Maurice's Blog

Leaving my old school mate, Richard Bell in Coulundra, I flew north up the coast for a spot of skin diving. I landed at Rockhampton just two minutes before the heavens opened with a torrential downpour, accompanied by thunder and lightening. I had just crossed the latitude of the Tropic of Capricorn. China, here we come!

After taking digital photographs of the local aerial maps, pinned on the wall of a local flying club, I navigated about 60 or 70 miles out to sea to find my first piece of coral and see the idyllic islands in the area. A dive boat with about 15 divers on board was moored on the edge of the reef in about 60ft of water, before the reef sunk away to the depths of the Pacific Ocean. I could see the bottom way beyond that depth.

It was clear that if I landed on the beach of the little island, half a mile away, I would be spending a great evening with the divers. Now this was bringing back memories of when I first proposed to a young lady, 100 feet below the sea, off the Greek Island of Corfu. Some evidence of Janet and myself has been retained due to a friendly Hun, both with an underwater camera and a secret air compressor hidden in the woods for our clandestine use.

'Raptures of the depths', it may have been, but, 'ambient temperatures and pressures' prohibited any suggestion of a consummation of this new arrangement and, anyway, the negatives were conveniently destroyed. Rather like the way the South Wales Police and Welsh Crown Prosecution Service do it with vital evidence.

Now, when I used to go duck shooting in Ireland in the 70's with my French built £800 2 seat wooden Sipa aircraft, it was essential to have a set of tide tables for Donegal, the beach being the only place to land next to the house of my brother, Michael. Apart from the double barrel 8 bore, my trusted 12 bore and father's rifle with home made silencer, I also carried, the then ubiquitous, 5 gallon plastic sherry containers which, when carefully squeezed like a bag pipe, into the single fuel tank of the aeroplane meant I could go from Taunton, in the West Country, direct to Donegal, some 400 or so nautical miles, irrespective of the weather.

Well I got it wrong this time in Queensland, because it was high tide and the only sand available was too soft even for my balloon tyres designed for the purpose.

I made three runs along the sand allowing more weight to leave an impression.

But I will be back, with luck, next time on floats! I finished up having a splendid night with fellow aviators, the Nixons, near Gladstone airport, he leaving at 5am in the morning in his supercharged Cessna 210.

The photos include the island I attempted to land on and wicked looking 12 feet sea crocodiles in NT, in reproductive mood.

With much film and footage of Sir Francis's take off run, off Slaughter and Emily Bay, in my pocket, it was time to prepare for the nine hundred miles direct to Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. The gravity feed, hoisting 20 litre drums to the roof of the cockpit had now proved unreliable, so it was now back to the drawing board!

A suitable funnel, when attached to a length of piping and drum, could deliver sufficient pressure on the top on the fuel, if then pointed into the slipstream of the prop. It would push, uphill, fuel into the front tank. Well, the funnel was not quite big enough and so, having not smoked a cigar for 4 weeks, I had a go at blowing in the 20 litres by putting the pipe in my mouth.

The system worked and so, as long as I was breathing, I now had a new method for emptying ferry tanks. Neville Christian, of Fletcher Christian descent, in the mean time had persuaded me to use his electrical pump, used to ferry the island's only "spam can", a Cessna 172, to Australia for servicing. He worked like a beaver and had it all installed in a day of running around.

After a good night's sleep I wandered through the township, so reminiscent of Alderney, Channel Islands, where I had worked for 4 years. Both have a population of around 2000, before tourists, tax concessions and an administration so similar, each being semi independent of their parent country. It was of no surprise to me, therefore, by subtle questioning, to find, unlike successive governments in the UK, the Australian Government operated a Zero Tolerance Policy on such matters as Corruption, Insider Dealing or Drug Money Laundering. The threat of the privilege, being removed, is always there.

The "spineless" element of Guernsey's Insular Authority was also a difference. The secret was out as to why I really wanted to visit Norfolk Island. I needed to know the obvious from the descendants of those who had caused the mutiny on His Majesty's Ship, The Bounty, just before Lord Nelson's claim to fame. They had first settled in Pitcairn and then later here in Norfolk Island.

