Falkland Islands 1982. EOD, made interesting!

What  started the whole book writing exercise off, was a call from the BBC asking if I would read the diaries on camera. Here is a snippet. Click on my picture below to see the film.

MY WAR 

 It’s Started Taken from the book.  Click the Sheffield below to zoom in.

On the 2^nd of May 1982 at around 17:00 we (The Fleet Clearance Diving Team) were steaming south with the fleet on board the Sir Tristram to-wards the Falklands. We had been on board for weeks when, on the 4^th of May, I was virtually alone in the mess listening to the BBC world service.

I heard the news that HMS Sheffield had been sunk by Exocet missile. I ran up to the galley where most of the ships company were watching ‘Flash Gordon.’ I was so shocked that when I made the announcement I could hardly speak. My voice was distinctly unclear, “They’ve sunk the Sheffield,” stunned silence “They’ve sunk the Sheffield!” I managed to blurt out.

On the steam south from the Ascensions, you have to go through what Mariners call ‘The Roaring 40s.’ This refers to the latitudes between 40° and 50° south. I had been through rough weather myself in the Navy but I have never seen anything like this.

The wind down there has virtually no land mass to slow it down. These great atmospheric depressions sweep unhindered around the cold, endless seas at the bottom of the earth, building the icy green water into an endless succession of mountainous waves.

These heavy winds predominantly roar in from the west, so you're either rolling heavily, or smashing your way through the huge seas. Sir Tristram took most of these ‘goffers’ on her starboard bow. They would slam into her making a noise like a metallic explosion.

Up on the bridge is always the place to witness these spectacular demonstrations of nature’s ferocity. The waves march on at you in perfect formation, relentless and menacing. Looking out of your secure location behind inch-thick glass, there is nothing but white madness and howling wind. 

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It was very eerie as we came in quietly and totally unopposed. All through the early morning while at anchor, troops, tanks, jeeps etc. were pouring off all of the ships. I was given a job as Gun crew as it was known I’d done it before.

Around ten o’clock came the pipe:

"Hands to action stations, Gun crews close up, Air raid warning red - IMMINENT"

This time was for real. Five Sky-hawks and three Mirage fighters attacked the fleet. A missile landed between the Elk and us, it was meant for the Elk. It was terrifying but fantastic.

At the end of the day many of their planes were shot down. Nig, Jan and Mick went to the Antrim to deal with a 1000lb UXB. It had gone through the Sea Slug launcher, through the magazine then tuned up-wards and hit the deck head (which was the underside of the helideck), dropped down and landed in the senior rates heads.

It took all night to lift and get over the side. During this the Ardent could be seen exploding about two miles away. It sunk about 07:00, 22 dead. Some of the survivors came on board the Antrim and other ships.

This bomb had very nearly gone clean through the ship: through the port hull, through a few bulkheads deep inside the ship and nearly out the starboard side. Think about that, and the amount of energy required to go through a warship. There was a rough split in the starboard hull, where the bomb had so very nearly gone clean through the ship.

I had the pleasure of diving, during an air raid, to hammer soft wooden wedges into the split, in an attempt to slow the floodwater down. It had immediately flooded the magazine and partially set off one of the sea-cat missiles, a combination of which had killed the two young sailors were stationed there.

Whilst diving and hammering in the wedges, I was very conscious that on the other side of this split was squashed ammo and all sorts of distorted, mangled, and shall we say unstable ordnance, which I could see through the split from my position on the outside.

Oh, and there’s a 1000-pound bomb in there. Hammer gently, I thought. If you can hammer gently, I did. 

PLEASE HANDLE WITH CARE Right >>

In English! In fact, they were British-made 1000 lb Mk 17 free-fall bombs, and they were shiny and new. When you sell a bomb (and someone does have that job), I doubt you ever expect it to land back on British sovereign territory.

As you see (right), this isn’t a rusty heap that’s been in the sea for 40 years, this has just been manufactured. This will go off how it was meant to, and everything in it is new: batteries, timers, wires, fuses and explosives.

This bomb had been armed that morning, just before take off. It should have gone live not long after leaving the aircraft that dropped it. For some reason it hadn’t done its job and gone off. Why? Did it have a timer, unlikely, but something to mull over whilst studying one? So, what are you going to do about it? This was the first one of the war so there was no precedence to follow.  

