My late mother had a half brother called Alan Catlow who served as a pilot in the RAF during World War 2. My second priority after finishing JBTR was to visit him and he lives in Ashford near Headcorn, a grass airfield which I flew into when I underwent my Air Training Corps Flying Scholarship at Biggin Hill in 1976.
The weather was fab and I stayed the night with Alans daughter Marian and her husband Bob in their lovely farm house. Alan showed me a photo of him (red circle left) on No 247 Sqn flying Vampires with Ginger Lacey (red circle right). Ginger was the top scoring fighter pilot during the Battle of Britain and he also checked me out at Bridlington Flying Club after I gained my Private Pilots Licence in 1976 - small world.
We also discovered that we served on the same squadron - No 79 - Alan was on Thunderbolts in Burma and I was an honorary member when I flew Jet Provosts at the Joint Forward Air Control Training Unit at RAF Brawdy where I met my wife Jill - small world. Alan kindly presented me with his 79 Sqn salamander brooch - I was very honoured and will treasure it as reminder of my visit.
The RAF spares no expense when they have spent a fortune training you - Alan's certificate was hand written in his log book! At least mine was a cheap black and white certificate. To a flyer though the cloth RAF wings are priceless. Note in his log book four (10%) of his course were killed in accidents - ouch!
I then flew on to Fairoaks for lunch with motoring.aviation journalist Colin Goodwin who is building an RV7 in his shed - yes shed - made my double garage look like a palatial hangar!