How to start a mutiny from within the UK's judicial system by those who wish reform? They are not, at present, prepared to, "throw stones at men in tall towers" or even, "put their heads over the parapet" due to its sorry state.

But I digress. The only aircraft on the island? Oh no. Tucked in amongst cars and lawn mowers, being serviced for summer, fast approaching, I spied a badly bent micro lite, the modern version to my chain saw converted hang glider of the 70's.

Haydn, one of the syndicate (not the one who bent her), appeared and, without much ado, started organising help from around the island to get still more fuel tanks and find a radio man to fix the broken transmitter. Garry did a splendid job with what he had available. Later, the island's radio station interview with me was played in full by George who also, later that night, kicked out a mean piece of music on the old ivories in the band at the League! Memories came back from 1984 of Martin, Alderney's resident policeman, doubling up in the band with tea chest, broomstick and a piece of string!

At 0745 local the old girl rolled down the runway with an indicated stall speed, on lift off, of around 54, as opposed to the book figure of 38 mph. I had a tail wind component of 12.7mph at airport height and 17.4mph at 2000 feet. The meteorological balloon, sent up at around 4 am, recorded a disappointing decline in tail winds, with height, causing me to mixture lean, only a little to save fuel, settling down to a 2 to 3000 ft flight.

Soon the problems started to mount dominated by the mere fact that I simply did not have the physical strength, especially 9 hours into the flight, to even get out of my seat, when clad in a, now steaming, survival suit with life raft, knife, torch, mae west, water and a number of other things tied about my person………

Hello

M set off am on 08/11 and flew directly to Coolangatta. I don't have many details despite his telephoning me at approx 8.15 our time on 8/11 to say that he had arrived. This was approx. 2 hours later than I had calculated/guesstimated and had I spent a not unfamiliar hour pondering at which point I should bother the authorities at his late arrival and if so, which authorities.

Anyway, this time he blinked first. He tells me that his arrival was not auspicious - there were no pilots with whom to swap flying stories, it was raining and he had to walk miles across tarmac to sort customs. Might just as well been at home.

Kind regards

KK

Hello

Received photos from M of the Cub on Norfolk Island. It looks wonderful - I'm sure that we will hear more in due course (and at length).

M has just telephoned me. He is going to bed now and is leaving at 6 am intending to fly delta charlie tango for Brisbane (800 nautical miles). He will decide about half way whether he is too tired to continue and divert to Lord Howe Island, if things are not going well.

If he achieves this flight, it will be a record for a J3 Cub, though I'm not entirely clear what the record is. He was not impressed by my comment that it should be easier to find a large place like Australia as opposed to a tiny dot in the Tasman Sea. He doesn't think that I am taking things seriously enough.

Let's hope that it goes well. More interminable water.

Kind regards

KK

Hello,

Phone call this morning from M to tell me that he had landed one hour earlier. Flight sounded as though it went well though there was some hitch with fuel (I think), something to do with having trouble reaching across the cabin. M said that he's getting old and is not as supple as he used to be. Perhaps, but I suggested that he's actually getting fat, it sounds as though his dry suit was a constricting factor.

Anyway he's made the first stop and is hoping to go deep sea fishing after working on G-KIRK and before flying on to Lord Howe Island.

Glad this first bit is over.

Regards,

Kirstie

8am was the earliest I could get Customs to the Airport . They, on the other hand, had given me special dispensation to leave only 80 miles south of North Cape, due to my 1943 war bird, rather than the standard departure from Auckland, to go foreign. Maurice is truly grateful.

Sir Francis always broke a whole bottle of good French brandy on the hub of the prop., before crossing stretches of the Tasman Sea. I made do with a quarter bottle and even that had been subjected to a random but somewhat lengthy quality test, two nights before.

NO DRINKING the night before.

Flying the 8 hour rule is nonsense and quite misleading…….even 24 hours after some of us can be detected as still, “under the influence’….not due to blood levels but due to its lasting effect, days for some, on the grey cells in your head causing you temporary (if you are lucky) loss of memory and to be slow in thought and action.

