Battle of the Atlantic Sunday - 2017

After several years of sunny weather on the first Sunday in May, I suppose it was time for some typically Nova Scotian weather to accompany the Battle of the Atlantic Sunday service. Halifax Harbour was socked in with thick fog, lifting only occasionally to reveal other ships in the Dockyard and the Macdonald Bridge.

HMCS MONTREAL in the fog.

As with last year, the service was held onboard HMCS MONTREAL, but unlike last year, the attendees were crammed like sardines into MONTREAL's helicopter hangar. Because of the wind, rain, and limited visibility, MONTREAL remained alongside for the entire service. Although the ashes of those to be committed were present for the service, the committal itself will occur at a later date, and the families of the deceased may or may not have the opportunity to be present depending on what arrangements are made at the time. The ashes of veterans are sometimes committed to the sea when the opportunity arises (and a ship is available) and it is not always possible to have the families present.

With the hangar so crowded, it was not possible to move around easily taking photos, without getting in the way of family members attending the service (or smacking them in the head with my camera bag, which is apparently bad form). Those of us photographers present spent most of our time just outside the hangar shooting the service from the front, trying to stay out of each other's way, while aiming for good angles of the proceedings.

Due to time constraints, I will largely present the photos of the service without further commentary:

The command staff salute during the singing of 'O Canada'.

The hangar was very crowded, making it difficult to move around.

Cdr. Chris Sherban addresses the attendees. 

LCdr. (Ret'd) Jim Reddy.

MONTREAL's kisbee ring, with the ensign at half-mast.

CNMT member Graham McBride stands by the ashes of veterans to be committed. 

Padre singing a hymn.

Raindrops on MONTREAL's bell.

Command staff of HMCS MONTREAL, from left to right: CPO1 Stan Ryan, LCdr Kevin Nolan, and Cdr Chris Sherban.

After the service, the ensign was hauled all the way back up.

Buran, the Soviet's Space Shuttle

Passing through Sydney, Australia, in 2001, the last thing I expected to see on the list of potential tourist attractions was a space shuttle - let alone a Russian one. The Buran spaceplane program started in the 1970's in response to the American space shuttle program, and produced several shuttles. Only one of the Burans ever flew in space (unmanned) before the collapse of the USSR and the abandonment of the project. One atmospheric test article, model OK-2M, was sold and ended up in Sydney to be displayed during the 2000 Olympics, and she was still on display when I visited in early 2001.

Buran test article OK-2M on display in Sydney, Australia, in 2001.

Unlike NASA's Enterprise, which was used for basically the same purpose, OK-2M was fitted with four AL-31 jet engines for her role as a flight test prototype, with a large fuel tank installed in the cargo bay. These engines are also used in the SU-27 family of jet fighters. Enterprise had to be lifted into the air on the back of a modified Boeing 747, and released at altitude to test her gliding capabilities. The space-capable Buran's did not have jet engines.

Two AL-31 jet engines mounted on the starboard side.

Access covers removed on one of the port AL-31 jet engines. 

The two upper AL-31 nacelles were mounted directly to the fuselage on either side of the vertical stabilizer, and appear to have had covers. The lower two engine nacelles were mounted on short struts.

A view of the orientation of the four AL-31 jet engines. One set of cargo bay doors was open, and I suspect the object in the cargo bay is the fuel tank for the jet engines.

Unlike the US Space Shuttle, the Buran orbiter lacked main rocket engines, and only had smaller engines for maneuvering in, and breaking from, orbit.

The Buran's maneuvering engines in the tail, with one of the jet engines outboard and above.

Another view of the Buran's engines.

A view down the starboard cargo bay door and wing.

While on display in Sydney, OK-2M was protected from the elements under a rigid frame tent structure, and was fitted with aluminum walkways to allow visitors to climb up and over the spaceplane and down into the cargo hold. Unfortunately, one could not actually enter the crew compartment or flight deck.

An access walkway runs along the port side of the cargo bay and down over the port wing. The port cargo door was removed, and can be seen hanging from the tent's rigid frame in the top right of the photo. 

Looking down over the nose.

OK-2M had black heat shield tiles around the flight deck windows, unlike OK-1K1 (the only airframe to fly in space). There were windows wrapping around the front, as well as looking out the top of the flight deck.

The starboard window over the flight deck.

Looking into the flight deck at the flight controls on the centre console. The Buran apparently didn't come with cupholders.

There were also two windows looking into the cargo bay.

Another view into the flight deck, this time through a window from the cargo bay.

The walkway dropped right down into the cargo bay.

Looking forward in the cargo bay. Instead of a pressure door, there is a grate over the opening into the crew compartment at the forward end of the cargo bay.

A closer look at the grate blocking access into the crew compartment. As a test platform, I'm guessing OK-2M's crew compartment was probably never finished inside, but I couldn't get close enough to the door to find out.

Details of construction in the cargo bay.

The cargo bay was home to a large fuel tank for the four jet engines. 

This is the aft end of the cargo bay, behind the fuel tank. I'm guessing the yellow piping is the plumbing between the jet engines and the fuel tank.

