Dear Editor, Claire Usher's feature about the Air Transport Auxiliary brought back a childhood event for me (Post, February 21).

On October 28, 1940, I was a five-year-old pupil at Castle Road School, now Lightwoods School, Warley, on the Wolverhampton Road near to the old Warley Odeon. As we were leaving school that afternoon there was an explosion, and a column of smoke could be seen down the hill beyond the Odeon.

In those days a five-year-old could run around the streets with impunity, and I made my way alone to the junction of Birch Lane and Hagley Road West. An aircraft had crashed there, and men in uniform were scrambling about in the smoking wreckage.

I saw a body lying at the side of the road covered with some kind of blanket. I picked up a couple of pieces of metal, which I still have, from the wrecked aircraft.

One of the men shouted at me, and I ran off to my home at 284 Hagley Road West, about 200 yards away.

The aircraft was a Blenheim Mark IV bomber. One of its wings had been severed when it struck the cable of the barrage balloon located in Ridgeacre Road, Quinton, causing the aircraft to crash.

In recent years, I have confirmed that the pilot, the sole occupant of the aircraft, whose body it would have been that I saw at the crash site, was First Officer, Leonard Satel of the Air Transport Auxiliary. He lived in Maidenhead and was based at White Waltham Aerodrome, Berkshire. He was Polish.

First Officer Satel will never enjoy the publicity attached to the spitfire women of the Second World War. He will never receive the recently-announced award acknowledging his service with the Air Transport Auxiliary.

The fact that he was Polish speaks for itself. He was fighting his war against Nazi Germany, the aggressor who had torn his own country apart, and against whom England had declared war. It was ironic and a tragedy that in the year following the invasion of his homeland First Officer Satel, all the way from Poland, should lose his life by misad-venture in Quinton.

JOHN SANDERS Stourbridge


A much-missed form of public transport

Dear Editor, Concerning the plans to re-introduce the tramway system back to Birmingham after an absence of 56 years, I say welcome back to a much missed form of public transport (Total lack of support, Post Agenda, February 28) Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle and Blackpool have good tramways, why not Birmingham?

Why should the tram be a "white elephant" to Birmingham, but not the other cities mentioned? All of their systems run at a profit, and so would ours. A white elephant is a burdensome or unwanted possession, but Mr Mahmood has yet to describe why he thinks this is so.

Why not a discussion between all Birmingham MPs to get their views? Even one dissenter can cause delays. Perhaps they can persuade Mr Mahmood that, like all of us, he has made a mistake. We want him on our side.



A great cityscape view

Dear Editor, Kelvin Campbell, as part of The Big City Plan, says "Highgate is very close to the city centre, there's a beautiful Victorian park sitting down there".

Working in the Department for Work and Pensions building (that near-borders said park) for 30 years, I have never understood why the council has not purchased the site immediately in front of said building.

Some years ago an American freelance photographer obtained permission to compile panoramic shots from the DWP rooftop, declaring the cityscape view as: "The best I have encountered after trawling the Inner and Outer Ring."

This vantage point is also historically relevant as it is close to the site of the original High Gate and landscaping the site would provide a superb location for locals and tourists to enjoy Brum in all its glory. Why, you can even spy the Flat Iron-inspired building in Bromsgrove Street.

Who needs New York vistas?



Expecting a world class building

Dear Editor, One can but hope that the design of the new magistrates' courts at Eastside (Post, February 25), will be one of merit. However the photographs of the Manchester Civil Justice Centre and the Museum of Sydney look less appealing than the much maligned Central Library.

Several juggernauts appear to have crashed into the side of the main structure of the Manchester building and the Sydney museum seems to be housed in a gigantic removal van.

Perhaps the photographs were taken from an unflattering angle, and these "award-winning architects" will produce a world-class building of which Birmingham, and the Midlands, can be proud.

We should expect nothing less.



Customers will not miss the odd 5p

Dear Editor, Concerning M&S and their laudable attempt to reduce the use of plastic carrier bags.

