GIBLI and the MAGNAVOX - Pt 2

In last month’s story, Hugh recounts how he came to be flying far out into the Libyan desert to set up a Magnavox, the forerunner of the GPS receiver. Now he had to get back to their remote camp – and a fearsome Gibli wind was beginning to raise a massive dust storm.

THE TRIP BACK FROM the Ubar Hills was one of those flights from which pilots' nightmares are generated. I could see that it was going to be a bit of a challenge, but at the back of my mind I always had the way out of going to Sebha, where the Instrument Landing System would always get us in, unless, for some impossible reason, it went unserviceable...and it wasn't until we were well past the Braspetro Rig that the big Russian cargo plane failed to get airborne from Sebha.

Not only did he fail to get airborne. He went right off the end of the runway in his desperate efforts to abort the take-off, removing the wheels of his left undercarriage and smashing the antennae of the Instrument Landing System.

My 'Way out' had thus been neatly eliminated and we were by this time right in the thick of it. Visibility was down to about two hundred metres and we were being thrown around all over the place as the wind howled over the crests of the big dunes. Paul was, thankfully, speechless as we thrashed on southwards.

Above the sandstorm the sun still shone and by its dimmed light it was just possible to make out the hunched shoulders of red sand, braced like vast stationary waves in a raging red sea. Sand-spume spattered against the windscreen like dry spray.

I could not climb up through the fury of the storm, otherwise I would lose sight of the ground and we would never find the camp. Our only hope was to keep going until we found some recognisable landmark.

Already we had been going for twenty eight minutes from the rig and I had not even seen the 'Double Ess', a white gypsum formation in the shape of two esses and they were still eight minutes north of the camp.

Maybe I had missed them in this mad maelstrom of screaming sand. Maybe we had been blown miles off course. I called on the long-range radio to try and find out the weather at Sebha, only to receive the disturbing information that Sebha Airport was closed due to the accident. Our windows of opportunity were closing one by one. Paul, however, unaware of the significance of this information and by now totally resigned to his fate, had started to take a hesitant interest in what was going on.

Sebha Airport is right in the centre of Libya.

I had to make a decision. If we just kept going until the fuel ran out, no-one would ever find us because we would not know our position ourselves, even if the radio did continue to function after our arrival on terra firma. My mind was haunted by the story of the "Lady Be Good", a B-24 Liberator bomber that returned to Northern Libya from a bombing raid on Italy. I think it was in 1943. They missed their home base at Benghazi because it was blacked out and covered with cloud. They flew on, talking to Benghazi control the while, requesting QDMs, until their transmissions faded and they ran out of fuel about three hundred miles south west of Benghazi. The crew bailed out and the aircraft carried on, landing itself on auto-pilot, damaged, but very survivable. I've seen it.

Only the mid-upper gunner's parachute failed to open and he was killed on impact. The others survived to die an excruciating death from thirst. All the bodies were found about fifteen years later by seismic teams working for BP. The Captain's body was 122 kilometres from the aircraft, about fifteen short of a road frequented, at the time, by the British Eighth Army. He had kept a diary. You don't want to read it.

No, we would definitely have to land as soon as possible, before we got too far away from the camp.

By this time the radio was swamped by static interference from the storm and we could not raise anyone to tell them of our plans. I just hoped they didn't try and send out a search party in these conditions otherwise we would have two parties to search for. I told Paul what I planned to do and with a shaky smile he appeared to accept that it was our only option.

And then, out of the corner of my eye I caught a fleeting glimpse of what I took to be a track. Definitely wheel ruts marked the hard sand of the old lake floor. They led off into the red gloom to our right.

My mind was instantly made up. No time for an inspection run as we would lose the track. I hauled off the power and as the speed bled off I ran through the landing checks and wound down full flap. We touched down and stopped in a matter of yards with that wind.

We were right beside a Seismic Survey Line. I could see the wooden pegs sticking up out of the sand.

The surveyors wrote the station numbers on the bit of the peg which was buried under the sand and the writing stayed legible for years hidden from the effects of the sun and wind.

Paul turned to me, a weary smile creasing his eyes, "And now?"

"And now, Paul," I said, relief obviously showing all over my face, "You're the surveyor, so you have to pop over to that peg there, pull it out of the ground and tell us where we are." So saying, I feathered the propeller so that Paul could open his door without being blasted. The wind was anyway doing its best to blow us away.

"Keep away from the prop! I shouted as he scrambled down the steps onto the ground And Paul, when you come back, get in the back door...it's easier."

Paul nodded and pulled his bush jacket over his head in a vain attempt to keep the sand out of his eyes as he struggled over to the peg. When he got to the line he pulled the peg out of the ground and huddled it inside the flapping folds of his jacket. Then he stabbed the peg back into the sand and made his way back to the plane. He slid open the back door and climbed in, slamming the door shut behind him.

"So, Professor," I said brightly. "Where are we?"

" Line three forty, station eighty eight."

"And the camp?"

"Oh I couldn't tell you that without a map," said Paul, shaking his head.

"OK, Paul. Listen, line three forty crosses line four ninety somewhere to the west of the camp, doesn't it?"

"Indeed it does." Paul replied, a gleam of an idea creeping into his eyes. "Seven point two miles to the north west, to be precise...and four ninety goes straight through the middle of the camp!"

So that's what we did. I unfeathered the propeller, glanced through the checks and we took off, following Three Forty like tracker dogs, about twenty feet above the line. Around five minutes later we crossed Four Ninety and I cranked the aircraft round to the left, keeping my eyes glued on Four Ninety in case it tried to escape from us into the red fog.

Minutes later the rigid wind sock appeared out of the dust a hundred and fifty yards ahead of us, right on the nose. Tents and trailers also emerged from the red mist and we saw a pickup detach itself from the office trailer and hurry over towards the indistinct runway. We landed, parked the plane and I closed down the engine.

I looked at Paul and said, "Thank you very much, Paul, you were a great help."

"Do you know, I think I almost enjoyed that!" said Paul.

"OK then Paul. As payment for the entertainment, could you give me a hand tying the old girl down before she goes off on her own?"

"My pleasure," he said, giving the plane an almost proprietary tap.

Heini, the Crew Chief greeted us as he got out of the pickup. "Thought you guys would never make it in this!" he said, scratching the sand in his hair.

"Joint effort," I said and left it at that.

When we got to the surveyors’ trailer, we went straight to the map on the wall at the far end. Station eightyeight on line Three Forty was a little less than four hundred metres due north of the camp. If we had kept going for another thirty seconds we would have flown right over it.

That's Giblis for you!