One of our trailers with load being transhipped by the look of things about 77/78 at a guess.
Nottsnortherner:
P.S., There was at the time at least two regular subbies, Roy"Cannonhaul" Clokes with his Volvo 88 and âBigâ John McFall with an ex Pro,s Scania 110. I,m interested to know of or hear from anyone I,ve missed !!
You have mentioned Mick Martin in the past Nottsnortherner. Was he not a full time subbie?. Understand he was on when you joined the company in 75. Attached photo shows Mick after he purchased my old unit in about 79 and had it resprayed.
Another full time subbie but later was Jeff Gardner. Wasnât around for long though.
PM sent Brian.
I did say âat least 2 regular subbiesâ! Mick Martin could possibly have been around in 75 but I didn,t bump into him until later whereas Roy and John McFall crossed my path more often. I think Geoff Gardner came to us as a regular driver first and then went O/D. I remember doing a Yugo one winter with him and getting stuck in heavy snow just outside Zagreb. I also remember being with him at the National on another trip when he was pulling for us and had suffered a failed trailer wheel bearing about 40ks back up the road towards Zagreb. Another Middle-east O/D overheard our conversation and not only came up with a spare bearing but also came back to geoffs trailer and helped us get it sorted. I said that I would make sure that he got paid for all his efforts and duly sent a telex of his details back to Stagg. As time went on I assumed that Stagg had taken care of it but about 3 months later I bumped into that O/D again who said that he never got paid and that if he saw one of Promotors broken down again he would drive right on by. All the bloke did was spend time on helping us out. Just another example of Staggs attitude towards drivers. I suspect that the incident never got as far as Peter because I,m sure he would have responded differently. Back then it was always necessary sometimes to do what you could to keep the wheels turning and the commeraderie between different companysâ drivers could generally be relied upon in times of problems. I know Stagg can,t be here to speak for himself but I thought it a poor show when he didn,t even send him the money for the bearing he gave us. Geoff Gardner now lives in the States and occasionally we exchange greetings so next time I,ll ask him about his Promotor history and maybe get him to join us on here.
PS, I think you,ll find Mick Martin is the guy on the right wearing the silly hat!
Nottsnortherner:
PM sent Brian.
Many thanks for that Tony. Fully understood. As for Mick Martin that was an assumption on my part. Guy on the left somehow fitted the bill better.
My work for Promotor took me increasingly to Iraq during the 80âs to the point where, on a couple of occasions, I spent up to four months a year there. In the late 70âs I drove one of our Scania 111âs then later a 112 but from about 84/5 onwards I flew in with a succession of carriers including British Airways, Lufthansa and Air France. However, whenever there was a flare up in the Iran/Iraq War the big boys ceased flying and we had to find other ways in.
The war started on 22nd September 1980 and for a year or so after that the overland bus from Amman was a favourite for some but it didnât take long before smaller airlines were offering their services. Austrian Airlines was perhaps the best option and most popular for us to get into Baghdad but Royal Jordanian, JAT and Iraqi Airways also offered flights. I flew with them all as well as Alitalia, Emirates, Turkish Airways and Egyptair but because of the danger of flying into Baghdad during the daylight hours all the airlines except Iraqi Airways flew in and out at night. Most of them arriving between midnight and three in the morning. One airline, as you would expect, that didnât fly into Baghdad was Iranair. But on a couple of occasions I did fly from Tehran to Baghdad but I had to go via Dubai. This involved having my Iraqi visa issued in my second passport which our office couriered out to the Interconti or Hilton in Dubai. I flew down from Tehran booked into the hotel for one or two nights, swapped passports sending the first one back to the UK. I then caught an Emirates flight up to Baghdad all very simple and it gave me a few days of R and R in the luxury of Dubai.
I am sure I have recalled this little anecdote before but as its short I will repeat it. I posted an arty photo in my last post showing Tommy Birch and myself in Baghdad. I was staying in the Meridien Hotel in the centre of town which was opposite the Sheraton and for a few days Tommy shared the room with me before he headed off home in the lorry. One night, about two in the morning, there was a tremendous explosion nearby. I was woken and immediately knew what it was. An Iranian Scud missile had slammed into some houses behind the filling station three hundred metres down Saadoun Street from our hotel. At the sound of the explosion Tommy sat bolt upright in bed then uttered a sigh and dropped down again into a deep sleep. Next morning I said to him âthat was a close call last nightâ to which he replied he hadnât heard a thing. Ah well it must have been nice to be a deep sleeper and able to sleep through anything. During the Iran/Iraq war five Scuds landed in Baghdad whilst I was there at various times, most at night but you never knew when or where they would hit. Certainly didnât help my sleep pattern. I have some photos somewhere of one such Scud hit. Will dig them out later.
