MY MEMORIES

Charles Glenn Petersen

1956 - Air Force Years

Hopedale (continued)

There were about 100 men on the base with 10 officers. All buildings on the main part of the base were connected by hallways. About a quarter mile away were the radio communication buildings, one on each side of the main base, one for radio transmission and the other for radio reception.

There were two separate hallways leading to 3 buildings off each hallway with individual rooms for the Airmen. Each room was about 10 feet by 6 feet with a cot, a small closet, and a chair. I have often described them as the size of a jail cell and in effect that is where we were. We were isolated here for one year with no place to go and no possibility of leave. With 160 miles of wilderness between us and the nearest civilization, if you could called Goose Bay AFB civilization, there was no escape.

Our job was to maintain all three of the radars, performing routine maintenance and repairs as needed. The large search radar and the height-finding radar operated 24/7/52. Our maintenance crew was divided into 3 shifts called day, swing, and midnight. We worked in two-man crews, 3 days on the day shift, 3 days on the swing shift, then 3 days on the midnight shift, and 3 days off. After 2 or 3 months of that cycle, we didn’t know which day it was nor what time of the day it was. My brother and I got the idea that we should be assigned to a permanent shift with no rotation and no fixed time off. If we put 3 men on each shift, one guy could get a night off at any time and we would still have at least 2 guys on duty during each shift. Ed and I and a black guy, can’t remember his name, volunteered for the midnight shift. For the next 6 months or so Ed and I worked the midnight shift every single night.