This time I want to tell a story related to the Beaver. I actually got that thought, as nowadays, with all the wars going on in the world, one often hears about land mines, where many times innocent people are the victims.
That brought my thought to an incident that happened along a short sand strip along a coastal route in Libya, close to the town of Sirte.
This was close to Muamer Khadafy’s birthplace, son of a Nomad tribe and future President of Libya. At the time it was not relevant yet, as the country was still under the government of King Idris.
We are talking the beginning of the 60s and in Libya the oil industry was just about getting into gear.
An important factor during this development was that they were confronted with the inheritance of the Second World War. Everywhere in the desert the traces of that war were still clearly visible.
The big withdrawal of the German armies under the command of General Rommel was, amongst other places, still visible at El Ghedahia and Beni Ulid in the form of a miles wide tank trail, which manifested itself as a light track right through the desert, direction Tunisia.
Straddling this strip and right along it were numerous mine fields.
With the Oil Company, where I was employed as a pilot, we had a special department for the clearing of mines.
The employees of this service were mainly Germans, who had been involved in the laying of those very mines, or at least were knowledgeable in the trade, and who knew too, where the mine fields of the opponent party were located. The about areas had all been charted globally and as pilots we had a copy of such maps on board. It was namely not unusual that with the surveyors and/or geologists we had to set down anywhere in the desert on a flat piece of ground, so that those people could do their surveys and/or their soil analysis.
So too, in and around Tripoli, were the traces of the Second World War still are visible. Not so much as showing damage to the city or so, but more by the presence of old English, Italian or German military trucks and lorries, which were still riding around everywhere. All these contraptions were unearthed in the desert by the Libyans, towed to town and put back in shape. After that it was tried to get a share in the booming oil-industry as well, by taking loads to and from desert camps. It was really "Big Business", and several men made a fortune with it and were able to build up big transport companies with modern material.
But others became deeply duped, as, while looking for still useable scrap, they got involved with land mines, and in the most favourable case had to go through the remainder of life less an arm or a leg. For those people Social Assistance or Welfare did not exist yet in those days. Many of them did not come back at all and sometimes left a family behind, which now were dependent on support from relatives to stay alive.
In the future I hope to tell a bit more about my experiences with the mine clearing service, but at the moment I want to get back to the story concerned.
Some Board members of our company had to have a concession meeting with government officials in Sirte, and as our DC-3 could not land on the small strip along the road, was it up to my friend and colleague Jan (also a Flying Dutchman) and I, to bring these people with two Beavers from a larger landing strip close to a desert camp, to Sirte.
I had arrived as number one and was waiting at the end of the strip for Jan who landed just behind me and taxied in.
Waiting for us were some police Landrovers, who would bring our passengers to the little town. When Jan stepped out could I see already, that something was going on. He could sometimes react in a rather hot-tempered way, if something was not to his liking.
(A short fuse, I always said). He made a B-line for the first the best policeman and started to rant in part Arabic, part English, embellished with Dutch expletives. Weren't they responsible for the condition of the landing strip? Wasn't it about  #$%& time, that they should have removed those big stones and should have filled in those potholes and dips, before some-one sailed on his #$%& face during a landing or take-off?
I had to admit, that indeed, the strip was a bit bumpy, but hadn't Jan and I experienced something like that in the desert before? But he was livid. He said that he had gotten an enormous whack under his tail-wheel from a big stone, which fortunately he could avoid with his main wheels; otherwise something more serious could have happened.
Jan continued to turn the air blue with expletives, also wondering about the policeman's ancestry, which luckily wasn't understood, was that policeman persuaded to come along with us to the spot where, according to Jan, that big stone was located in the middle of the runway.
And indeed, we saw that whopper already from some distance. I had hard to believe, that I had not seen the thing myself, but maybe during the landing had I been more away from the middle of the runway and had passed it unnoticed.
We drove straight towards it and when we came closer did all of a sudden our policeman turn alert. He stopped the Landrover and indicated to us to stay behind. Very cautiously did he walk towards the boulder and ...... there was a whopper of a round mine, laying on its side next to a round hole, from where it clearly had been dislodged, ...... and yes, over the edge of that hole ran the tracks of the tail-wheel of Jan's Beaver. How in heaven's name it was possible I still don't know now, but I did see it with my own eyes.
With his tail-wheel Jan had run over the edge of that mine and in that way had tipped it out of the ground and the crazy thing had not detonated. Hard to believe, not?
As was usual during our ventures in the neighbourhood of small villages or settlements, we were swarmed here too as by flies by children and all of them had ran after the Landrover and were now crowding us. The policeman chased a bunch away (which in countries like this is definitely not done gently, and many times accompanied by the use of a stick or a swishing cane) but, as with the aforementioned flies, it was to no avail, and they returned in no time; and as it seemed, with twice as many.
Meanwhile the policeman had lifted the mine carefully and put it in the back of the Landrover and had indicated to us, who by the way, had been easing further and further back, that it was now in his hands and that we should now walk back to our planes. So, we went on our way and thought that the man would have sent for assistance. Imagine our amazement, when after we had gone only about twenty meters, our friend came sailing past us, over potholes and bumps, with the bouncing mine in the back and a horde of screaming kids behind him.
Involuntarily we both crouched, but on that day Allah was omnipresent and benevolent, as nothing happened, and we never heard anything about the incident anymore.
Later on I have seen quite a few more victims of mines, but the way this turned out, I will not forget as long as I live.
Hopefully until a next Tale.