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08 Pilots Course December, 1952
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Back row L-R: John Williams, Roy Scaife, Eric
Rees, Brian Holding, John Seaton, Frank Daniels,
Doug Dohle, Athol Fraser, John "Spud" Taylor, Bill Monaghan,
Brian Millis, Gavin "Gabby" Collins.
Middle row L-R: Doug Cameron, Bryan Abrahams, Geoff Cramp, Lloyd Knight, Not known, John Sutcliff, Kev Knowles, George Barren, Kevin Thompson, Ron McIver, John Cook, Eric Eggelton, Bill Massey. Front row L-R: John Laming, Bob McIntosh, Roy "Nugget" Hibben, Brian "Chunder" Martin, Keith Cottee, Keith Killen, Ron Bastin, Don Pinkstone, Peter Coy, Paul Choquenot, Geoff Banfield, Des Nolan. |
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No 8 Post War Pilots Course started at Point Cook in October 1951. It included signallers. There were about 100 Trainee aircrew on the course. Due to expansion of the Korean War, the RAAF later re-opened both Archerfield as No 1 IFTS (Initial Flying Training Course) and then Uranquinty as No 1 BFTS. Point Cook became No 1 AFTS.
No 8 course then went to Archerfield around January 1952 and started all over again. That included flight grading on Tiger Moths. However the signallers went direct to Ballarat from Point Cook. After flight grading at Archerfield which started on March 1 1952, where we did ten hours on Tiger Moths, it left approx. 45 trainee pilots who had passed flight grading and who then went to No 1 BFTS at Uranquinty. No 8 Course was thus the first post war pilots course to train at Archerfield and Uranquinty; meaning in effect we did two “rookies” courses - initially at I FTS at Point Cook in October 1951 then a repeat in January 1952 at Archerfield. From 1 April 1952 we did the Tiger Moth phase at Uranquinty and started the Wirraway phase on 28 May 1952.
No 8 Course then went to Point Cook to No. 1AFTS and my first trip there was on 13 August 1952. No 8 Course then graduated at Point Cook on 8 December 1952 with 30 RAAF and seven RAN pilots.
John Laming.
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