January 1953, Matagorda Tower at Matagorda Air Force Base off the coast of Texas in the Gulf of Mexico just south of Victoria. The tower cab was made of metal and glass and perched on a metal girder system about 50 feet above the field elevation. There were a few problems but they were mostly environmental. Immediately noted in the winter was, no heating. No air conditioning either, unless the spaces around the door frame which allowed free air flow could be considered to conditioned air.
Now one might consider heating an unnecessary luxury in the Gulf of Mexico, but, on some 45 degree days in January when the clouds allowed no sun to be seen and the wind blew from somewhere in Canada unimpeded by any orthographic feature for 1600 miles until it penetrated those very spaces around the door frames mentioned above, it was damn cold. In opposition to that lack of warm air, the days when the south winds blew off the Gulf and the sun’s rays were unimpeded by anything but the roof of the tower, the air in the Tower cab was both hot and humid.
To counteract the cold we did have two electric heaters with fans. They were the military standard issue, olive drab, one foot square boxes. By setting them on the console desk and allowing one of them to blow directly into an open field jacket, which one wore for basic warmth, and with the other pointed at the feet, sans boots, the cold days could be endured.
The base was occupied about every other month for two weeks by a Wing of F-84’s from Bergstrom AFB, Texas or Turner AFB, Georgia and other Air Force Bases. During these deployments aircraft were in their sortie mode using the gunnery and bombing ranges of the Matagorda complex. The Tower was a busy place on launch and recovery of anywhere between 4 and 20 aircraft. There were the inevitable emergencies caused by hydraulic failures, control surface malfunctions and once, in my experience, a returning F-84 with part of a tow target imbedded in the wing. There were the “Hot shot, Top Guns” in those days also though they didn’t have the named programs as they do now.. The rest of the month things were mighty slow in the Control Tower.
Too explain our bucolic existence: There was a circumstance when after landing in an F-84, Capt. Fritz, the pilot, noted that some cattle were very close to, or on the end of the runway. He asked for and was given permission to attempt to chase them away upon which, he held one brake pedal down and advanced throttle while spinning a circle with the aircraft. Very effective and it could have been a barbecue if the cattle didn’t move fast enough.
One day in January 1953, while attending the airport and tower alone I had a radio contact. A gross interruption of my reverie but it was expected. The Base Commander was inbound in a twin Beech, a C-45(Twin Beechcraft), one of the two aircraft assigned to the base. The other was a Terrible Texan AT-6.
Now there were certain things which were required of the Tower operator in such an eventuality.
1. Peruse the airport and insure no cattle had strayed upon the operating surface.
2. And, though in the SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) but somewhat ambiguously written, a requirement to notify the Crash Crew of the approaching aircraft.
3. Notify Base Operations after the landing of the aircraft.
I did note that all the cattle and other large animals were well clear of the landing surface. I did fail to notify the Crash Crew of the approaching aircraft and therefore they were not manned and ready when it landed. The pilot of the C-45 asked me to appear in his office as soon as I could and answer his question, “Why was there no Crash Crew vehicle present on the ramp when I landed ?”
I contacted the other Tower Operator, who was in the barracks, that I had this request and he said he would relieve me as soon as he could, about 20 minutes. I then went immediately to the “Letter of Agreement” and other letters on operations in the SOP book to find if I could wriggle out of this one without too much damage. I found the perfect though somewhat legalistic situation.
That I was not directly in the command structure of the Base Commander was very important to my future. Because the AACS detachment was a tenant organization on almost all Air Force bases, a Letter of Agreement between the Base command structure and the local AACS detachment spelled out any special circumstances or requirements that that base might have due to its mission. There was no fully coordinated standard detailed instruction such as the ATC Handbook 7110.8 and its descendants in existence.
There was an instruction in the SOP that the Crash Crew was to be informed of an approaching aircraft, but, and thank God for the “but”, the instruction had been a verbal command of the Base Commander some months before and had been noted in the SOP as such. The Letter of Agreement between the Base and the AACS organization stated that verbal orders of the Base Commander would be conformed with for 48 hours, after which there must be written confirmation.
There was no written confirmation and therefore I was “off the hook”. I went to the Base Commanders office and showed “His Eminence” the problem. He stated most emphatically at the end of our conversation that he was again ordering the procedure to be re-instated and there would be written confirmation on the way that day. A quick “Yes, Sir”, a sharp salute, about face and quick departure was performed and that was the end of that problem.
Now again there wasn’t anyone put in danger, unless the good Base Commander wasn’t sure of his landing abilities. So I had now made two mistakes in my fledgling career and both were not to bad. One even was arguably not a mistake at all, the second, and the first only a military not an Air traffic Control mistake.
This is not the end of my stupidities. See you next time