‘One blessed himself.... the other asked me if I was a spaceman’

Cavanman's Diary

Picture the scene. It’s the early summer of 1961, you’re working in a bog, near Mullagh, with an ass and cart, when you see a man drop from the sky. What would you do?

It was a Friday morning, May 6, as a sortie of three Vampire jets set off north from Baldonnel Airbase for a routine training spin. On board one was Commdt Jerry O’Connor, a Kerryman with 21 years’ service, and a 20-year-old cadet from Drumshanbo, Ronnie McPartland, who had only 15 months under his belt.

As they flew over the Mullagh-Kingscourt area at 30,000 feet, practising spins, something went wrong and Commdt O’Connor lost control of the aircraft, which soon began to plummet, losing altitude at a rate of 5,000 feet per minute.

At 20,000 feet, the pilot released the canopy, which flew off with “a deafening roar” as both men were hit by the full blast of the air.

The plane was still out of control, descending rapidly in a spin, and at 10,000 feet above the Co Cavan countryside, Commdt O’Connor instructed his cadet to eject.

The three Vampire jets had been in the fleet since 1956 and were the first Air Corps aircraft equipped with Martin-Baker ejector seats, which had been invented by a Co Down native, James Martin. Never, before or since, has the mechanism been called into action in this country.

In the following day’s Irish Press, both men recounted what happened next.

“I should have got out myself then but with the ejection of the canopy, the plane seemed to right itself and I had control of it again at about 5,000 feet,” Commdt O’Connor said.

Meanwhile, McPartland – a Leitrim senior footballer whose brothers Noel and Sean (twins) were both in the US Army at the time – was earthbound above Cavan. Below him, we presume from his descriptions in the press, may have been Kilconny Bog, which is famous for connections to St Kilian, although readers from the locality may be able to correct us on that.

“I saw boggy land below me and when about 500 feet above the ground, I saw a man working in a bog near the road where he had his ass and cart,” McPartland recalled in the next day’s paper.

“I roared down at him and when he looked up and saw me, he ran to his cart and drove away. When I landed on the ground I shouted at him again but he either didn’t hear me or pretended not to.”

With no parachute training and little means to influence the rate of descent, it was reported that he focused on staying out of a nearby lake, which he managed, but the last thing he expected was to spook the local man, out working at the turf.

That April had been the wettest for 40 years, according to the records at Kevitt Castle, Crossdoney. Maybe ground was softer than usual for that reason; regardless, he managed to land and, as he did, he thought he caught sight, in the distance, of the plane flying once again in a controlled fashion.

His eyes were not deceiving him; at the last moment, at 5,000 feet, O’Connor had managed to right the plane and had turned for Baldonnel again, flying in the open air with no canopy and little in the way of contact with base.

The next day’s Press recorded: “McPartland said that after landing, he made his way to the farmhouse of Mr Muldoon at Fartha, Lisduff, who drove him to Mullagh. On the way, they met the Garda Sergeant and he returned to the station with them. The cadet then rang Baldonnel and learned that the plane landed safely. He was then taken back to Baldonnel.”

In an excellent article by Michael Traynor in the Leitrim Observer to mark the 50th anniversary, the Drumshanbo man added more detail.

Having landed uninjured and seen smoke coming from the chimney of a farmhouse, he gathered up his parachute and made his way towards it on foot.

“I knocked on the half-open door through which I could see two elderly men drinking tea. They looked at me in disbelief – I was still wearing my helmet – and one of them half-rose and blessed himself. The other asked me if I was a spaceman.

“I replied I was merely a member of the Irish air corps who had to leave my aeroplane in a hurry. They initially declined to drive me to the nearest Garda station and indicated me the direction of the town of Mullagh, ‘over the hill’.

“After I had travelled a few hundred yards across the field, I was called back and asked if payment would be made for the journey to Mullagh and, after my assurance that it would, the householder drove me to the local Garda station.”

On the way, they met a local man and his wife who told him that the plane had crashed some distance away, which confused him as he thought he had seen the aircraft in controlled flight.

Upon reaching the Garda station, the sergeant’s wife made him a cup of tea and he contacted Baldonnel, receiving the good news that O’Connor had managed to land safely. A car arrived and brought him to Gormanstown Aerodrome from where he was later flown by Chipmunk to Baldonnel.

Lt-Col Kevin Curran, OC of the Flying Wing, was quoted saying that “due undoubtedly to the skill and courage of Comdt O’Connor, the £40,000 jet plane has been saved”.

The ejection seat and canopy were found by Army personnel about three miles from where Cadet McPartland landed and brought back to Baldonnel.

At a reunion in 2010, McPartland again spoke publicly about the incident.

“He [O’Connor] was wrestling with the controls and, although he was very strong, we were going down, so he pulled a handle which released the canopy on the plane so we were effectively flying open-top in the cockpit.

“I reached down and pulled the ejector handle and I was shot out clear of the plane.”

He said O’Connor “would normally have ejected as well but at the last minute he felt as though he was getting control back. He fought it and got control back because he’s a brave man.

“I came down gradually in Co Cavan. That had never been done before and hasn’t been done since.”

O’Connor, originally from Sneem, went on to become the first Air Corps officer to attain the rank of General and was a hugely popular figure. He retired in 1980 after 40 years of service and died aged 95 in 2016.

The ejector seat invention has saved thousands of lives worldwide; Ronnie McPartland is number 430 in the records of air crew saved. And number one, we presume, to land in Cavan…

Curiously, the story was not picked up by this newspaper at the time but, 61 years on to the month, we’re glad to give it a belated mention.