I would suggest that the 5p charge to M&S customers is not going to amount to a hill of beans when it comes to a change of attitude.

The M&S food hall, where the charge is being introduced, is not known for being the cheapest of food outlets, although admittedly one of the nicest, and consequently the clientele are not usually short of the odd 5p.

Surely the answer to the billions of plastic bags being dumped in landfill sites every year is to stop making them all together.

Long-lasting and reusable green bags could then be sold in their place.

While we are on the subject, maybe food halls and supermarkets could also address the ludicrous amount of packaging that accompanies our purchases.

Polystyrene trays and cling film surround the smallest quantities of food and plastic bottles have completely replaced glass bottles.

Even dishwaster tablets come individually foil wrapped - madness.

I recently opened one cardboard covered bar of soap to discover a plastic film wrapper inside.

The world will not sustain this idiocy for much longer.



Send OAPs to the safety of jail

Dear Editor, With the crime and violence on today's streets - and our politicians and police being all talk and no go - how about releasing all prisoners from jail and replacing them with us OAPs?

After all, having guaranteed food, heating, a roof over our heads and all other facilities on hand can't be a bad thing. And best of all, the "do-gooders" could work wonders for our human rights.

W LANGTON Stechford


Stupidity and hubris of Harry's war

Dear Editor, We learn today that the third in line to the throne is over in Afghanistan fighting Terry Taliban. I'm aghast.

Watching the story on the News At Ten, I found myself getting increasingly angry at the whole situation.

How many millions of pounds have been wasted so that Prince Harry can go and play soldiers?

With our troops constantly complaining that they are ill-equipped for the fight, surely the money spent on protecting the prince would be better spent safeguarding them?

I'm surprised at our newspapers and TV stations agreeing to the black-out and applaud the decision of the Australians who spilled the beans.

Watching the news, I got this strange feeling that I was back in the 1940s, with the Pathé Newsreel in the cinema.

Never have I witnessed such blatant propaganda.

Harry looked completely out of his depth, holding a telephone in a most unusual manner and awkwardly firing a gun.

If I was in his regiment, I'd be very worried today.

Short of publishing the actual grid reference of Harry's bunk, it's impossible to think of a more dangerous revelation. The Taliban must be rubbing their hands in glee. In a single stroke of stupidity and hubris, Harry's war has compromised our mission.

Imagine how the parents of any other squaddy on his tour of duty must feel. There'll be a bounty on his head now and, by extension, on any other soldier in his regiment. The situation must be untenable.

Harry did little to disguise his disappointment when he was forbidden from going to Iraq. That was understandable. He is a soldier and soldiers go to war.

The decision to stop him going was the right one though, and apparently endorsed by his grandmother, the Queen.

Now we find he's in Afghanistan are we supposed to think that this is somehow a less dangerous war?

Certainly the casualties have been fewer so far, but everything we hear about the adventure in Afghanistan is deeply worrying.

Military experts seem to agree on the fact that we are not actually winning the campaign and that the outlook is bleak. Our allies in Iraq have refused to get too deeply involved and the ones who are there are talking of pulling out their troops.

It looks like we'll have a large military presence there for years as there is no apparent exit strategy.

It's also a war that most of us here don't support or understand. Harry thinks he's following in the footsteps of other members of his family who have gone to war, but this is a very different war in a very different time.

The gung-ho spirit drummed up by last night's propaganda merchants doesn't chime with the reality of today.

We live in paranoid times where the enemy could easily be a neighbour or a colleague. Communities are more deeply divided than ever and fundamentalism is on the rise.

The real frontline is in our segregated council estates, not in a desert thousands of miles away.

Moreover, I imagine Prince Harry's mother, the saintly Diana, would be appalled at the prospect of her son going to war. For all her faults, Di was a woman who did much to raise the profile of the innocent victims of conflict; the women and children maimed by land mines.

There was no room in her world for the macho posturing of war games.

Pull Harry out now and save lives.

ALEX ACHURCH Handsworth Wood