Out over the cliffs of North Cape I only had little over 400 miles to run so it was time to test the long range system. You can always calculate the “point of no return” variable with wind speed and direction or the exact halfway point with no need, whatsoever, of multiple thought processes, slide rules, drift calculations and the like. All you need is a good ear because, as sure as eggs are eggs, the old donkey will start to miss and run rough to tell you. For some reason, once the newly injected adrenalin has circulated the bloodstream for a few minutes and is now being broken down to give you the uncontrollable tremors, only then do the irregular beats and vibrations from the engine mysteriously drift away leaving you drained of energy and powers for reasoned thought.

Yes, this time she did better, the engine stopped.

No speed to height ….dive, dive, dive, keep the old fan turning as there was no option in this cumbersome survival suit to get out of the aircraft, stand on the wheel and hand swing….I was far to close to the water!

As, always, in cases of self preservation matters, forces for you come out of nowhere. Like, for example, when recently, the judge had ordered me to produce witnesses there and then, without due notice. Following the removal of a dead rat from my pocket, I thought his resting place appropriate being our local chamber for the cabal of corrupt lawyers, generally financed by the tax payer, there being no effective audit in the UK on such matters. I had swung round, near to panic to see who was in the well of the court …but that is another story for later.

I went for all fuel cocks on for each wing tank, mixture rich, throttle linkages and mag switches both on? No, only one mag on, possibly knocked off in the panic within such a cramped cockpit.

No “go juice” had to be the reason soon to be confirmed .

Once back in level flight, I decided to talk to the, always so friendly, passing airliners at 30,000 feet. I reached for my newly installed vhf only to find the first knob, needed for frequency change, was snapped off at the root and any time spent trying to change frequency with pliers from a multi knife was quite futile.

WARNING to others…the cumbersome survival suit, making me look like Mr Michelin, and my total lack of physical strength caused me to be unable to reach the hand held that had slid away, on the floor. Nor could I reach to rectify an air lock, up front, in the long range fuel system. Power to the GPS terminated at that point leaving me well over a 100 miles to run. Intricate and methodical log keeping, together with a steady and reliable weather forecast for 5000 feet, allowed me, an hour and a half later, to just detect a silhouette of two islands to emerge out of the low status of cloud before me . There’s nothing worse than seeing an island that is not due to be there! This one was Norfolk Island, gracefully adorned with the many Norfolk Pines, so much admired by the first aviator to visit.

Now yesterday was great and the day before even better when, with the exhausts going on in beautiful fashion, I had made a bee line for North Cape. As it was getting dark, I called up an old school friend whom I had not seen since his wedding some 27 years ago, he having taken to the Metropolitan Police for a career whilst I had, for the past 20 years been signing documents, when requested occupation? A chronic litigant. We had camped and mountaineered all over the British Isles together, whilst in the Taunton School scout troop, revered as the “Best in the West”.

Overhead Maganui Bay, where I believed he lived, I gave him a call and on reply, over the noise of the engine, I said I had fled the UK and was seeking police protection and could he help? It was not until I reminded him that he last saw me disappearing from his wedding reception with some 3 nubile young ladies adorning my 1936 PB MG, each with a bottle in their hand, did he remember my voice. Latitude and longitude, once given, I flew along a spectacular coast near Taupo bay to land in a sheep field just a few fields from his house, perched on a hill top with breath taking panoramic views. Next day, after much talking through the night, over a scrumptuous plate of snapper and the getting out of the old scout photos, we were invited by Ray to watch the shearing and him feed “gurt eels” in the stream, some weighing well over 4lbs.

I had to move on but not without the clear impression that, despite Richard’s total dedication to his job and despite the sinister Masonic environment of devil worship to which he had so nobly chosen to be within, he may have been side lined, yes, but had maintained sound principles of conduct, especially when dealing with the general public. Now was that due to genotypic traits or was there also phenotypic influence from a private education that both our parents had so sacrificed for, back in the 50s and 60s?