Another little story I think Iâve posted before happened on the 23rd September 1980, the day after the war started. On the 22nd Iraqi fighter bombers attacked Iran and on the 23rd Iranian fighter bombers retaliated. One of their targets was Baghdad International Airport on the western outskirts of town. I was in the fairground asleep in my lorry having tipped the day before. At about six in the morning I heard aircraft fly overhead and immediately all hell was let loose. Every gun in the area opened up even if there was nothing to see. An Iraqi trait. I heard explosions as bombs hit the airport and got up to see if I could see anything. The only thing I saw, apart from the puffs in the sky of AA fire was one Iranian F-4E Phantom as it banked around over the fairground and headed off on another bombing run to the airport. Although the raid only lasted ten or fifteen minutes the Iraqiâs continued firing into the air for the next three hours or so. We also had air raid sirens blasting away whenever they felt like it. Mid morning I decided to leave. It was chaos out on the road but I made my way to Fallujah and then headed west to Syria as I was booked on the Tartous ferry. I heard many years later that an Astran driver was also in the fairground that morning but I never saw him.
I have no dates in mind for the following little tale but must have been around mid 80âs or a little later.
It was about six thirty in the evening and three of us were sitting in my room on the eighteenth floor of the Meridian Hotel in central Baghdad. There was one of our exhibition customers, Awat al Barzenji my Kurdish friend and myself. Awat was drinking his usual Coke and we were on beer and sitting around a small table adjacent to the window and sliding door which led onto the balcony. From there you had a fine view up the river and over the north western part of Baghdad. The sun had already gone down and you wouldnât believe there was a war on as the place was so illuminated it must have been almost visible from the Iraq/Iran border to the east.
Suddenly there was an enormous sharp crack. An explosion. We knew what it was immediately. It was another Iranian Scud missile attack. Awat jumped up shouting âI saw it, I saw it come downâ. The three of us rushed out onto the balcony, I had grabbed my camera as I went. âLook its landed up Abu Nawasâ Awat said. Abu Nawas is the small road that runs parallel with the Tigris river and marks the edge of the river. Well, not so much the river as the mud flats which are accessible where decking had been laid leading out to a few fish restaurants. Smoke was rising from where the Scud had come to earth which was about four hundred metres north of our hotel. It certainly looked bad news for anyone living up there as we knew these things can flatten half a street when the go off.
After the explosion there was a quiet lull in proceedings. The traffic around our hotel was always heavy early evening and tonight was no exception. Within a short space of time it got spectacularly worse as a convoy of fire engines, police cars and ambulances all tried to force there way onto Abu Nawas to get to the scene of the carnage. There were traffic lights on the corner below us. Cars were stationary and people milling about with much shouting and gesticulating as the convoy attempted to force there way through this pinch point. The three of us of course found it all very amusing like watching a Keystone Cops movie. We stayed on the balcony for maybe an hour as the action played out in front of us.
Next day I drove up Abu Nawas and past the scene of the previous evenings entertainment. There was as if nothing had happened. No bombed out buildings. No streets flattened. No nothing except a bit of disturbance of the mud flats. It was a miracle. It wasnât until later that I was told that the missile had indeed landed on the banks of the Tigris and all of its explosive force had been nullified by the mud. I believe that was the only Scud raid on Baghdad which didnât result in huge loss of life.
Can you remember Brian a story that was going around the Mocamp in the early eighties about a nuclear power station that the French were building for Saddam Hussain somewhere in Iraq. After years of building it, it was just about to be commissioned when The Israeli Airforce attacked it and raised it to the ground.
The Iraqis allegedly launched a retaliatory attack on Israel with a number of their aircraft being shot down but one aircraft managed to get through destroying a Coca Cola plant.
This the Iraqis proclaimed as a great victory. 
I was in Baghdad when that Scud landed in the Tigris. Must have been at the same time as you Sandway. I remember that next day the long column of smoke was still there what seemed to be most of the next day. One year I drove down unloaded and was there for a couple of months working with Chick. The other long stay in Baghdad I had was post-Promotor and working as a competitor at the expo. One of the translators took a shine to me and invited me to her party.
