FINAL STAGES OF AIR TRAINING

Southland Times, Issue 24758, 1 June 1942, Page 6

FINAL STAGES OF AIR TRAINING

NEW ZEALANDERS IN I BRITAIN 1 (By WALLACE REYBURN) What happens to a New Zealand flyer ■ who has been trained in New Zealand and Canada under the Empire Air . Training Scheme when he arrives m Britain? After passing through the various training schools in New Zealand and Canada, the flyer emerges as a fullyfledged pilot, observer, or wireless-operator-gunner (known asa“Wog’ in the service). With a group of other lads he embarks for England. But although he has been through the full course in New Zealand and Canada and wears his crested wings, flying “C” or ‘AG badge, as the case may be, he is not ready to go into action immediately upon arrival in Britain. There is still more training awaiting him at an operational training unit. It might occur to some readers to ask: “Why can’t the whole training job be done in New Zealand, or in both Dominions, and the men arrive in Britain ready to step into R.A.F. planes and go on operations?” It would be ideal if it could, but it’s just not practical for a variety of reasons. First, there is a lack of planes. Topnotch war planes such as the Stirling, Manchester, Beaufighter, Vengeance and Typhoon, to mention only a few of them, are needed for the active squadrons. Relatively few can be spared for training and these must be kept for the operational training units in immediate support of each group of operational squadrons. OPERATIONAL TRAINING When he arrives in England, the New Zealand airman is ready to go to one of these highly specialized operational training units. Maybe he will have to wait his turn a while; if so, he may be attached to the Army or to the Navy to give him an insight into the other services and so improve his ability for co-operation later; or he may go to a special school for training young officers in leadership and command. But as soon as there is a vacancy for him he goes to an operational training unit, and- there he gets on intimate terms with the latest planes from Britain’s aircraft factories. No amount of training in any other type of plane is going to fit him to fly and fight a Beaufighter. The only way is to climb into a Beaufighter and learn its tricks and I hear that this newest of Britain’s twin-engined fighter planes has quite a few, too. Then there’s the climate. Accustomed to flying in excellent weather back home, the Empire Training Scheme pilot has a lot to learn when he takes off into the heavier, rainy, hazy atmosphere over Britain. And finally—camouflage. To the pilot trained in New Zealand, finding his home aerodrome there presented little difficulty. In the familiar countryside, the hangars and clearly defined lanuuig ground, brilliantly lighted for him at night, stood out for miles. When he comes to England he has to learn how to seek out camouflaged aerodromes and make landings in the black-out. R.A.F. COMMANDS The newcomer from New Zealand is destined for one of the four main R.A.F. commands —Bomber, Fighter, Coastal or Army Co-operation,, and each of these has its operational training units (O.T.U.’s as they are called). As an R.A.F. station commander defined it to me: “The function of an O.T.U. is to turn a qualified pilot into an operational pilot . .. under the very nose of the enemy.” That last phrase is important, for here is the pilot’s first taste of the difference between flying over New Zealand, where he worries about the prospect of attack in the air only theoretically, and flying over Britain, when he can’t be absolutely sure that there isn’t a Messerschmitt waiting for him on the other side of that bank of clouds ahead. The trainee flies in the type of plane in which he is going to go into action later when he passes on to an operational squadron, and he leaves the unit not as an individual pilot, air gunner, or observer, but as a member of a crew that has worked together throughout their time at the O.T.U. When the time comes for them to go on actual operations they are a trained team, knowing each other thoroughly. And it doesn’t take each aircrew long to develop a healthy team spirit, even though they may have been drawn from as divergent walks of life as this typical one I met: a former Rhodesian bank clerk, a Canadian college student, an Australian farmer and a New Zealand insurance salesman. FLYING AND LECTURES The airmen fly and take lectures on alternate days. On the flying days duties start at seven in the morning and they are in and out of their planes and in and out of the sky until four in the afternoon, stopping for a break for lunch at eleven. From four until ten at night they have free, then they fly again until dawn. Every day at the station is a flying day, no matter what the weather, because the flyers are split up into two groups, alternating flying with classes. At the lectures they learn ship, submarine, and aircraft recognition, become familiar with new types of guns not yet installed in training planes in New Zealand, learn the intricate theories of “patrol and search” used in Coastal Command flying duties over the sea, fill out their previous studies in navigation, bomb-aiming and wirelesscommunication. They have one day a week off, and at the end of this two months’ course they are granted a week’s leave before joining a squadron as fully fledged representatives of New Zealand’s contribution to the Empire’s war in the air. From England these New Zealand airmen may be sent to fly and fight anywhere where British forces are in action. And so New Zealand is now regaining some of her airmen sons who have won their spurs in battle and are returning to strengthen the Royal New Zealand Air Force as seasoned warriors of the air.