British Commonwealth Air Training Plan

British Commonwealth Air Training Plan:

Air Observer School

December 1942

28th

TOS No.9 St. Jean (St. John), Quebec

Recruits going into air bombing were trained not only to drop bombs accurately, but to assist navigators as well. They spent 8 to 12 weeks at B&GS and six weeks at an AOS

For William Uyen this training on st Jean was don in a AVRO Anson
between December 1942 and February 1943

February 1943

5th

#9AOS bomber officer P/O awarded air bomber badge special reserve

6th--19th

William is on Leave for two weeks and after that,

19th

SOS St. Jean, Quebec

Cocpit of a AVRO Anson

Air Observers were called ‘navigators’. Navigational training began at ITS where all students were introduced to tools such as compasses, sextants, drift recorders, and manual computers.
Concepts such as air speed relative to ground speed, track, and drift were introduced.
At AOS, the student’s most challenging task was to master the art of ‘dead-reckoning’ -a combination of
careful calculations and accurate measurement by which a navigator could determine the position of an aircraft in flight and plot its course from point to point. The work became progressively more difficult as cross winds,
variable airspeeds, variable altitudes, compass bearings, windspeeds and direction had to be measured and
properly accounted for. More advanced techniques utilized direction-finding radio and star-based
observations and calculations.

February 19, 1943. Wing Parade, William Uyen was one of the 9 Air Bombers and 23 Navigators by whom the wings were pinned by Squadron Leader R.J. Gray, the Chief Supervisory Officer.