RAFBEA (North America)
Welcome to the RAFBEA North American 2004 Calgary webpage. We held our RAFBEA North American reunion in the beautiful city of Calgary in Canada during the weekend of October 8 - 11, 2004. The total number of people attending the fourth annual RAFBEA North American reunion, including spouses/significant others, was 40 which consisted of boys from the 6th Entry through to the 47th Entry. We even had one couple who came from Australia!
On Friday October 8, there was an informal "pub night" held at the Hilton Garden Hotel. This was a great chance for everyone to get together and catch up on what's been going on in their lives since our last reunion.
The next afternoon, all the ex-boy entrants were given a personal tour of the WestJet facility at the Calgary airport. Afterwards, they toured the Aero Space Museum in Calgary.
That evening the reunion dinner was held inside the Aero Space Museum. What a great background it was to be amongst all those spectacular airplanes. Also included was a table with Boy Entrant memorabilia (a big "thanks" to everyone for loaning items to this table). Everyone met at 6:30 pm for cocktails and socializing. A delicious buffet dinner followed an hour later. After dinner, a short talk was given by Flt Lt Andy Crabtree of the Royal Air Force, Calgary. Then each boy entrant was asked to give a brief outline of their RAF service, training station and postings.
Pictured from top to bottom:
Top: Dave Mattingley (44th Entry AirRad Cosford)
Dave Williams (27th Entry ElecAir St. Athan), John MacGillivary (46th Clerk GD Hereford).
John MacCauley (34th Entry A/frame St. Athan), Garth Hammond (37th Supplier Hereford).
Back row Left to Right:
Colin Sewell (14th Entry Air Wireless Mech), Reg Moore (47th Entry ElecAir St. Athan), Chris Simpson (26th Entry Teleg Cosford), Mike Claydon (26th Entry Teleg Cosford), Bruce Allen (46th Entry Air/W Cosford), Mike Woods (ex-apprentice, 97th Entry A Flight RAF Halton 1961-1963,Airframe Fitter, St. Athan), John Weatherley (8th Entry AirRad Yatesbury).
Front row Left to Right:
Flt Lt. Andy Crabtree of Royal Air Force, Calgary, Brian Carlin (29th Entry Air Elect St. Athan), David Leech-Hines (21st Entry Engine Fitter Cosford), Norrie Hathaway (46th Elect St. Athan), John Halliwell (30th Entry General Fitter St. Athan), Martin Roberts (22nd Entry AirRad Cosford), Mike Williams (29th Entry Instrument Fitter St. Athan), Gorton Lawrence (21st Entry Arm Cosford).
Wanna send us an e-mail? Here's our mailbox. We've tweeked our e-mail address a bit to prevent all that awful spam. We think you'll figure out that AT is to be replaced with the @ with no spaces in between the @ symbol.