I flew up 90 Mile Beach, low level, not a soul in sight, on to North Cape and landed at a duster’s strip as part of my “pre-flight planning”......more on this, possibly, later.

Back at Kerikeri no one, but no one, had a chart of Norfolk nor the space between there and the North Cape. No one could even tell me distance or range and the commercial pilots backed it with, “don’t trust weather forecasts!” Now I had discovered yet another leak in yet another tank and now one of the fuel taps was dripping ever so slightly. Much work to do with no time and no tools. The weather window was now starting to close and I was tired.

Customs, thankfully (Maurice is bowing), allowed special dispensation to clear foreign via Kerikeri, rather than via Auckland, well over a hundred miles in the wrong direction. They had not been given sufficient warning of my exit, so could only clear me on the Friday, as late as 8am, which brought me far too close for comfort to incoming adverse weather forecast later that day. I needed a good clear 5 degrees between dew point and ambient temperatures to reduce the risk of sea fog, so notorious for blotting out Norfolk Island, even for the commercial boys.

My margins were being eroded by the hour and I still had to pack and post my worldly belongings, laptop and all, file a flight plan, get through 3 newspaper interviews and try and get some sleep. Sleep..... 3 years ago, after over 21 days of little of it and over 11 hours of flying low level over the Timor had led to the next day with my falling asleep “at the wheel”, the out of balance airframe only saving my life, as I hurtled to the ground some 200 miles south of Darwin. On becoming aware I was nodding off, I had realised that the rubber bungee that had been pulling the control column [joy stick] diagonally all the way from Biggin Hill, as the aircraft was so out of trim, needed to be released on the premise that I may fall asleep.

Upon recovery I promptly got lost, my mental state not even being able to remember which way the sun went round, south of the equator.

I am now 3 years older but, with severe bouts of cramp in the cockpit, together with all 7 broken joints now giving me periods of significant pain, it feels more like10 and yet with failing eyesight, hearing and what was it, I’ve forgotten again? Ah yes, memory, makes the future far more daunting for me than the last few days of the London to Sydney Air Race.

Happy Birthday to my brother and sister, Tim and Celia.....and may you both age gracefully and both succeed in passing on wisdom.

Terrible news just recieved late Jan 005 in that RAY WHITE has just been killed on his farm by electrocution while sorting out the water for his sheep....

.....In the very short time I knew him he had been a great inspiration jumping from his truck to quad to horse just to round up a few thousand sheep.......despite being busy he took me off to see the eels in the stream and showed me round the sheep shearing in full steam! A terrible loss for not just his family but a great inspiration for anyone who met him ,,,,,my movies of him will be on site once I have sorted the royal courts of justice farce.

The exhausts return from South Island today ....if i can get them on in time I fly to Kerikeri, Bay of Islands and sort out customs for Wednesday and grass strip on northern tip, 10 miles from sea.

In reality filming and meeting up with old scool mate by landing on 90 mile beach is important. So as long as the high pressure system remains over Tasman Sea I will cross Friday.....sponsorship and www is actually now at its most important stage; so can delay flight with good enough reason.

Cheers,

Maurice

New Zealand Police
PO Box 6641
Wellington

1st Nov 04

Ref N 4063966 12.10.04

Smiling Police officer E971

Unsafe Lane Change $150 fine

Dear Sir,

Having just been struck off as a veterinary surgeon for motoring offences of the above same calibre and with the remotest possibility of my obtaining any further ones, anywhere in the world, even a parking ticket, I regret that I find it only appropriate to plead Not Guilty or I will not be re-instated in December, upon their Lordships' wishes as stated in the Privy Council, on 19th January 2004, by Lord Hoffman.

Further information on this incident can be found on Diary entry 13th Oct (Sir Edmond Hillary and smiling policeman) on www.kirkflyingvet.com and the legal restraints upon me on www.kirkflyingvet.co.uk

Yours faithfully,

Maurice J Kirk BVSc

Need £500 to get to Auckland Court 15thMarch TO fight case or will not get re-instated as a Veterinary Surgeon.