It was a Sunday morning on the training area, and we were having a well-earned break from rushing around, practising our role of providing mortar cover to the footsloggers. Suddenly we were called upon to drive up to the heath and help in extinguishing a fire which had broken out in the gorse and scrubby woodland. With a full complement of blokes with shovels etc. mine was the first truck to leave our camp area, and to reach the track which led up to the heath.
As I was about to turn onto this track, a German civilian fire appliance passed ahead of me. This was a green vehicle, with the fire fighters standing on footboards along the sides. As soon as it hit the deep sandy soil it bogged down, being only two-wheel drive. As I drove up behind it, the crew dismounted and started pushing, in a vain effort to dislodge it. I was almost beside it when, around a bend in the track ahead appeared the fifty-two ton bulk of a Centurion tank, travelling at speed! The crew of the fire engine saw this monster bearing down upon them and promptly abandoned their efforts and turned and ran. They stopped at a safe distance and gazed in awe at what was, in all honesty, a mighty impressive sight.
It drew up close to my truck, and the tank commander shouted, “OK, leave it to us!” With that the tank swung round and made off, full tilt, towards the blazing scrubland. Just short of the flames, the driver swung this giant in a long arc. The effect was just like that produced by a water-skier performing a similar manoeuvre, except that it threw up an enormous wall of sandy soil. A couple more runs in this style, and the fire was out, with the driver just making a couple of runs through the middle for good measure. They then came back, hooked a chain on the front of the fire engine and pulled it out as though it were a toy. What we had all expected to be a long and tiring job was all over in about three minutes! That’s the way to go fire-fighting, without a single bucket of water needed.
Part of Mortar platoon off duty. This is my Humber, 15 BK 01. The chap with glasses is myself and Ken Terry is at my right. The weapon in the foreground is, of course, a 3-inch mortar. If any reader can fill in further names I would be delighted.