EA (Air) David Green.
The S227 was a Fleet Air Arm assessement report for Royal Navy Aircrew
David Green was awarded this honorary assessement (tongue in cheek) with the highest possible grade of 10.
Signed by the Squadron Commanding Officer of 899 Squadron. Cdr. David Dunbar-Dempsey RN and Commander Air of HMS Eagle. Cdr. Ted Anson RN.
November 2007 ...." so, having spent most of my Naval career maintaining Sea Vixens, the memories came flooding back when viewing seavixen.org.
Above my desk there is a picture of Sea Vixen XN655 of 899 Squadron (#121) along with my S227 Record. This was presented to me by Sub.Lt.Kim Sharman for the 1Hr and 10 min. that I flew in it with Kim in the fall of 1969 from Gibraltar. I see that Kim is still around and has made a contribution to the website. Attached are pictures of that momento, the quotation below the picture is "Sublime Faith".
After completing the Aircraft Artificer apprenticeship at Arbroath I was drafted to Yeovilton in January 1960 and other than a few months spent on 766 Venoms and the Admiral's Vampire the next 3.5 years was spent servicing Sea Vixen’s with time on 766B and 899 Squadrons.
The decision to convert to Elecrical Artificer (Air) was probably due to the time spent in the fuel bay or replacing the No. 1 or 1A Tank liners. One could never quite get rid of the smell of avgas or hydraulic oil.
After completing the EA(Air) conversion course it was back to Yeovilton and the Sea Vixen, now the Mk 2. Prior to joining 899 in January 1968 I completed the Sea Vixen SAMCO at Lee with special emphasis on the Red Top missile and the armament systems.
One of my early tasks on 899 was to fulfill Cdr. McCullough's mandate and make all aircraft Red Top ready. One aircraft in particular I recall, kept roasting one of the missile boxes, this we traced to an aircraft wiring error. That aircraft was probably miswired on conversion and may never have had the Red Top system operational.
In 69 we were in the Med and I found great satisfaction working with the Senior Pilot and Air Weapons officer fitting the Sea Vixen for the more unusual weapon options. This led me to request a flight in a Sea Vixen, before leaving 899, with the Senior Pilot. On the night before the flight I discovered my pilot had gone from the Senior Pilot to a very junior pilot, S/Lt Kim Sharman, not surprising since we had a Divisional Officer/Chief relationship, but my determination to fly didn't waiver.
The experience was one not to be missed, takeoff and climb out were quite a bit faster than my first ever flight, a Blackburn Beverley. Then, it was great fun handling the aircraft via the autopilot and going through the sound barrier.
I did make a couple of novice mistakes; the barf bag goes in the lower pockets, not required thank goodness. The other was looking down, when doing a low level pass on a destroyer; this was in spite of tapping the altimeter to ensure that it really read zero feet, should have looked up. The rest of the flight and landing was uneventful, although the air around the Rock was turbulent. All told Kim , it was an experience I will never forget, you did a great job and I never doubted your skills. Not sure though, after working on the Mk1 as an AA, whether I would have flown in a Mk1.
Sea Vixen Citation for David Green. Electrical Artificer.
