If all four cable cutters succeeded in cutting right through their respective section of suspension cable that would be fine but it only needed one severed cable to drop the bridge. However, if neither cable was completely severed, the damage done would render the bridge unsafe, thereby necessitating many months for disassembly of the entire bridge before replacement of the custom-designed suspension cables was possible.
There was another unusual project explored but never put to the test. This was to have been a Hunter-borne, non-explosive, man-killing device. It all started with an article I read in some scientists’ magazine reporting the potential of low-frequency noise to subdue riotous crowds or to actually kill large numbers of people if applied energy levels were high enough. The article told of a French scientist and his four assistants who were all killed in the wee hours of the morning when they conducted their first-ever test on an oversized, low frequency, ‘whistle’. Disaster struck when they passed large volume airflow from a compressed air tank through the sound generator. Not only were buildings for some distance around subjected to severe damage, the autopsies carried out on all five victims revealed that their vital organs had been pulverised by the high energy, four cycles per second, sound force.
I was intrigued by this information and looked into the possibility of towing a suitable ‘whistle’ through the air behind a Hunter flying at high speed. Calculations, or should I say guesstimations, showed that the required amplitude of sound waves oscillating at four cycles per second could be achieved without danger to the pilot or anyone on the ground. Only in a sustained steep turn at the right speed would ‘killer sound waves’ focus for the few lethal seconds needed to cover a fair sized area within the orbit.
Had we had the time and found a suitable way of testing such a device, we might have produced an ideal low-cost weapon for a large variety of CT targets. I am left wondering if the concept was realistic, or not.
Katoog
DURING MY VISITS TO CSIR in Pretoria I became very interested in an aeronautical division project known as Katoog, which is Afrikaans for ‘cat’s eye’. This project looked to the future when a helicopter gunship pilot would be able to aim his power articulated guns by simply placing an illuminated spot in his helmet visor onto a target.
When I had checked on the project, back in February 1978, no noticeable progress had been made since my previous visit many weeks earlier. The South Africans were obviously in no great hurry as they knew that helicopter gunships and their rotating ‘chin turrets’, for which Katoog was intended, lay a long way off in the future.
For my part I could see immediate use for the Katoog system in a side-firing mode, so I asked if it would be possible to let me take the equipment, as it was, for a short-duration trial in Rhodesian operational conditions. The CSIR engineers were especially keen because this would give them early technical feedback; so a signal was sent up to Air HQ in which I made a proposal to borrow the equipment. Authority was given for me to pursue the matter with the South Africans.
Because Katoog was a top-secret project there was much to-and-fro communicating in Pretoria before the request was accepted in principle. However, the South Africans insisted on finishing an incomplete mounting for four .303 Browning machine-guns and conducting ground-firing trials before passing the system over. The gun mounting incorporated hydraulic servos to traverse and pitch the guns in direct response to Katoog’s sighting sensor.
There was no hope of finalising a pilot helmet sight before the gun system itself was ready. So I requested that CSIR produce a simple mounting post on which to fix their angle-sensing device with a collimator-reflector gunsight affixed between two handgrips incorporating a firing button. The idea was that the guns would be operated by one of our helicopter gunners sitting in a sideways-facing seat set central to the front doorway of an Alouette. On his left side, the multiple-gun platform would be wholly accessible to him with gun barrels projecting through the rear doorframe.
By early May the system was working well and was transported with the senior project engineer to Salisbury on six weeks’ loan. As soon as the whole unit had been fitted to an Alouette, firing trials were conducted with the CSIR project engineer making suitable adjustments to allow for direct aiming at targets with the guns offset for normal attack speed. Squadron Leader Ted Lunt and Corporal Thompson conducted these tests.
Ted Lunt was the Squadron Commander of 8 Squadron, which had only just been created, ostensibly to lessen the burden on No 7 Squadron. Initially 8 Squadron operated Alouette IIIs, though none of us knew then that the true purpose of creating this new unit was to prepare for the on-take of larger helicopters.
We moved to FAF 4 at Mtoko and commenced work right away. The Alouette with the Katoog system was referred to as ‘K-Car Alpha’ to distinguish it from the 20mm K-Car gunships. The plan was for Ted to position at a safe place that was nearest to the area I was searching and wait for my call. In this way, and acting entirely on his own, he could respond very quickly.
We struck luck immediately when I called him to a large CT camp near an abandoned farmstead southeast of Mtoko. As Ted arrived, over thirty CTs broke cover and started running and splitting into small groups. I called for Fireforce as Corporal Thompson’s first long burst downed six CTs. Five stayed where they fell.
Ted’s specific instruction was to remain at 1,200 feet above ground so that the Katoog aiming system and the four-gun mount could be compared directly with the established 20mm cannon performance. Whereas the first burst had been made from the correct height I could see that Ted was progressively dropping height to get at small groups now scattered and snivelling from cover to cover. So far as I could see CTs were dropping every time the guns fired but some rose again, staggering noticeably.
K-Car Alpha had run out of ammunition before the Fireforce took over. Most of the seventeen CT’s accounted for had either been killed by Katoog or were so severely wounded that they were unable to escape the attention of the troops. Katoog had proven itself on its first live outing.
Ted was directed onto a number of unoccupied places before I put him onto a group of fourteen terrorists. Corporal Thompson knocked hell out of these guys who attempted to fire back at the helicopter until they realised they came short every time they stopped running in zigzag fashion. By the end of the action Ted had dropped right down to about 300 feet to get at three remaining survivors who made the mistake of going into cover under a small clump of bushes. They did not stand a chance. The whole group lay dead before troops arrived to sweep the area.