UNITED KINGDOM

MOBILE AIR MOVEMENTS SQUADRON

Op Hamish 

Bill Halford

Soon after I arrived in November 1971 war broke out between India and Pakistan. Some old sweats will remember that we had a dozen or so Hercs based at Masirah for a about a week and teams came from UK and NEAF MAMS. Sorties were flown to Karachi and Islamabad during a week of very intensive ops and we brought out well over 1,000 refugees and packed them off screaming in VC10s to Akrotiri to be re-distrubuted from there. Many nationalities were involved and I had a terrible job persuading people from the Far East, Australia and New Zealand that they had to go West to go East.

Flt Lt Bill Halford, Flt Lt Norrie Radcliffe, FS Chas Dalglish, Cpl Keith Simmonds, SAC's Hugh Curran, Troop Smith and Bob Thacker.

Standing:        Frank Holmes  Peter Herring  Keith Parker  Troop Smith  Bob Thacker   Charlie Dalgleish                             Norrie Radcliffe  Don Stewart,  Roy Millington (Movs Masirah)   Kneeling:        Doug Lister  Colin Allen  Hugh Curran  Charlie Marlow  Keith Simmonds   Sadly both Chas Dalgleish and Roy Millington are now deceased but the rest are going strong, the Wg Cdr pilot leading this task received an Air Force Cross as the Hercs did land under hostile fire, Hugh Curran and Troop Smith also received some hostility from the passengers!! Photo courtesy of Ian Berry