Skytrain

It was a steep climb up the metal walkway.

The fuselage was squat and wide and for the purposes of public visitors the load bay had been cleared apart from a battledress clad and head bandaged mannequin lying prone on a stretcher across a few of the canvas seats. There were no handholds or hanging straps and so making my way up to the perspex divider giving a view into the cockpit adopted a 30 degree forward lean, I felt a distinct tug on the hamstrings and shuffled forward carefully.

Me and the Boy had timed our visit to the Douglas Dakota on static display perfectly and we had the aircraft to ourselves and the sole attention of an elderly RAF steward with beret and a line of campaign and long service medals on his chest. We nodded respectively as we passed him, sat on a garden chair just inside the sliding door on the starboard side.

In our casual gear and trainers, travelling light, it was still quite an effort to ascend the slope of the parked aircraft. In some small way we could appreciate how a fully clad and equipped paratrooper may have felt in taking up his seat in wartime ahead of a drop into the heat of conflict, well apart from having no perception of the actual paralysing fear and trepidation of the moment. The cockpit was cramped and claustrophobic for the four flight crew. There would be no real forward view for the pilot until the plane was up to take-off velocity and the tail had lifted to a more even gradient before straining engines broke the friction hold of the concrete runway or the makeshift grass landing strip.

Huddled behind the front seats were the darkened holes in which the navigator and radio operator would sit and beyond the bulkhead the main payload, either troops, supplies, the wounded, general freight or a vehicle.

The old airman was pleased to share his experiences of the C-47 Skytrain as he had worked on them as ground crew in service of his country. At an approximate age of 80 years he will have been only a teenager at the end of the second world war and so he will have been spared that traumatic period. There will have been plenty of opportunities, however,  in the fragile post-war years for him to be involved in many other theatres of war within the British Empire and Dominions.

A bit out of breathe, I sat down on one of the canvas stirrup seats just uphill from our guide.

My back was resting on the cold surface of the panelling between the raised and stout ribs which gave the plane its legendary resilience to withstand significant stress and impact from heavy laden flight, flak and the raking spread of shells from enemy fighters.

The sheet panelling seemed wafer thin and hardly able to withstand any intrusion even from a bird strike. A few fleeting scenes from Band of Brothers were fresh in my mind of bullet riddled airframes, shell bursts and the sheer noise of machines, men and warfare.

Just sat there, on a bright June day and with the only soundtrack being birdsong and a group of excitable school children dressed as evacuees, was testament enough to those who had fought their way out of such aircraft and jumped into the unknown in my name.