Michael Levett

This is Michael Levett. I was a Navy pilot in the Second World War on board an aircraft carrier by the name of HMS Indefatigable. Operations, initially, were over Norway doing fighter patrol cover, etcetera. But, our main operations were out in the Far East. Because after the war in Europe finished there was still much work to be done. Initially we were required to clear off the islands, which the Americans sought to retain after the Japanese capture. We were based in the Admiralty Islands. And then, there were several other islands where we were engaged in assisting the Americans to recapture. In my capacity as a fighter pilot to carrier air patrol, that meant that you flew above the fleet, in formation, being on the alert for any approaching enemy aircraft. A second function that we had to do was to escort the torpedo bombers on raids to places like the airfields at Palambang, which was one of the more dangerous operations that we were involved in. And then, the third function, apart from escorting these torpedo bombers, was actually strikes on shore. We were equipped with a 250 lb bomb, under our fuselage and then, they upped that to a 500 lb bomb, so we actually became dive bombers... fighter bombers. The war proceeded much along those lines for several months. And I think we flew once or twice per day, for a four or five day period and then, we would withdraw from the Japanese coast for refueling. One of the problems about being a naval pilot was the difficulty of landing on the aircraft carrier. In those days, there was no angle on deck as there is now on modern-day carriers, which meant that there was no opportunity to go around or to have a second run if you were not doing too well on your approach. Now they did have a batsman to advise you with signals whether you were too low, too high, too fast or whatever. But, once you got to a certain point on the landing approach, it was all or nothing. And you had to land in a very short space and you only had six arrester wires - that is six wires to catch the tail hook on your airplane - and pull you to a dramatic stop. Although we did lots of practice for this, on land, once you got onto a carrier, it was a fairly dangerous operation. And a surprising number of mishaps per hundred landings. One or two that I do recall was an Avenger torpedo bomber, where he misjudged the landing and went over the side. But the aircraft was hanging by the hook and the arrester wire dangling over the side of the ship and the pilot and the navigator were able to actually get out of the aircraft and clamber up back onto the ship. And that was a very lucky pilot, indeed.