Page 126 - Demo

126%u0001%u0004%u0008%u0006%u000c%u0017&%u0013/-%u0017%u0017)%u0006 The officer positions in SOAF were held by both RAF seconded and contracted officers. The rank of the seconded commander SOAF was squadron leader when I arrived in 1971. It was group captain when I left in 1973. Tour length averaged eighteen months to two years. Contracted officers were employed by Airwork but were otherwise integrated into the normal SOAF structure. In 1972, CSOAF%u2019s deputy, OC SOAF (Tac), was a contracted squadron leader. OC 1 Sqn (Strikemasters and Beavers) was a seconded squadron leader while OC 3 Sqn (helicopters) was a contracted squadron leader. OC SOAF(Tac) became a seconded wing commander at the same time as CSOAF became a seconded group captain in early 1973. Salalah was an RAF base and OC Salalah was a Royal Air Force squadron leader, the post later being upgraded to wing commander. The ratio of contracted to seconded officers was two to one.2 In 1971, SOAF had one Omani administrative officer who was based at Salalah %u2013 Pilot Officer Malillah al Sadiqi %u2013 who went on to a sparkling and highly successful career as pilot and senior officer. At Salalah, SOAF officers lived in the RAF Officers Mess and slept in prefabricated air8conditioned rooms surrounded by large oil drums full of sand as a defence against incoming enemy weapons. Strikemaster pilots (some of whom also flew the Beaver) could expect to fly up to two or three operational sorties each day that they were based at Salalah. We normally spent a few days every six weeks in Muscat for training and rest and recuperation. Most of us clocked up hundreds of operational sorties during our tours but there were three particularly noteworthy events involving secondees %u2013 the actions at Habrut, Hawf and Mirbat in 1972. Generally speaking, seconded and contracted pilots were treated the same on a day to day basis but this changed when we were tasked to carry out attacks across the border into the Peoples%u2019 Democratic Republic of Yemen. %u000b(0%4%u0016%u0006 In 1972, a series of contacts occurred at Habrut on the border some 120 miles north west of Salalah. Two forts faced each other across a wadi (dried river bed); one in Oman manned by the Dhofar Gendarmerie, the other in PDRY. A patrol from the local Omani firqat