Jack Hemmings was reunited with a Hudson aircraft decades after he flew them in World War II (Picture: MAF)
From flying back to base with a plane riddled with bullet holes to aircrafts catching fire on the runway, these are just some of the dangers pilots experienced in World War II.
One of those was Jack Hemmings AFC, who signed up to the RAF Just before his 19th birthday. His reasoning was: ‘if I am going to fight a war, I may as well do it sitting down’ – and by the end of the battle he had become Squadron Leader.
Jack led a nautical squadron in India, protecting the Bay of Bengal so ships could deliver and take essential goods between Kolkata and the UK without being torpedoed.
He received the Air Force Cross for ‘exemplary gallantry while flying’ and later received the RAF’s Master Air Pilot award in 2017.
Four years after the war, Jack flew in the Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) – the world’s largest humanitarian air service – helping to carry out the first British humanitarian survey of central Africa, visiting more than 100 remote outposts across the continent.
Aviation and planes remained a passion of Jack’s throughout his life, yet despite his wartime expertise, Jack was forced to go back into accountancy after the war, as British Airways wouldn’t hire him as a commercial pilot due to his eyesight.
It wasn’t until after his retirement that Jack had the opportunity to properly take to the skies again after he bought his own plane, got a private licence, and flew privately for 20 years.
Although his entire squadron survived the war, he tells Metro.co.uk that during Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday his thoughts are always with the people he met during training who were sent elsewhere and sadly didn’t survive.
Jack Hemmings thought ‘if I am going to fight a war, I may as well do it sitting down’ (Picture: MAF)
He worked his way up to become Squadron Leader (Picture: MAF)
To mark Remembrance week this year, he visited the RAF museum in London earlier this week, and was able to get up close to a Lockheed Hudson aircraft – the same planes he flew during the war.
Describing the experience of revisiting the historic craft as ‘just like old times’, Jack said: ‘I love flying because it gives a feeling of detachment from all the problems in the world – and there are a lot of problems.
‘I actually liked flying in wartime, because you don’t think about the consequences, you’ve just got to stop somebody doing something infinitely worse.
‘The Hudson was a very nice aeroplane to fly, it had been designed as a small airliner so it was meant to be comfortable, and it was.
‘It did have one weakness, when they turned it into a war plane and put gun turrets on it and bomb bays, one of the turrets was at the back end and was a big heavy affair, it made it a bit difficult to control on the ground.
‘It was prone to get out of control and get into what we called a ground loop, going around the runway in a big circle, and the undercarriage would collapse under the stress of the unusual manoeuvre.
‘Often the broken undercarriage leg would go up into the wing and burst the petrol tank, so a ground loop and broken undercarriage on fire was not rare.
‘Not frequent, but it was a weakness to be thought about on take off.
‘We got fired at lots of times and we were hit a few times, in fact my plane came back once with holes all over it, but fortunately that didn’t stop it flying.’
Jack said seeing the Hudson again was ‘just like old times’ (Picture: MAF)
Jack said he will be marking Remembrance Day from home this year (Picture: MAF)
This year’s Remembrance events are taking place amid two major world conflicts: the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, and the recent conflict in the Gaza Strip between Israel and Hamas.
Reflecting on his time in the MAF, which he describes as ‘the good Samaritans of the air’, amid the ongoing wars across the globe, Jack said: ‘There are really nasty goings-on. I do often say to my wife how fortunate we are to be in this house which isn’t in a part of the world where there’s a war going on.
‘The older I get the more I realise how ridiculous it is to want to kill people because of what they believe in.
‘Two people can get along perfectly amicably with different beliefs, you don’t have to kill one another because of it.’
While Jack will be marking Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday at home this year, he’ll be watching the procession at the Cenotaph in London – and has voiced his support for the pro-Palestine peace march planned for Saturday.
He said: ‘I think the idea of the groups walking together saying “we want a ceasefire” is a good idea, and I’m with the police who I believe are going to allow it.
‘Undoubtedly there will be people who want to disrupt the march because they want to keep on fighting, and I hope they can be dealt with by the police.
‘These people who want harmony and brotherhood and getting on together – let them have their say. I hope it all goes off peacefully as that’s the object of the march.’
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‘The older I get the more I realise how ridiculous it is to want to kill people because of what they believe in.’
