BARRIE DAVID

Reflections of...

...a one pound tax bill

Mid August - 2010 – Barry – Vale of Glamorgan

The first thing I've discovered about being retired is an abundance of time on my hands and that almost anything can trigger a serious trawling of my yesterdays. It’s a fabulously sunny August day and as I settle down in the garden with a good book my black Labrador, Bill, laying at my feet, gives a sudden upward tilt of his head as we hear the tell tale recoil of the front door letter box.  Bill stares at me until I say commandingly, ‘Postie’. He’s off like a shot, returning moments later with a letter. Praising him, I open it to discover a long defunct Building Society Account has accumulated 24 pence in interest from which HM Inland Revenue has automatically deducted 5p in tax.

Unbelievable! The postage alone far exceeds the remaining 19p.

As Bill flops contentedly down I pick up my book but begin to reflect about an even more diabolical tax bill I once paid, which amounted to exactly one pound and was the culmination of one of the most unforgettable experiences I have ever known.  I have excellent visual recall and as I close my eyes the story, factual in every detail, begins to unfold to the four roaring engines of an RAF C130 Hercules transport aircraft which is circling Fermain Bay off the coast of Guernsey. Sitting on its red webbing seating sixty British paratroopers wear shorts, tee shirts and trainers plus a main and reserve parachute. Three at a time they are about to parachute into the sea. Amid the unrelenting drone of the engines I gaze at the clarity of the images on the screen of my minds eye as they effortlessly haul me back to a July day more than three decades earlier....

Mid July 1976

With each circuit around the bay three more men leave. The waiting seems eternal but the numbers laboriously whittle down until there are three of us left. I will be the last man to jump and feel my stomach churn unmercifully when an RAF Flight Sergeant signals us to stand up and hook up. Following my two mates to the half open starboard door, as we get into line I catch a fleeting glimpse of vast blue ocean twelve hundred feet below stretching to the unbroken infinity of an equally blue sky. Tiny dots breaking the singularity of the sea are cross channel ferries and other commercial shipping. Three of them will be our pickup boats.

The objective of the exercise is to train us to parachute into water and to not become entangled in the canopy and rigging lines beneath the surface, which could easily prove terminal. I have logged dozens of parachute descents, such as night ballooning with equipment, (which the MOD later banned) and a night drop into the desert laden with over one hundred pounds of equipment. On a free fall course the previous year the exit from the aircraft, an antiquated De Havilland Rapide Bi plane, was as hairy as it gets. Carrying four men, an instructor and climbing to 2,600ft, one at a time we would climb out onto the wing, clinging to the support struts between them, until stepping backward when ordered to go. The Army called it ‘character building/adventure training’. We called it initial terror followed by almost addictive exhilaration to go back up and do it again. As my thoughts return to my first, and probably last descent into water, I dwell in detail on its awesome content.

While floating down we will utilize what the RAF terms an emergency/manual/harness release.

This means each man will manually release all the parachute harness couplings thereby allowing him to jump free of the entire parachute just before entering the water. It’s a drill leaving positively no margin whatsoever for error and no second chances.  Get it wrong and your dead…

As we wait to go and additional RAF crew members vigorously check every tiny detail of our parachutes, the best training in the best army in the world has taught me, conditioned me, to ignore my churning stomach and rigidly switch on to what's coming. Suddenly the Flight Sergeant bends and grips the underside of the door, sliding it upward until it’s fully open. As the roaring slipstream  pervades the aircraft it never fails to stampede butterflies around stomachs.

Guiding my best mate Brian fully into the door, the Sergeant stares up at a glowing red light immediately above him. When number two, Mac, utterly fearless in all things, moves closer to the door I close up tightly behind him. As always prior to jumping time seems to freeze as if deliberately elongating the agony until almost lazily a green light directly below the red comes to life.

Instantaneously the cavernous, near empty aircraft, resounds with shouts of ‘GAW’ from the rigidly unsmiling Flight Sergeant.  With not a hint of hesitation Brian simply disappears into the void. Mac is right behind him and then me. Split seconds after the howling slipstream plucks us away from the aircraft like proverbial leaves in a gale our standard military parachutes open automatically via a static line and we are all floating down to the sea. We will be in the air for less than sixty seconds in which time there is much to be done.

Noting we are well spread out and in no danger of mid air entanglements, I immediately begin the release drill by unhooking my reserve parachute to jettison it, throw it forward where a twenty feet nylon rope unravels to retain it.  Next, I haul myself up in the harness to create slack in the webbing around my hips allowing me to ease it to the centre underside of my thighs, thereby creating a kind of Boson’s chair. By now approximately six to eight hundred feet in the air I turn the circular couplings box at my midriff, which unlocks it, and then bang it very forcefully with the heel of my hand. As I feel the couplings break free and the entire harness slackens up, it is unspeakably un-nerving and brings the distinct feeling I will surely fall out but I am retained by both the webbing under my thighs and my iron grip on the lift webs or risers at my shoulders. Next, using one hand at a time, I draw the harness webbing free of my hips and groin area. With this completed, I am suddenly sitting on a swaying mid air trapeze with the sea looming up to meet me.

