JOINT SERVICES TRIALS & DEVELOPMENT TEAM. (JSTDT )
In the mid 60's,in order for The Red Devils to have some military tactical connection, certain experienced members, together with 22 SAS, were formed into the JSTDT.
It was the brain child of Major Heerey, who was the Team Commander at the time.
Our brief was to look into and develop the feasibility of High Altitude Free Fall infiltration, day and night in all weathers, mainly for the SAS, Pathfinders and Recce.
The JSTDT consisted of about 20 members and we were to be launched from RAF Abingdon, the Army Parachute School, at the time.
We were to be dropped over Salisbury Plain, day and night, from an average height of 14,000 ft, with oxygen and full equipment.
The RAF PJIs were to dispatch us, the pilots using a ground based radar system, already in place on the DZ, so that we didn't go too far adrift.
In preparation we all had to go into the pressure chamber at Farnborough, to check out our high altitude toleration. There was lots of farting even the fillings in our teeth expanded, as a result.
One of the PJI's at Abingdon, was a right Brylcream Boy, very full of himself and always combing his hair. We knicknamed him Cyril.
He really thought that he was IT and kept treating us like crows, We still had to go through the sideways, backwards, forward landings, etc plus all the ground training connected with basic para training. The RAF even wanted us to complete 8 static line jumps before Major Heerey put a stop to it.
Anyway, because we were using an RAF Argosy we had to put up with a lot of rubbish. The RAF just did not understand the tactical bit.
Like most people, who live in ivory towers, this new concept was foreign to them. Change was always resisted. All of this was prior to the RAF Falcons Parachute Team.
After completing some preliminary easy day jumps, to iron out the creases and bond all the different guys together,using standard developed systems,we progressed onto night jumps.
On the first night jump, from 14,000 ft, through cloud with full equipment. Cyril was at the back of the Argosy, off set from the tailgate which he had just opened, shouting and waving his arms about, like a demented Magnus Pike, pointing at the jump
lights, which went to red.
The team moved en masse to the tailgate to exit all together.
Unknown to Cyril I had smuggled a folding bike on to the aircraft, I was No 1 off the ramp, his face was an absolute picture as I rode past him straight off the tailgate on the bike.
I managed to smuggle the bike inside a spare weapons container. As it was so dark on the aircraft, I put it together using the cover of darkness and the lads to conceal and distract Cyril's attention away from me I constructed the bike.
I'm told that he went back to Abingdon and reported the incident however no-one would believe him.
Years later I saw him on Airborne Forces Day in Aldershot.
He had been looking for me to find out the truth about the incident which of course I denied any involvement, I used the old Maggot excuse, "It wasn't me!"
He knew it was me but he could never prove it - (innocent until proven guilty).
Anyway, we're still looking for a 2inch high bike, dug in on Salisbury Plain.
If you find it let me know.
Bill Scarratt.DFC.
D324.
