THIS IS THE WORLD SERVICES OF THE BBC

I had the 320 HF radio tuned into the BBC to listen to the World Services. It was about the most reliable source of information about what was happening. De de de de, da da da da da. God how  I was beginning to hate that tune .It really managed to get on your tits. I will probably remember it for the rest of my natural born life.

I was squatting down in the corner of the sheep sheds writing the daily bulletin on a scrap piece of paper. Quite happily listening to a man 8 thousand miles away, telling me what was going on  in this small corner of the South Atlantic, on my own doorstep you might say. At least he  seemed to know more than what the officer’s were passing on to us at any rate.

A small circle of light appeared on the wooden floor next to the radio. Followed in rapid succession by several more. I looked up and could that they were coming from holes that had magically formed on the corrugated roof of the sheep sheds. From the corner of my eye I caught movement.

Several people were charging about wildly, gesturing, lips moving frantically. I stood up slowly and removed the head set, I couldn’t concentrate on the voice any more any way. Bedlam hit my ears. Then I was knocked off my feet as an explosion rocked the building. Grabbing my helmet and weapon I ran for the door. Once again I was bowled over. This time it was from the down draft of a Sea King helicopter. It was bobbing up and down by the side of the building.

I could see a plume of black smoke rising from behind the small out crop that was linked to the main shore by a small jetty, come landing dock. It was coming from the direction of where the lads had been re-zeroing their weapons. It was also where the Sir Galahad and Sir Tristam lay at anchor. I started to run. I headed towards the line trenches we had dug over the last couple of days. As I ran down the slight slope I could see people firing weapons from every type of position. Hip, shoulder, waist you name it. SLR’s, SMG’s, GPMG’s even pistols were going off.

Then I saw it. It came in low. It popped up from nowhere in fact. An A4 Sky Hawk. I could see the pilot clearly, big bushy moustache with a slight grin on his face, looking back over his left shoulder. He soon lost the grin though. When he levelled out, and saw all the shit that was being sent in his direction. The pilot could only see the tracer though, most of the nine mm was ordinary ball. He must have literally flown into a wall of lead.

The plane must have been hit by some of it, because the pilot kicked in his after burners. With a flash of flames from his engine exhaust, he was soon a black dot heading for the horizon. Black plumes of oily smoke trailing behind him. On the outcrop above the jetty was a small group, of about three blokes standing upright. It was one of the air Defence detachments. They had the shoulder mounted blowpipe ground to air missiles. They let one fly. Then I realised why the Sea King was bobbing behind our shed, and what had first knocked me off my feet.

We watched as the missile they launched, changed direction in mid flight. (It had lost the Sky Hawk due to its turbo-assisted exit). Having been launched it was however still trying to acquire a target. It now decided to home onto the nearest heat source. It turned out to be the Sea king helicopter. He bobbed back down again. The helicopter pilot was using the corrugated sheep shed as a screen from the missile. The earlier explosion was from the first Blowpipe missile the detachment had fired.

The Air Defence detachments were unlucky. The first missile they had launched at the leading aircraft had apparently just missed the cockpit. They had fired as it was directly beside them and the missile hadn’t armed until it had gone passed the Sky Hawk. Being armed and having passed the Sky Hawk it was looking for an alternative or second target.

The missile now picked up the Sea King which had been unloading from the Sir Galahad. Dodging behind the large sheep sheds had screened the helicopters heat signature. The missile tracking the target altered its trajectory, then losing in effect all sight of the target, nosed dived into the ground on the opposite side of the sheds from the helicopter. Exploding on impact with the ground.  This second attempt by the Blowpipe crew looked like it was taking the same route as the first.

The second missile, now having lost all sense of purpose flew towards our trenches. It may have lost its target, but as the earlier one proved. They still went bang. I dove into the nearest trench landing on top of its occupants. The second Blowpipe arced and exploded harmlessly in the peat near the shore. It turned out it was a bit of tit for tat in the end. Apparently we had pinned down the Blowpipe teams with all our small arms fire in the first place. (Probably just as well for the crew of the Sea King). I was just being bodily thrown out of the trench when a third Sky Hawk appeared in front of us. The Blowpipe detachment once again dived for cover, and I didn’t blame them one little bit. Cause we all opened up again.