Bob Morgan is a great storyteller and his tales about his 36 years as a Canadian Air Force pilot are fascinating.
Without hesitation Morgan, who has lived in St. Albert for 30 years, will talk about such humanitarian efforts as airlifting sorghum to Niger to relieve famine or flying to the Philippines with blood plasma for the Red Cross.
He'll describe search and rescue missions over the barren lands in Canada's Arctic in sub-zero temperatures. After considerable prodding, he may also describe what it was like to be one of Canada's top fighter-jet pilots stationed in Europe with 439 Squadron during the Cold War.
The thing he won't easily relate however, is a second-by-second accounting of the 100-yard-dash he made across an air tarmac in Marvelle, France in 1955 towards a crashed, flaming F-86 Sabre Fighter jet that was spewing ammunition.
His action was so fleeting, so spontaneous and so without thought for his own safety, that Morgan will only say, "It's too long ago. I don't remember it."
When asked about the pilot he saved that day, Len Fine, Morgan will only say, "He was at the same base, but a different squadron. I'd seen him before, but didn't really know him."
Morgan, who was then 22, was sitting by himself in a tiny shack at the end of the runway supervising landings when he saw the crashing of the F-86 Sabre, which carried six guns, all loaded with ammunition.
"His plane was on fire," Morgan said. "There might have been some ammunition shooting."
He didn't know it then, but another airman had raced to the scene as well, a Captain Waters, who was on the other side of the Sabre.
"I didn't see him. He said later there was ammunition shooting," Morgan says.
Morgan had to leap onto the wings to release the canopy and pull Fine from the wreckage. The plane was already on fire and fuel tanks were under the wings that he stood on.
Somehow, Morgan freed the trapped pilot, whose back was injured in the crash.
"I guess I took him to the base hospital. Then I went back to the mess and had a drink," he says now.
The George Medal
In May 1957 Gov. General Vincent Massey presented Morgan with the George Medal.
At the time, the George Medal was an award second only to the George Cross, the civilian equivalent to the Victoria Cross. It is awarded only for acts of great victory to civilians and to military personnel for gallant conduct that is not in the face of the enemy. Only 77 Canadians have been presented with the medal since its inception in 1940.
His citation notes he was awarded the medal for his, "splendid courage in the rescue of the trapped pilot of a crashed F-86 Sabre Fighter aircraft, with complete disregard for his own safety, ignoring flames and exploding ammunition, while standing over fuel tanks, removed the pilot. His prompt, courageous and sustained rescue efforts in the face of mounting danger saved the pilot's life."
Fighter pilot
Morgan, who is now 81, started his military career as an air cadet in 1944. He received a flying scholarship and got his pilot's wings in 1950.
"I wanted to fly," he says simply, adding that until 1985, when he retired, that's exactly what he did.
"I flew the F-86 Sabre, CF 104, C-130 Hercules, Harvards, Vampires, Mustangs and Twin Otters," he said. "I flew around the world in a Herc, because I was in places like Midway, Japan, Guam, Malaysia, Tanzania, Niger, the Azores, Greenland and the Canadian Arctic. I carried nuclear weapons in the CF-104."
He spent four years on Canadian radar stations and spent three years in Moose Jaw, Sask., teaching NATO students how to fly. He also spent 10 years on Arctic search and rescue missions.
Morgan presently spends many of his daylight hours volunteering. He spends hours at the St. Albert Volunteer Information Centre doing taxes for seniors; he volunteers at bowling with Special Olympics athletes; he served as the Duty Airport Manager for 19 years at Edmonton City Airport and for 30 years organized and chaired the 418 Squadron's annual Air Force Mess dinner.
Morgan Street
Just prior to retirement, Flight Lieutenant Morgan was selected as the 1985 Air Force Association of Canada's National Airman of the year.
Last April Morgan learned of another honour. The City of Edmonton will name a street in Griesbach in his honour.
Morgan has not piloted an aircraft since his retirement, but he is taken with the idea of having a street named in his honour. He is extremely proud of his career as a Canadian Air Force pilot, but that five-decades-old adrenalin rush is still a hard thing for him to put into words.
"It's just something you do automatically. You don't think," Morgan says.