<Click photo to enlarge. This is by far the best photo of the war. I've seen it printed lots of times but not explained. If you just look at it nothing extraordinary leaps out at you. This is how it is printed. (left) I will put it again at the bottom of this page and highlight the area's to really look! See anything out of the ordinary? A clue..? This was taken during an Air Raid. Go to the Bottom of the page to see what you can't see!.

HMS Plymouth. More diary extracts

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Wednesday 8 June 1982 (DAY TWENTY)Attacked at about 17:30.

 

Waves and waves of Mirages and Skyhawks. 

 

After the attacks, the Plymouth came in just ahead of us. She was ablaze and listing badly. She asked for bomb disposal assistance. We all looked at each other, it’s a sick feeling. Mick Fellows myself and Billy E went over to her.

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She had been hit by two 1000 lb bombs, plus cannon and rocket fire. The two bombs had gone in the port side and amazingly turned upwards and flew out of the deck around midships. The funnel was ripped apart. One of the cannon fire shots had hit a depth charge on the flight deck.

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It went off, nearly a full order. There was a hole ripped in the deck about 5 foot in diameter. That was above the POs’ mess. The after end caught fire and swept forward. Again, brilliant Naval fire fighting saved the ship. When the bombs came in, they smashed two mortar bombs in half, in the mortar magazine. That’s what we had to render safe. We eventually lowered them over the side.

 

Another air raid took place during job. It was not at us, but at Teal inlet, I mentioned it earlier, I believe. Tristram and Galahad were at Bluff Cove. Upon arrival back to Intrepid, we were hit with the news, Sir Tristram and Sir Galahad were ablaze and abandoned. Tristram took two 1000 lbs and Galahad three or four at Bluff Cove. The casualties were ferried to the Intrepid where a hospital was again set up in the dining room. 

 

Crew and embarked forces were ferried to us from Tristram and Galahad. Some were burned beyond recognition. Many we knew well from four of five weeks on Tristram. It was clear lots had not been wearing anti flash. The blast or flash had caused most of the burns. Many had no skin on the exposed areas, their flesh was just black and swollen, most had no hair. 

 

It was sick, disheartening and demoralising. The guys we knew from Tristram told us about it all. They said she was exploding like mad as they left. They don’t know if she sunk. I hope not, to put it mildly. 

 

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During the war, hundreds of canisters of Napalm were found at Goose Green by the Para’s as they took the airstrip back. Whilst at DEODS training, we saw the effects of most weapons and bombs either on film or in use. Napalm fills everyone with foreboding. It’s not a complicated bomb, in fact it’s barely a bomb in the true sense of the word.

It’s simply a thin canister that has no fuse; all it has to do is break open on contact with the ground and it will spill its deadly jellied gasoline out and burst into flames as soon as it comes into contact with the air. Because of the speed of ignition, it creates a deadly shock wave before burning everything flammable in its path. If you are caught by the huge ‘hot area’ of say 100 meters across, you will have the jellied petroleum stick to you, engulf you in flame and simultaneously, starve you of oxygen. Fire fills everyone with dread so to be bombed with fire is truly horrific. It was there in Goose Green to be used; there is plenty of photographic evidence.  

Brag-rags

But why didn’t any one of us get something? When the Boss was dealing with the UXB on the Argonaut Dave Southwell and Stan Bowles were beside him the whole time. Dave, being the senior Kilick (lead diver) on the team, and Stan, being built like an all-in wrestler, between them did most of it in fact. Other men at other times.

But the exploits of the guys on Argonaut, and with Mick on Antrim and Plymouth, and on the covert operation at Bluff Cove, went unrecognised. Who has to recommend men to get something? The Officer in Charge, your boss. In my view the teams’ interests were not represented by anyone in authority.

Who’s job was it to write a report of proceedings for all of the teams allocated tasks and experiences in the conflict? Who should have made recommendations for honors and awards for members of the team? I have no idea if I or any of our team were recommended for anything (I’m told not). Nobody ever said we were recommended, so we got nothing.

No wonder the team were not mentioned in any of the official conflict history documents, or even represented on the war memorial at Port Stanley until this year, 2007, 25 years late! Nobody knew we existed. Jan Sewell, who wrote the piece about HMS Antrim, told me once;

‘I didn’t even think about medals. When I got back, though, I did just once wonder, “Which one I will get?” Not, I wonder IF I'll get one.’ 

