One of the last surviving World War Two female 'plotters' has celebrated her 102nd birthday with a surprise RAF visit - and said she'd "do it all again in a heartbeat."
Kate Orchard, from Cornwall, played a vital role during the war, plotting the positions of enemy aircraft - a role hailed as crucial in defeating the Nazis.
She joined the Women’s Auxiliary Corps in 1941, and is the last of a generation who founded the Fighter Controller specialisation during the Second World War.
Kate has now turned 102 and received a surprise visit from nine members of the Royal Air Force’s Deployable Air Defence Flight team at RRH Portreath to her birthday dinner.
She was delighted to be joined by aviators currently deployed to Remote Radar Head Portreath and they reminisced about her efforts in the war to defend the skies from enemy aircraft.
Speaking after the visit Kate, from Camborne, said: "If I could put my uniform back on and do it all over again, I would in a heartbeat."
The team from RRH Portreath said they were honoured to be the surprise guests and were able to swap stories about how the skies above the UK are protected and defended in the modern day.
She added: "I wanted to do something for my country, which we all wanted to do during the war.
"There was a large grid in this room with a map of India.
“As the messages came through you had to identify if it was hostile or friendly. The enemy was the Japanese aircraft. They were the ones we were plotting on the big grid.
“It saved a lot of lives, otherwise we would have been bombed.”
Kate was born into a large Anglo-Indian family, one of 13 brothers and sisters.
Her father worked as chief telegraph officer on the railways, so Kate spent much of her childhood in boarding schools.
Kate trained as a governess after leaving school and was due to go to South Africa with the family she was working for when war broke out in 1939.
India started recruiting women to come and help the war effort in 1941, so the Women’s Auxiliary Corps India was formed.
Having always been interested in aircraft Kate underwent an interview for the Air Defence Centre, in which she passed the tests for speed and plotting.
Two of her sisters, Merle and Helen, joined up at the same time as her and were all on the same watch.
Sergeant Anthony Thompson, 34, was one of the RAF team who joined Kate to celebrate.
Anthony, who is a cyberspace communications specialist within 144 Signals Unit, Deployable Air Defence Flight, is part of a team who have deployed a RADAR to Cornwall to provide 24/7 air surveillance to the UK, developing an air picture, much the same as Kate did over 80 years ago.
Sgt Thompson said: “Whilst the technology of systems that were used during Kate’s time of service have changed, the methods and procedures in how we use the information have fundamentally stayed the same.
“Information from all air defence sites are brought together by the command and control systems within the UK’s Control and Reporting Centres, generating the recognised air picture.
“This is similar to Kate’s role as a plotter within the filter room and is why she was able to save so many lives from enemy bombers.”
Kate was joined by four generations of her family to enjoy the celebrations, including her niece who flew all the way from Switzerland to be part of the special day.
Kate worked in the Air Defence Centre, Number 5 Filter Room, alongside both the RAF and the Indian Air Force, as a plotter/teller on 24-hour watches, plotting aircraft targets and sending signals to the air warning systems.
She rose to the rank of Warrant Officer First Class and became a trainer of new plotters. She also met her husband, Bill, during the war who was serving in India with the Royal Artillery before he was, later, sent to Burma.
Having married in 1944, after the cessation of hostilities, in 1946, the couple moved to Bill’s home in Cornwall – Kate’s first visit to the ‘homeland’.
She wears proudly her 1939-45 Service and India Service Medals when attending VE Day and VJ Day Remembrance Day services and was present at Bentley Priory in 2015 for the Battle of Britain 75th anniversary commemorations.
She was also invited to attend the annual Battle of Britain Sunday service at Westminster Abbey in 2022.
That same year she took to the skies above Helston in a glider, to raise money for Help for Heroes - just nine days before her 100th birthday.
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