At the Iraqi party was when a (different) Scud landed at about 1am in the morning I think it must have been. There was a terrific âwhumpâ and the building we were in shook and all the power went off and all the girls began screaming. Itâs what brought it home to me. I wasnât scared for myself but these people were scared for their families⌠I was about 33 then and one of the party goers was encouraging me to marry her extraordinarily pretty 17 year old daughter, a Christian (they were Assyrians). The party consisted mostly of young women although a few English ex-pats arrived late evening so I didnât feel too much of a sore thumb. Happy days!
There was another Scud landed on the German pavilion at the exhibition but didnât actually explode. I wasnât there when in Baghdad when that happened though. I think Peter Calderwood was around then and explained it to me. Somewhere I have a âBaghdad Timesâ and all the war reports appear to be about diggers being knocked out. Iâll see if I can find and post a copy here.
Thought you might all enjoy this⌠A very stylish 3 point turn⌠I use the term â3â rather loosely.
Itâs only a ridged tanker !!! why didnât he just reverse out⌠or inâŚâ â ?
JeffâŚ
Jelliot:
Itâs only a ridged tanker !!! why didnât he just reverse out⌠or inâŚâ â ?JeffâŚ
Perhaps heâs a poser. If heâd have done that he wouldnât be here on TNUK!!!
mushroomman:
Can you remember Brian a story that was going around the Mocamp in the early eighties about a nuclear power station that the French were building for Saddam Hussain somewhere in Iraq. After years of building it, it was just about to be commissioned when The Israeli Airforce attacked it and raised it to the ground.
The Iraqis allegedly launched a retaliatory attack on Israel with a number of their aircraft being shot down but one aircraft managed to get through destroying a Coca Cola plant.
This the Iraqis proclaimed as a great victory.
I remember it well Steve even though I wasnât there at the time. It was I think 81 or possibly 82. The nuclear power station was about 16km from Baghdad and set in the south east quadrant of the city. As the reactor was nearing completion the Israeliâs knew it was ânow or neverâ to put the plant out of commission. It was a successful raid of course with casualties kept to a minimum. I understand one Frenchman died and a small number of Iraqiâs. It was a huge feather in the cap of the Israel air force being so far from their bases. I heard that Sadaam had many of the top men in charge of the anti aircraft screen to the west of Iraq executed which seems a bit harsh seeing that the Israelis flew down over Saudi and the came up from the south to hit the power station.
Another little snippet of useless information was that six years previously the Iranians had also attacked the power station but only using two Phantom fighter bombers. They had not tried to hit the reactor only the peripheral buildings around it.
Hi Brian, itâs brilliant what you can find out by doing a Google search. 
I was never sure which year I heard about that attack on the Iraqi Nuclear Power Station but I have just found it fascinating reading about it. Itâs interesting to find out that the youngest Israeli air force pilot who took part in that raid, llan Ramon was actually killed on the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster some twenty two years later 
.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera
Brian, if you look at the âOld A One Driversâ thread which by now is on page two or three of this forum then I think that you might find a couple of stories from some of their lads.
A One drivers did quite a bit of work to Yugo and Hungary in the early eighties, you might remember seeing their bright red motors as they often parked up at The Zagreb Hotel and The Hotel Wien in Budapest.
There was a short story by a Truck net member called âDry Gingerâ on a trip that he did to Mostar on Page 9 of the thread which I think that you might find interesting.
As I mentioned Skopia in a post a couple of weeks ago it started me thinking which British companies (if any) actually delivered to Albania in the 70âs / 80âs. As far as I know Dow Freight never went there but I did wonder that if anybody ever went there then it might have been Promotors or O.H.S.
I think that it was Wheel Nut who mentioned many years ago that John Williams took a convoy of aid through to Albania after the fall of The Iron Curtain in the nineties. Somebody mentioned that there was a Long Distance Diary covering the trip but I donât think that it was ever shown on Trucknet. If Dean or anybody else who has got that magazine can repost that story then I for one would be very interested in seeing it.
Skopia customs yard had a few large warehouses where western trucks would unload and if the cargo was for Albania then it would have to be loaded onto an Albanian registered truck.
I remember asking a Dutch driver if he had ever been to Albania and he told me that he had only ever heard of one guy who had driven there. A Belgium driver who had loaded American cigarettes from Antwerp docks and delivered the load to a place in Tirana.
