In 1954 a new RAF mountain rescue team was formed at Nicosia in Cyprus. It was this team which was to be involved in rescue work at extremely high altitudes; in fact, their first serious call-out was to a crash at over 14,000 feet in winter.

As far as British and Allied military aircraft are concerned, the team's area of responsibility is the eastern third of the Mediterranean. This includes Turkey and extends northward indefinitely. So, when a British aircraft was missing over Eastern Turkey in April 1959, Nicosia had a very personal interest in the preliminary air search.

On Thursday, April 23rd, 1959, an Avro Tudor super Trader left Ankara on the Ankara-Bahrein leg of a cargo flight from the United Kingdom to Woomera in Australia. It was carrying twelve men and top-secret equipment for Woomera rocket range. Between Ankara and Teheran it was using an air corridor which would take it over the middle of Lake Van: a large lake almost surrounded by mountains and lying close to the soviet-Armenian border.

About forty miles to the west of the lake is the town of Mus. The Tudor sent a signal when over the town; it was then on track but seven minutes behind schedule. It should have called up again over Van, but after Mus, there was silence, nor did it arrive at Bahrein that afternoon.

On the following day Turkish aircraft searched for the missing Tudor, but the R.A.F. Rescue Co-ordination Centre at Nicosia was not alerted until the evening. Before daylight on the 25th two Hastings and a Shackleton took off to search the Turkish air corridor and a tract of country extending for forty miles on either side. They had permission to operate from base in Turkey. Aircraft from Turkey and Iran continued to participate in the search.

The mountain rescue team was also alerted on the 25th but, this being a weekend, the advance party were already at their base camp near Kyrenia with the equipment. They were recalled and returned to Nicosia about ten o'clock on the Saturday morning.

The team were put on half an hour's notice from dawn to dusk, and two hours' notice during the hours of darkness. They waited like this through the following four days while the air search continued. A parachute medical rescue team was also standing by, but eventually these were stood down when it was found they would not be required.

It would'nt be possible, when the mountain rescue team was needed, for all to go with the first lift, so seventeen were selected. At that time they were without a permanent officer but Flight-Lieutenant Robertson was put in charge. He had been out with the team on a number of weekend exercises. He came up from Middle East Air Forces H.Q. at Episkopi and, immediately he arrived, asked for crampons. These were delivered promptly from London - by a Canberra jet.

While on stand-by the team continued with their routine work. On the 26th they were told what was in the Tudor's cargo. The area of the search now covered 25,000 square miles. From the 25th until the 28th the search conditions were bad, with cloud on the summits and much new snow on the ground; and the R.A.F. had logged 50,000 miles and the Tudor was still missing.

On the 29th, with the search due to be called off, the crew of one of the Hastings, piloted by a Flight-Lieutenant Noble, played a hunch and concentrated on Mount Suphan, 14,547 feet - a peak a little to the north of Lake Van. The wreck of the Tudor was spotted soon after dawn and very close to the top of the mountain. Less than four hours later the rescue team was airborne.

In view of the secret equipment which the aircraft had been carrying, it was of over-riding importance that the R.A.F. should reach the crash as Continue to page 2