Winds of Destruction: The Autobiography of a Rhodesian Combat Pilot by Peter Petter-Bowyer

Author:Peter Petter-Bowyer [Petter-Bowyer, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781908916754
Publisher: Helion
Published: 2012-08-29T22:00:00+00:00

Visibility markings.

The Squadron Commander of Hunters in the period 1973-4 was Rob Gaunt. Flying FAC for him was quite an experience. Unlike other leaders, Rob favoured a procedure that worked well for him. He descended from the IP to run in at low level about one minute out from target. In this way he always picked up my aircraft flying at 2,000 feet before he pulled up to his ‘perch’ point, keeping me visual all the way.

As I pulled up to roll over into the dive, Rob had his nose pointing towards the target, finger on trigger. Just by watching my dive, Rob placed his gunsight pipper at the point he expected to see the marker rockets. On three occasions I recall seeing Rob’s 30mm cannon shells exploding bang on target just before my phosphorus rockets reached ground. The white markers looked puny in the centre of the large area covered by his 30mm cannon shell flashes that rippled through target at forty rounds per second. This was very spectacular but I always tensed my buttocks expecting Rob to collide with me. There was really no danger at all; his Hunter always flashed through well below me.

There was seldom need to call corrections to succeeding pilots, usually three of them, who placed their strikes to cover the target area without overlaps. When all was over, the jets returned to base and I continued recce, seldom to know what results had been achieved. Occasionally I saw individuals running during my marker attack, then nothing until the last Hunter had run through target. There were always bashas burning furiously with much black smoke and dust drifting on the wind before any human movement was observed. On occasions secondary explosions removed any doubts I might have experienced when no persons were seen.

I continued to deeply regret not being able to work in the SAS areas of operations. Had this been allowed, no airstrike would have been made without SAS verification of ZANLA or FRELIMO presence. Following an airstrike the SAS would have been able to capitalise on enemy confusion and the Air Force would have known what results had been achieved. Many months were to pass before SAS moved in immediately after every air action. In the meanwhile, the SAS created havoc on the ground using no more than twenty-four men in six sticks of four men each. It took FRELIMO some time to realise what was happening and then they themselves started employing large forces to search for the elusive SAS; a kind of terrorist war in reverse!

A pathfinder group making a free-fall parachute descent at last light from a Dakota flying high-level over unpopulated territory usually preceded deployment of the main SAS force. The four-man pathfinder group would then search for a suitable site to receive twenty men who would be flown in the following night.

At their selected DZ (drop zone) the pathfinders provided pilots with the QFE (altimeter setting for zero height at the DZ) and guided the Dakota captain by VHF radio directly towards the DZ.

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