Postby John Webb » January 20th, 2013, 11:11 pm
Hi Keith,
Your post on Bloodhound SSC reminded me I had the pleasure of sitting next to Andy Green at a dinner in London just before Christmas. He's a great character, well over 6'-0" tall and used to fly Phantoms and the Tornadoes. I asked him how he got on being so tall. He told me the Phantom was OK, but his bone dome was a bit tight against the canopy on the Tornado !!!!!
We then got around to talking about SSC and it wasn't long since the team had published the video of the 1st run of the rocket engine at Aberporth I think it was.
I told him I could understand how he would control and throttle the Eurofighter engines but what about the rocket?? Answer : It's not and we haven't quite worked that out yet !!!
A great character and I hope he succeeds. I was telling him and several of his former RAF colleagues about the LMA and telling them about DJ's latest Vulcan and the other things we do, and most of them have no idea what we get up to at Cosford and so on.
Later at the dinner a toast was made to one Squadron Leader Tony Iveson DFC. Andy knew him well and offered to intoduce me and a couple of fellow guests to him.
What a treat !! Tony Iveson is ex 617 squadron, and bombed the Tirpitz in 1944 with a Tallboy 12,000lb bomb. He's now 93 and in fine fettle and happy to recount in the bar afterwards much of his time on Lancs. As an ex Lanc modeller you would have loved it.
Tony wrote about his exploits in "Lancaster The Biography" in 2011 -- I'm half way through it and it's a good read for any Lanc Fan.
He was also latterly Chairman of the Bomber Command Association who were instrumental in raising the funds for the Bomber Command Memorial opened last year in London's Green Park. As most of us know it commemorates the 55,573 who never made it back in Bomber Command in WW2. I've been to the memorial -- it's well worth it for any member with a little time to spare in London.
Cheers
JOHN
