Wellesbourne and other local wartime airfields. RAF Gaydon had 3 runways in the standard shape of a triangle at the time, later it had one long runway when it became a V bomber station, on one occasion a Valiant crashed soon after take off most of the crew being killed. Later it became a training station with Varsities, and 637 Gliding School which is where my father learned to fly. It closed and became the testing ground for modern car company testing and the Rover museum. Most of the runway can still be seen on google pics. At one time c 1949 Chipping Warden had been a storage area for Horsa gliders that were spares for the Airborne landings in 1944 many of which were towed from Oxfordshire airfields.
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  18. The loss of so many aircraft here and in other Welsh locations led to the formation of the Royal Air Force Mountain Rescue Service who have saved so many lives and to the Search And Rescue Squadrons who carried out similar work and over wider areas. The Whirlwind's, Wessex's and Sea King helicopters in bright yellow were a common sight up here for many years training or rescuing people in distress. A salute to them and to the Ogwen Mountain Rescue Team. My father told me that in Bethesda there was a hut behind the pub just as you enter the town that was used by the RAF MR Team as a base for searches and which was also used for the bodies of aircrew lost in those hills when recovered, he was a cadet and the hut was also used for RAF ATC Air Cadets for Expedition training and mountain experience. May all those lost Rest In Peace.
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  19.  @EdNashsMilitaryMatters  I sympathise i have been all over those mountains, it has some hard sections and lots of boggy and soft areas which are thigh killers and the wind saps your breath no matter how fit you are.
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  20.  @tomlobos2871  Agreed, but i know a lot of people in that area, and most are respectful
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  21. B-17, B-24, Ansons, Wellington's, Cessna, C-47, many other types. Sad history
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  22. I think Tyrone Power was one of those who flew that route
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  23.  @martinhughes2549  Long live, Y draig goch, the red dragon
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  24. Civilians can fly there, i have also seen para-gliders, but mostly military I believe.
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