Regards Steve.
mushroomman:
Hi Brian, itâs brilliant what you can find out by doing a Google search.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera
Brian, if you look at the âOld A One Driversâ thread which by now is on page two or three of this forum then I think that you might find a couple of stories from some of their lads.
A One drivers did quite a bit of work to Yugo and Hungary in the early eighties, you might remember seeing their bright red motors as they often parked up at The Zagreb Hotel and The Hotel Wien in Budapest.
There was a short story by a Truck net member called âDry Gingerâ on a trip that he did to Mostar on Page 9 of the thread which I think that you might find interesting.
As I mentioned Skopia in a post a couple of weeks ago it started me thinking which British companies (if any) actually delivered to Albania in the 70âs / 80âs. As far as I know Dow Freight never went there but I did wonder that if anybody ever went there then it might have been Promotors or O.H.S.
I think that it was Wheel Nut who mentioned many years ago that John Williams took a convoy of aid through to Albania after the fall of The Iron Curtain in the nineties. Somebody mentioned that there was a Long Distance Diary covering the trip but I donât think that it was ever shown on Trucknet. If Dean or anybody else who has got that magazine can repost that story then I for one would be very interested in seeing it.
Skopia customs yard had a few large warehouses where western trucks would unload and if the cargo was for Albania then it would have to be loaded onto an Albanian registered truck.
I remember asking a Dutch driver if he had ever been to Albania and he told me that he had only ever heard of one guy who had driven there. A Belgium driver who had loaded American cigarettes from Antwerp docks and delivered the load to a place in Tirana.Regards Steve.
Hello Mushroomman! As soon as I saw your post I remembered the article you referred to: it was in Trucking Internatational. Iâve scanned it for you (see below) Robert
Thanks for that Robert, I thought that was very interesting and it sounded like the convoy from hell but I wondered if there was another side to the story. 
I wouldnât of criticised anybody who carried snow chains in Southern Yugoslavia in the winter and even if you didnât need them then surely that was a bonus.
Prague, in my opinion was one of the worst cities in Eastern Europe to transit with all itâs low bridges, low tram wires, cobbled roads and itâs many road works which must of been a nightmare with a convoy of 20 trucks so I wonder if John took them along the old road around Prague so they didnât get split up and lost which to me would of made a lot of sense.
I wonder what other drivers think of the article.
Regards Steve.
I mentioned in a recent post the Scud missile that landed near the Masgouf fish restaurants on the banks of the Tigres off Abu Nuwas street in Baghdad. I have found a couple of photos of the inside of one of those establishments. Its interesting looking at the pictures on the walls portraying Saddam and of the restaurants themselves. The depicted photos shows a group of mainly exhibitors from the Baghdad Fair. At a guess Iâd say about 87 or 88. The event was organised and paid for by Andy Mclean (Jazzandy) of Orient Transport Services. Now we never usually visited those places as they were very expensive, up to 100 dinar per fish, but paying with black market money and asking for a group discount you could get the price down to an almost acceptable level. The fish were Carp and kept alive in tanks. You chose the fish which was then killed and prepared in a way that had been handed down over the years then grilled. They were very large fish so a group of you was always needed otherwise much of it was wasted. It was also a long process to kill and prepare the fish so much downing of Johnie Walker, well thats what the locals did, took place prior to actually eating it.
Edward Mansell-Thomas on your right Sandway. He worked for Saftcrest out of Northiam, Sussex, and they had a container parked in Baghdad that was painted in the Union Jack colours. They sold sports equipment.
I delivered their container back to Northiam. He and his wife were really great company and we went all over the place together as they had a house in Baghdad. It was on their stand that I was interviewed by English language Radio Baghdad which was famous amongst the ex-pats because the fellow hosting had such bad English. They were interviewing Edward - whilst I was suppressing laughter - when he suddenly swung around and put the microphone in front of me⌠he said âso Mister, what you like in Iraq?â⌠My mind raced through all the âthingsâ - the ânice thingsâ about Iraq and replied, after a long silence âErrr, you have very good weather hereâŚâ. Talk about feeling dim.
I met up with Andy McLean (jazzandy) recently at MickTwemlowâs funeral.
I had a few beers with Gavin too and he told me about turning his car over whilst trying to impress an Irish Nurse from the Park Hospital. She wasnât impressed.