London to Kathmandu - Turkey; the breakdown
Autumn 1978
It was early morning. It was cold, very cold. We were in the Eastern Anatolia Region of Eastern Turkey, in the mountains. Everybody was keen to get going. We had been watchful during the night because, at the time, Eastern Turkey was known to have bandits, and westerners were rich pickings. Breakfast dealt with and packed up. Everyone was on board, in their thick coats, still shivering. The engine had warmed up, and we set off. We were on dirt roads that were a lot better than some. We were making reasonable progress. Then we came to an incline. We were in the mountains so that was not unexpected. What was unexpected was that a short while later we came upon a queue of tipper trucks and some roadworks.
I took the view at the time that they were construction trucks waiting for their spot it he works. I started to pass them. Kids on the trucks, noting abnormal in that, started to throw rocks from the load at us. It was not the first time that hostility had been shown to westerners in the region. Foot down a bit harder, change gear, more speed required to get away form the rock throwing. Some forty years later, writing this, it could be that they were throwing rocks to indicate their disapproval at us queue jumping, and that those particular tipper trucks were not part of the works, but also queuing to get past. It became a mute point, we were no longer queue jumping, the engine blew and we came to a juddering halt.
Minutes before we were having rocks throw at us, and now we were stuck in the middle of it. Not a pleasant situation. It was not a safe place to investigate, and most definitely not somewhere we could stay the night. The highest priority now was to get to a place of safety. We arranged a tow to the nearest village with a police station. Personally i don't remember much about the village, and only a little about the police station. Appaerntly, from a Enflash reporting the incident, the village was Yüksekova. We negotiated with the police to park and camp in their yard. A degree of safety established, it was time to find out what had happened to the engine.
The weather in the region is very extreme. The region has the lowest average temperature of all Turkish regions, with -25 °C. Although it can get below -40 °C. Fingers would stick to the engine because of the cold. A bowl of water was kept warm by the team, continually boiling the kettle. The whole bowl of water froze solid in half an hour once the sun had gone down. I am sure somebody could calculate the approximate temperature from that, having made some assumptions. A quick dinner rustled together by the team who appeared to be holding up well, and it was time for bed. Sitting around the back of the truck chatting away the evening, did not seem to be high on the agenda. Tents are not a good place to sleep in those sort of extreme temperatures. I suggested that for those that could, inhibitions should be put aside, for the time being, with two to a sleeping bag could be a warmer option. I know that some took up the suggestion. EO tents are thin at the best of times. All pitched together in a confined space, conversations are difficult not to be overheard. "If you keep on wiggling like that there won't be room for both of us in this bag!!".
In the morning, back to the engine. There are some inherent problems with working on a Bedford TM. Firstly, I should point out that they were one of the most workable trucks of the day. The were good workhorses that sold well globally. As a result parts were readily available throughout most of Asia and Africa. Bedfords were perhaps not as as sophisticated as some competitors of the day, and it is very true that they were not the most powerful. They were however, very simple to work on, even on the roadside. They were ideal for unsupported expeditions because of the simplicity of maintenance and availability of parts. Obviously in a military situation, the vehicles are generally supported, which is a different scenario. However, although most repairs and maintenance were easy and accessible, working on the engine was not. The Bedford MK was the 4x4 variant of the Bedford TK which was launched in 1959, before tilting cabs had come into use. Access to the engine under the cab was by small wing panels towards the back of the cab, on both sides. This is OK for most things, but bigger jobs need the cab to be lifted off, or the engine dropped. Neither being roadside activities.
There was a hole in the side of the engine. Straight through the casting. The problem is then, how much damage has been done to the inside of the engine and is it repairable, even as a temporary fix. Time to start stripping the engine down and taking the head off. This involves removing the push rods. All but one is easy to remove. the back one hits the floor of the cab above the engine before it is clear. That is a real problem. It is still very cold so the rod is as short as it is going to be. The fingers are still sticking to the cold metal. Will the rod break if I flex it and force it out without lifting the cab off? Will it still work if I do, or will it be slightly bent, upsetting the timing of the engine at the very least. Taking the cab off in this situation was not an option. Without the rod coming out we were not going anywhere. So, after another cup of tea, it was time to just do it. There, it was out. The team helped throughout, making tea, boiling water for the bowl, putting up with the dining fold up bench becoming a workbench. All these years latter I don't remember any whinging about the situation. Congratulations to the team for that. It was not part of the itinerary, and it was cold without respite or diversion. There was nothing to do in the small village. At least we were safe.
Head off, and the extent of the damage was clear. It was a thrown rod. Only one, and it appeared that it had not done any collateral damage apart from the hole in the casing. The sump was still intact and the head was undamaged. Such a catastrophic engine failure would normally result in a complete engine replacement. That could not be undertaken here. We had to get to somewhere with more facilities. Even if I called for Encounter Overland help, it would have to be done somewhere else. Was it time to abandon the trip? What was the best for the team and the trip?
It was getting late in the day again. I talked to the team about the option of going to the nearest big town to buy parts for a temporary repair. A piston, rings, small end, conrod, and big end shells should be enough. I can patch the hole as it is in a low pressure area. That would enable us to move forward until a permanent solution can be achieved. I did not talk to them about the more desperate options, including abandoning the expedition.