Some of the Antrim’s crew that helped Jan, Nigel and Mick, I believe, got mentioned in dispatches. Good luck to them. We just got our Commendation. It looks a bit like a child’s swimming certificate. Mine is so valuable, I don’t even know where it is. 

Medals are usually dished out for things done ‘beyond the call of duty’. Rightly so. None of us had done anything remotely near ‘How to remove a new bomb from a working warship during an air raid.’ We’d never been trained to do it. We were divers.

CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE>> 

It grated on some more than others, and why not? Not long after we got back to Vernon after our week’s leave, we had an official photo taken (Right) of the team. The photo was really to show the Boss’s new medal.

Well, we didn’t have a great deal to show for our efforts. So we made some. Stan had a stroke of brilliance when he suggested we make our own and surreptitiously stick them on just before the shutter went ‘click’.

I and most made some sort of fancy medal. Stan went right overboard and hung what looked like a huge German Third Reich eagle on his chest. Wilki had made a sort of ‘Military Order of the Bath’ like Nelson had. The photographer got us ready and said ‘say cheese’, which was our cue to ‘up medals’. The photographer did look up from his camera when he saw the twelve simultaneous moves, like some bizarre military salute, as all our arms went across our chests to stick on our home-mades – but he took some photos without saying a word. 

Then our devious plan was uncovered. Wilki’s Order of the Bath gave up its tenuous grip on his tunic and floated off in the breeze. Of all the places it could have gone out there on the edge of the sea and the heliport, it landed at the Boss’s feet.

He bent down to pick it up, looked at it and then looked behind as the remainder of us frantically tried to remove our unearned decorations. We were rumbled, and the grown-ups were not amused. We then had an official photo taken, minus the home-mades, and that was the one that was circulated. But I had a word with my mate, the photo-tech. He got me copies of the unofficial photo, which still makes me laugh to this day. The smug looks are everywhere, like naughty little boys who have just got away with stealing a tot of Daddy’s whiskey. 

FCDT 1

Lt Cdr Brian DUTTON DSO, QGM, RN (OIC)
FCPO(D) Michael FELLOWS MBE, DSC, BEM (2 I/C)
CPO(D) W ‘Bill’ BAUCKHAM (Passed away 23rd Oct 08)
CPO(D) Brian T ‘Ben’ GUNNELL
LS(D) C W ‘Billy’ EVERNDEN
LS(D) Lester GEOFFREYS (Missing, call me!)
LS(D) A P ‘Tony’ GROOM
LS(D) Ian MILNE
LS(D) ‘Nobby. NOBLE
LS(D) Garry ‘Jan’ SEWELL
LS(D) David W ‘Saggy’ SOUTHWELL
LS(D) David ‘Wilkie’ WILKINSON
AB(D) Nigel M PULLEN
AB(D) Billy SMART
AB(D) J W 'George' SHARP (Missing, call me!)
S(D) W G 'Stan' BOWLES
S(D) D BARRETT

 FCDT 2

 CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE. This is the same shot as above. I have just highlighted the fighters. When I say in the book about how low and how fast they were, I think this shot shows what I mean.

The noise is something that will stay with me forever. Not just the noise of the planes, there are hundreds of soldiers and sailors shooting at these two. They are dropping bombs and firing their rockets and guns. Intense!

 If you think you are beaten,

you are.

if you think you dare not,

you don't.

if you'd like to win,

but think you can't,

it's almost certain you won't.

Life's battles don't always come to

the stronger or faster man,

but soon or late the man who

wins is the man who thinks he can!

The man who thinks he can, By Walter D Wintle. 

Recommended read - SOD THAT FOR A GAME OF SOLDIERS!

Mark Eyles-Thomas and his three friends were just 17 when they were sent to war 8,000 miles away from home to win back the desolate Falkland Islands from Argentine invaders.

Too young to even vote for the Government that sent them there, the rookies were thrown into the bloodiest land-battle the British Army had fought since the Korean War.

On the night of the 11/12th June, 1982, the men of 3 Para fought with bayonets fixed for control of Mount Longdon, which barred the way to the capital Port Stanley.

That night 23 paratroopers paid the ultimate price, including three of the teenage band-of-brothers. Their platoon sergeant, Ian McKay was subsequently awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.

 Ask me a question; info@Deep-Sea-Diving.com

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