Stealing a split second to note a pickup boat is shadowing my approach to the water, at what I estimate to be fifteen feet from the surface I draw my knees and feet are together, ensure my elbows are well tucked into my sides and eject myself free of the parachute which drifts away from me. Entering the water, which is positively bloody freezing, the momentum plummet’s me downward until I feel I will surely rebound off the sea bed. Instinctively clawing my way upward and feeling my lungs pleading for air, I break the surface to see my pickup boat immediately beside me. Greedily gulping down air the next thing I see is a hand reaching for me. Behind it is a brawny suntanned forearm with a heart shaped tattoo and the word ‘MAM’ engraved inside it? For the rest of my life I will never forget that moment or that tattoo. As additional willing hands appear and haul me into the boat, my parachutes, floating nearby, are also retrieved. Far in the distance I note Brian and Mac have been salvaged and have lost no time donning their red berets. I reach for mine, bone dry in a plastic bag inside my bathers and put it on. The trio of pickup boats, manned by volunteer local seamen, now ferry us across to two waiting RAF launches, the ‘Sea Otter’ and the ‘Sea Osprey’. After we thank our rescuers and clamber aboard to join the bulk of our mates, powerful diesel engines roar into life for the short trip into Saint Peter Port, the capital of Guernsey, where a most pleasant surprise awaits us.

Walking ashore, bronzed, lean and as fit as any athlete, we find ourselves greeted by hundreds of applauding, cheering holidaymakers and Islanders who have watched the descents from the quayside.

In that exact moment our C130, with a deafening roar and its wings continually lifting and dropping, flies directly over the centre of the harbour at such low altitude it appears that it will surely scrape against the bobbling mainmasts of nearby yachts. The aircrew are undoubtedly saluting us. As I stare up amid the most monstrously satisfied grin of all time, I admit to feeling a bit like James Bond.

Using a waiting truck to change into jeans and tee shirts etc, our Colonel, a man who commands our immense affection and respect, (and very typically the first man to jump), tells us to have a good night on the town, but advises, somewhat tongue in cheek, we are not to damage the Island or any of its inhabitants in any way. That evening in the bars and clubs we are the toast of Guernsey and made exceptionally welcome.

The following day, directly in front of the entrance to Guernsey International Airport, and again under the gaze of the general public, we put on parachutes and board our nearby C130 for our return home where we will drop into our own back yard at Hankly Common near Aldershot. By now every man has purchased duty free bottles of spirits which are protected inside his jump container firstly in Army socks and then thick woollen pullovers. The big unknown is, will they survive the landing at Hankly?

Conditions are perfect as we pile out from both side doors into the late afternoon sunshine and the familiar yellow flowered gorse of the common. There are no injuries and it’s a sight to see everyone hoisting his container skyward to check if it leaks Whiskey or Bacardi or whatever. Remarkably, not one single bottle comes to grief. Elated to be home and to have chalked up the experience of a lifetime, the euphoric bubble bursts as we walk to our waiting trucks but are ordered to line up in front of a guy who stands behind a small table. Wearing a shirt and tie and a peaked cap and showing ID confirming he’s from HM Customs and Excise, he promptly demands fifty pence per bottle per man in additional duty. As we all pay an average of one pound each, one of our Sergeants, amid a quite murderous expression, tersely states to everyone in earshot, but mostly the Customs guy.

'Life has two absolute guarantees! One is death! The other is the taxman!'

Feeling somewhat demoralised by this crass official pettiness that we are powerless to question, we finally head for our trucks. Someone sums up our anguish perfectly when he very sardonically murmurs…     “Welcome home lad’s...!”

The next day is Sunday. A day to relax before our normal lives resumes and we return to work as truck drivers, architects, factory workers or whatever. The folks who cheered us on that quayside and watched us kit up at the airport would probably never imagine we are reservists in 44 Para Brigade, hand picked volunteers who have survived gruelling selection and state of the art training to travel the world clocking up mileage and experiences that occasionally defy belief.

Much of the general public are unaware we even exist.

*                  *                   *

Back in the present I feel the warm sun on my face and smile at my reminiscences.

More than thirty years down the line Britain has changed out of all proportion to what it was during the ferocious heat wave of 1976 when water was rationed with standpipes in the streets and climatologists hinted at something called 'global warming'. At that time, if you listened carefully, you could hear the distant rumblings of what would become the winter of discontent. Before I delve further Bill scatters my thoughts with one of his a long audible yawns. Grinning, I settle back in my sun lounger and pick up my book but become distracted by a rather large spider that emerges from the garden and then roams curiously across the wooden decking of the patio.

Bill watches the spider and makes no move to harm it but immediately it sparks off another reflection that happened many years ago in the United Arab Emirates. Four of us, a Welshman and three tough as teak Jocks, were asleep in our Bivvy when we were awoken in the silent pitch black small hours by the ominous scrapings and scratching of ‘things’ crawling all around us. Well aware we are camped in a Scorpion infested area it kicked off the sack race from hell as we stood, flapping like Budgies, and frantically hopped outside in our sleeping bags. As I watch the spider scurry away into some nearby foliage I feel tempted to revisit the story in more detail but decide I have done enough reflecting for now. It’s a good yarn, a true life drama of which I seem to have an endless supply, but for now I’ll read my book and bring it back to life some other time…

Barrie David.

Parachuting text from my book  ‘Dormant Courage’ www.barriedavid.com

‘Back in work on Monday – darker than a spoonful of Nescafe’

United Arab Emirates – 1973

Barrie David - Author

‘Dormant Courage’ ‘Movie Idea’  ‘The Broken Bond’