The dash for parts
Decision made. Time to set off. I asked for a volunteer to accompany me, preferably a German speaker. English is not the second language in Turkey, German is. One of the Swiss girls volunteered. For the avoidance of doubt and speculation, she was not my girlfriend. I also asked for as much cash as people could spare, either in Turkish Lira or negotiable foreign currency, with it all written down, with a promise to pay it all back. I can't remember if we had to get a taxi to catch the bus. We definitely had to do so on the return. Once on the bus we were driven through the night to, Erzurum I think. The first big city from our little bolt hole. The first place that I thought there was a reasonable chance of there being a Bedford dealer with all the parts we needed. As we got closer to Erzurum we relised that we were about to arrive in the middle of the night, with nowhere to go or stay whilst we waited hours for the first shops to open in the morning. I discussed our options with my companion, and then the bus driver. We carried on all the way to Ankara, about 550 miles /900km and another 10 hours on the road. However, it meant that we had an even higher probability of finding the parts, and the shops would be open by the time we arrived. I had been to Ankara before, on trips before I joined Encounter Overland, and easily found the motor area. Not long and we found the right place. We managed to communicate with a mix of various languages, hand gestures, and pointing. He had all the parts, and then offered to sweat the small end on. This was really good of him as it would have proved difficult in the field. The garage / shop had a stove, very old fashioned but it provided some warmth. He put the piston and con rod on the top, where the kettle would often sit. Ten, fifteen minutes later and he carefully picked up the warm parts and gently persuaded the cold small end home, into the very slightly larger, warm parts. A few minutes later, the parts had cooled enough for us to carry them and were firmly fixed together.
The next decision was whether to find the main post office. Either to telex EO London or to try to book an international phone call. Yes, that's right, you have to prebook use of either the phone or the telex, with telex frequently being easier to get time on. With the telex you wrote your message and the operator sent it. If something came back, you wrote another message in reply. Not the most efficient in today's terms, but once started it was near instant communication. I know of some UK companies that had whole floors dedicated to communications and they were staffed with telex operators 24 hours a day, all day, all year. However, delaying catching the bus back would leave the rest of the team on their own for a whole day longer. That was not fair to them so we skipped the post office and went back to the bus station. On to the bus, and then a taxi back to the group as dinner was being served the next day.
Unbeknown to me, some of the group had become concerned. There was disquiet in the camp. Somebody had persuaded our hosts, the police, and had contacted the EO office in London. There is somewhere in the back of my mind, that I may have suggested the phone call. Either way, nobody told me that they had done so. An hour or so later a person climbed into the back of the truck out of the darkness. Greeting us all in farsi. I went to challenge the stranger, only to find that it was Ian Way, the Hot Seat occupant from the London Office. He had just arrived by taxi from the same town we had come from. He compared taxi fares and concluded he had paid more even before the extra he had to pay for a broken windscreen. It was of course his fault it became broken as if he was not a passenger, the taxi driver, would not have been driving, and therefore the windscreen would not have broken. I learn later the EO London was told I had ran of with a girl and all of the money, and had abandoned the group in the middle of nowhere.
In fact the volunteer and I had travelled over 1500 miles on buses, there and back, in just about two days. I thought that was quite a feat. I am guessing that the call was made to EO London quite soon after we left, for Ian to have been able to arrange flights and get there in that time.
Still, it was good that they had called for help because it was easier with Ian there to help resolve all the issues. Some of the team were happier, with the extra attention as well. I admit, that keeping the EMs happy had become slightly secondary to keeping them safe and resolving the issues. The next day I think I put the engine back together. However, the temporary repair was never tested. Ian arranged for us to be towed to the Iranian border, and then to the nearest town. The truck was dropped of at a garage and we all went to a hotel. After showers all round it was time for group dinner. Warm for the first time in ages. There was a sense of relief, and anticipation for a good, hot meal in comfort.
As we were eating another Encounter Overland team arrived. A female leader / driver, Lindi Wall, with one of two Encounter Overland six wheel Bedford KM trucks.
War broke out in Iran
Whilst we were happy to be out of Eastern Turkey, it was a bit of frying pan and fire as there were tanks on the street we were staying on and a hotel further down the street was burnt down for having westerners, apparently. Civil War had broken out in Iran colminating in the appointment by the Shar of a military government on the 5th November 1978.
Again, no memory of the name of the village, but the Enflash report came to the rescue again. Apparently it was Rezaieh, or Rezaiyeh, now known as Urmia.
I can't remember how long Ian and the group stayed in the hotel before resuming the trip on public transport. That was the end of my involvement with the group, and I did not hear how they got on for the remainder of their trip.
I stayed behind, visiting the truck daily. The garage lifted the cab off and extracted the failed engine. Two EO drivers struggled through the snow in Eastern Turkey and arrived in a truck from Wren Park with a spare engine. It did not take long for the garage to swop the engine over and put the cab back on. The failed engine was put in the back of the truck that brought the spare, for failure analysis back in the UK. We set off together to get back to the UK as soon as possible. We got stopped by the police on our short journey through Italy, it was Sunday and apparently it was illegal to drive trucks on Sunday. We had to stay in the layby until Monday, but we got away without being fined. The rest of the journey to the UK was uneventful all the way back to Wren Park. I worked there until my next Encounter Overland trip, which was in January 1979,London to Johannesburg.
Please drop me a line if you can fill in any of the gray areas, or if you were on the trip.
Update on the group. Apparently Ian Way was told by the Chief of Police to get out of Iran because of the disturbances. He took them through Iran on public transport. The plan was for the truck from Wren Park to be the replacement but the situation did not allow the time. Another truck came from Kathmandu to pick up the group. They met up in Kabul. Afghanistan was also in a state of turmoil at the time following the Russian invasion in April.
A final quote from Enflash;-
'A very happy group arrived at KGH on the 16th of December and all send thanks to yourself and EO for doing a good job.'
KGH refers to Kathmandu Guest House and yourself, to Ian Way, the knight in shining armour.
The group most definitely had had an expedition that they could talk about for the rest of their lives. As for EO, I think it performed really well, reinforced it's top of the tree reputation, and demonstrated that a company with the right resources and willpower can resolve issues. Only one day late in Kathmandu.
