Morning Fewbie Desert Drive - 100 Km + Challenge - Dubai/AD - 05 May 2024

[Aser]

3 hours ago, Andrew John Melvill said:

@Ale Vallecchi thanks for a fantastic drive this morning, that we all managed the complete over 100km through the technical terrain covered is testament to your navigation skills. Proud of the LRDG sticker, my grandfather was a navigator in the LRDG during WW2 in North Africa. 

How interesting, I had no idea about the LRDG ( like probably most people ), thinking the SAS invented the long range vehicles patrols...

Thanks to the sticker I got to read the wikipedia 😅

[Andrew John Melvill]

7 hours ago, Aser said:

How interesting, I had no idea about the LRDG ( like probably most people ), thinking the SAS invented the long range vehicles patrols...

Thanks to the sticker I got to read the wikipedia 😅

Thanks Aser, grandad received a medal for his service with the LRDG as a navigator during the lead up to the battle of El Alamein. He surveyed the artillery positions amongst other information gathering. 

[Ale Vallecchi]

11 hours ago, Andrew John Melvill said:

@Ale Vallecchi thanks for a fantastic drive this morning, that we all managed the complete over 100km through the technical terrain covered is testament to your navigation skills. Proud of the LRDG sticker, my grandfather was a navigator in the LRDG during WW2 in North Africa. 

Amazing @Andrew John Melvill !! There were never more than 350 LRDG commands. You must have had a super grandpa!!

[Andrew John Melvill]

47 minutes ago, Ale Vallecchi said:

Amazing @Andrew John Melvill !! There were never more than 350 LRDG commands. You must have had a super grandpa!!

Thanks Ale, he passed away in 1986 but I remember his stories well and am super proud of him. He was a man of strong convictions and lived by his own rules, even to the point of living in exile due to his liberal political beliefs in 1950's South Africa. Left to settle in Swaziland. 

[Ale Vallecchi]

@Aser @Sviatoslav @RiadJL @Zak_ @Andrew John Melvill @Batuhan Kulac @Johannes Roux @Julien Recan @Hani Howeedy and @Luke K P (even though you already know the story), for more info about the legendary Long Range Desert Group (formerly Long Range Desert Patrols), please visit Long Range Desert Group - Wikipedia

A few notes: Major Bagnold (Ralph Bagnold - Wikipedia) their founder, is also known for studying the dynamic of sand, which explains how dunes and deserts form and "move", as well as he's the "inventor" of tire deflation and dune crossing, discovering the key role of momentum in desert driving. Seems obvious now, but try managing desert crossing in the early 1930's, driving heavy 2-wheel drive cars!!

Major Bagnold is also referenced in the movie "The English Patient", as one of the companions of another great desert explorer, Lazlo Almazy. From 1925 to 1935, Bagnold had explored the Great Libyan Desert, 1,100 miles east to west, 1,000 miles north to south, as part of an international group that included the future central character of the novel and film The English Patient, Hungarian Count Laszlo Almasy. “Never in our peacetime travels had we imagined that war could ever reach the enormous empty solitudes of the inner desert, wailed off by sheer distance, lack of water and impassable seas of sand dunes,” Bagnold remembered. “Little did we dream that any of the special equipment and techniques we had evolved for very long distance travel, and for navigation, would ever be put to serious use.”

For more, read Nomads of War: The Long Range Desert Group - Warfare History Network

[Luke K P]

throwback to the last known photo of LRDG back in 1943,,, i mean 2023 😆


hope to see you all for some further lomg distance patrols soon. 💪

[Ale Vallecchi]

57 minutes ago, Luke K P said:

throwback to the last known photo of LRDG back in 1943,,, i mean 2023 😆


hope to see you all for some further lomg distance patrols soon. 💪

@Luke K P I need to give you the coveted (😉) LRDG sticker. Next drive

[Andrew John Melvill]

Hi @Ale Vallecchi @Luke K P @Aser and anyone who is interested.

A brief history of my Grandfather Alexander Melvill and his involvement with the LRDG.

After Schooling in South Africa he studied mine surveying and started work in the deep gold mines near Springs. After an accident where his entire crew was lost, he missed it as one of his men had left my Grandfathers plumb bob behind and he went to retrieve it. He left the mine and started work in topographic mapping, 

A few years later he went up to then Northern Rhodesia and worked on the Copper mines, once the Great Depression hit re was retrenched and with his pay out flew up to then Tanganika to try his luck.

Here he worked on a gold mine as a mine surveyor and then did topographic mapping along the western border and into what is now the DRC.

In 1936 he returned to South Africa, worked on power station construction and then as a topographic surveyor. During this time he met my Grandmother. 

After the outbreak of the War he volunteered and left his wife and two young boys on the family farm in South Africa. 

He was 1st stationed in East Africa but not long after was transferred to the 8th Army in North Africa, he was officially part of the 46 Survey group. After studying astral navigation, using a theodolite to observe the stars and give precise position coordinates, he was seconded to the LRDG. 

There are two missions that I have been told about in his time with the LRDG.

Near Buerat in Libya he led a small group of men to obtain ground control of an area so that it could be mapped and to confirm the info received from aerial photographs. For this operation he received the Military Medal from General Montgomery.

Just prior to the battle of El Alamein he mapped a route through the Qatara depression, in an area that was only accessible by using the LRDG expertise. In addition to mapping a route for the main army they surveyed enemy positions prior to the main battle of El Alamein. 

After the War he returned to South Africa worked as a miner, surveyor and farmer. 

 

 

Signed Recomendation.pdf

Edited May 9 by Andrew John Melvill

[Emanuel]

59 minutes ago, Andrew John Melvill said:

Hi @Ale Vallecchi @Luke K P @Aser and anyone who is interested.

A brief history of my Grandfather Alexander Melvill and his involvement with the LRDG.

After Schooling in South Africa he studied mine surveying and started work in the deep gold mines near Springs. After an accident where his entire crew was lost, he missed it as one of his men had left my Grandfathers plumb bob behind and he went to retrieve it. He left the mine and started work in topographic mapping, 

A few years later he went up to then Northern Rhodesia and worked on the Copper mines, once the Great Depression hit re was retrenched and with his pay out flew up to then Tanganika to try his luck.

Here he worked on a gold mine as a mine surveyor and then did topographic mapping along the western border and into what is now the DRC.

In 1936 he returned to South Africa, worked on power station construction and then as a topographic surveyor. During this time he met my Grandmother. 

After the outbreak of the War he volunteered and left his wife and two young boys on the family farm in South Africa. 

He was 1st stationed in East Africa but not long after was transferred to the 8th Army in North Africa, he was officially part of the 46 Survey group. After studying astral navigation, using a theodolite to observe the stars and give precise position coordinates, he was seconded to the LRDG. 

There are two missions that I have been told about in his time with the LRDG.

Near Buerat in Libya he led a small group of men to obtain ground control of an area so that it could be mapped and to confirm the info received from aerial photographs. For this operation he received the Military Medal from General Montgomery.

Just prior to the battle of El Alamein he mapped a route through the Qatara depression, in an area that was only accessible by using the LRDG expertise. In addition to mapping a route for the main army they surveyed enemy positions prior to the main battle of El Alamein. 

After the War he returned to South Africa worked as a miner, surveyor and farmer. 

 

 

Signed Recomendation.pdf 146.42 kB · 2 downloads

Amazing story. What an exciting adventurous life. Much to be proud of.