|
Post by errolmartyn on Mar 19, 2015 10:48:48 GMT 12
Cigarettes Found In Plane
A carton of 200 American cigarettes, doubtless "planted" four or five years ago by an ingenious airman who hoped to avoid its detection by Customs officers, has been recovered by accident by the buyer of one of the many fighter planes from the Pacific sold as scrap at Rukuhia airport, Hamilton. The cigarettes, with their heavy greased paper wrapping intact, was found in a slide-fastening compartment beside the bay into which the starboard wheel retracts. Mr A. Welsh, of Cambridge, who bought the aircraft to obtain Components capable of being use in his garage business found the cigarettes. He does not smoke. Friends, however, who developed a wartime taste for American tobacco, reported no deterioration in the cigarettes, which they are enjoying the more because of the recent increase in dollar values.
(The Southland Times, 29 Sep 49)
Errol
|
|
|
Post by Bruce on Mar 19, 2015 11:57:34 GMT 12
I would assume that to be Alf WALSH, not Welsh, who had the Corsair beside the Tower Tearooms...
|
|
|
Post by Dave Homewood on Mar 19, 2015 14:41:09 GMT 12
|
|
|
Post by pjw4118 on Mar 20, 2015 14:50:45 GMT 12
Errol, what a subject , if only they could talk ! Many aircraft could tell tales of what interesting private loads they carried, not really smuggling , but perks for the troops. I know that in the post war RAF , chocolate and coffee were prized items and while the poms did it , the Kiwis assumed that it was just part of the job , while the Aussies were total professionals taking orders prior to a trip. A gunner from 101 SQ said that on repat trips from Bari they always took the farest perimeter track on landing so they could offload before coming up to HM Customs waiting for their arrival, but if they had POWs aboard , every body just looked the other way. It would be interesting to learn what other objects were carried.
|
|
|
Post by Peter Lewis on Mar 20, 2015 16:51:33 GMT 12
Sunderlands coming back from Fiji were always 'interesting'.
Apparently the skill lay in informing the Customs Department of the pending arrival of the aircraft at the right time, so it would already have got into Hobsonville before the customs man could get there.
|
|
|
Post by camtech on Mar 20, 2015 18:43:20 GMT 12
Or in later years, take the customs men to the Sgts mess and ensure that they were well looked after.
Worked for us quite a few times.
Occaissionally, the drug dog turned up and he wasn't welcome in the mess.
|
|
|
Post by isc on Mar 20, 2015 21:20:58 GMT 12
There's a bit in Desmond Scott's book "Typhoon Pilot" of filling two 90gal drop tanks with Champagne, flying it to England, filling the tanks with beer, and taking it back to France. They had to give up after they were attacked twice in one day by US Thunderbolts, and they had to drop the tanks to get away from them. Somewhere in the same book it tells of the modified drop tank that Des Scott had for his Typhoon, in which he carried a folding commando motor bike. isc
|
|
|
Post by Dave Homewood on Mar 21, 2015 8:43:17 GMT 12
It is a wonder that when the news got out about the Walsh brothers' cigarette find that the Customs and Excise didn't make them pay duty on them.
|
|
|
Post by wanganui on Mar 21, 2015 9:00:37 GMT 12
One of my pilot veterans bought back from the islands a bunch of bananas & an American M-1 rifle he'd bought in Guadalcanal. It's amazing what you can tuck into the small corners of an aircraft!!
|
|
|
Post by komata on Mar 21, 2015 10:14:23 GMT 12
FWIQW
My father was at RNZAF Rukuhia when the Corsairs and PV-1's came home and said that it was amazing to see exactly what 'walked away' from the aircraft after they had finally been parked: It seems that the aircraft's clocks were especially prized. PV-1 bomb bays also divulged various 'items'. No-one said anything of course, and as the machines were deliberately 'decommissioned' by means of rifle butts through instrument panels shortly afterwards, the whole matter became somewhat academic; after all, who could tell what had been in place beforehand.
As I said, FWIW
|
|