You could also walk underneath the shutte and view the landing gear up close.

After I visited OK-2M in Sydney, the company putting her on display went bankrupt, and she was stored out in the open for a year before moving to Bahrain. She was found there in 2004, and eventually made her way to Germany where she is now on display at the Technik Museum Speyer, near Heidelberg in Germany. She hasn't flown since 1988, and all her subsequent moves appear to have been either via sea or land.

Battle of Doiran

I find it interesting to peruse family history from time to time, and my grandmother's extensive memoirs are a treasure trove. Something in those memoirs that has caught my attention, it being both nautical and naval in nature, is a short mention of a 1913 visit of HMS THETIS to her hometown of Walls, Shetland. Her brother, my great-uncle, Robert (Bertie) Andrew hosted some of the officers at the Manse where the family lived (their father was the Church of Scotland minister in Walls).

Four years later, and one hundred years ago, saw the culmination of the Battle of Doiran in northern Greece. This battle against the Bulgarian Army raged from April 22, 1917 to May 9, 1917, and its loss ultimately cost the British 12,000 killed, wounded, and captured. One of the over 1,200 who died was this same great-uncle, now Lieutenant Robert Andrew. He was killed in the final attack on May 8, 1917, at the age of 24. His name joins those of 700 Commonwealth soldiers on the Doiran Memorial, whose final resting places are unknown.

Lieutenant Robert Andrew, Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders, 12th Bn., Company "C". As a child, this picture of my great-uncle was on the wall first at my grandparents, and then after they passed away, in my parent's house.

It is probably best to simply repeat the words from my grandmother's own memoirs on the subject:

"Meanwhile in the remote north of Greece, near the border of Yugoslavia and Greece at Lake Doiran, our eldest brother Bertie has his resting place. He was 24 years old when the troops in that northern campaign had to make their first retreat in a night action 8-9 May 1917, from which over a thousand men failed to return (repeated in the autumn of that year when another thousand similarly laid down their lives). Some part of the debacle was due to the dreadful intestinal troubles which  pervaded the swamps, but also the campaign was a complete failure and it looked as if very many lives were lost needlessly. Bertie had just returned (8th May) from a long-awaited leave in Shetland and we gleaned from quiet talks he had with his father that he was going back without much hope for the success of the final campaign. Certain platoons who took part in the 8/9 May battle had orders - No retreat - hold back the enemy while the main body retreats. Bertie, though just returned from leave, would normally have had a day or two to recover from the journey. However, there was a scarcity of officers as well as of men owing to dysentry, and so the 12th Battalion, "C" Company, went into action knowing full well they had little or no chance of survival. As the Captain had been invalidated back home to Britain, Bertie acted that night as "acting Captain", as we learned later, and as one returned soldier told my folks, he refused to accept the double rum ration offered, saying he wanted to face his end without the rum's deadening effect. However that may be (we know he was teetotal), he was among those who never returned, and there he lies. A large monument there testified to the memory of over 2000 men who in the disastrous retreats lost their lives, and whose graves are unknown. On one of our later trips to Greece, Sandy [my grandfather] and I had the privilege of visiting this monument." - From the memoirs of Vaila Mowat.

My grandmother, Vaila (Andrew) Mowat, was very fond of her eldest brother, and I'm told missed him terribly. Even knowing he was dead, she apparently went to the dock to greet the ship bringing soldiers back to Shetland, hoping he might be one of them (and as I recall didn't tell anyone of this until many years later).

Lake Doiran (also apparently spelled Dojran) is split in two by the border between Yugoslavia (now Macedonia) and Greece, and apparently photography was not allowed at the time due to border tensions. Ever resourceful, my grandfather painted a picture of the memorial from memory. 

My grandfather's watercolour, from memory, of the memorial at Lake Doiran. I believe the row of buoys in the lake represents the border between then-Yugoslavia and Greece. Painting by Alexander (Sandy) Mowat.

It is interesting to compare this painting to a photo from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) website. Although located near the south end of the lake, from the painting I assumed it was nearer the north end. While the central monument is not the spire from the painting, and rather is flat topped, he got the general layout correct with the four smaller plinths and a low wall surrounding it. Much better than I could have done, I must say.

The Doiran Memorial is located in the north of Greece not far from the Doiran Military Cemetery, and it stands on a landscape feature formerly known as Colonial Hill. Designed by Sir Robert Lorimer, and with sculpture by Walter Gilbert, the memorial stands roughly on the line occupied by Commonwealth forces during the war.

A CWGC photograph of the memorial at Lake Doiran. http://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/160000/DOIRAN%20MEMORIAL

The CWGC cares for memorials at 23,000 locations in 154 counties around the globe, and coincidentally they also have their centennial in May 2017.

As for THETIS, she didn't survive the war either. Although she outlived Bertie, almost a year later on St. George's Day in April, 1918, she was filled with concrete and deliberately sunk as a blockship in a raid on Zeebrugge.

Four blockships fitting out at Chatham (THETIS on right). I have copied (rather incompetently) the photo from the 1958 book "Zeebrugge - St. George's Day, 1918" by Barrie Pitt.