dramatic rescue of a racing pigeon 40 years ago.

something i found on internet

Geoff Hayes, 90, of Ilkeston, recalls his dramatic rescue of a racing pigeon 40 years ago.

I WAS employed as a rigger's mate, working full-time on and around the iron furnaces at Stanton Ironworks.

It was generally hard and brutal work. You were involved with heavy blocks and tackle, pull lifts, always clambering and climbing the furnaces and gas stores.

I had been doing this work for at least 15 years, so I knew a little bit about furnaces, gas plants, cleaning plants, casting plants, the works.
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One lovely summer Friday afternoon, when I was the last man in the queue waiting patiently to clock out at about 4pm, I looked skywards idly watching a flight of pigeons flying high towards the ironworks.

To hazard a guess, I would have said about 25 of them. I calculated they were about 150ft high, flying fast in full racing mode.

They looked small for pigeons but they looked very fit and businesslike. They were passing over No 3 furnace when the unthinkable happened – one of them collided with the boom wire at the furnace top. The very top.

It spiraled down in a small heap. I guessed it was quite dead, lying on the very top of the furnace platform where it would be blown with the skips of coke and other materials into the furnace. I stood there, just taking in the scene.

The rest of the birds continued their flight and disappeared into the distance.

"It must be dead, surely, but just suppose it isn't," I thought to myself. "Will it be lying there, helpless?"

I moved forward to clock out and, having done so, I had made up my mind to find out. I walked out with my cycle back down into the furnace yard. My luck was in.

There was no-one about, the entire furnace yard was deserted and there was no-one in the haulage winding house. I looked all around again. A second's prayer, then it was up and over the safety gate I went.

Soon I was racing up the steel staircase to the landing walk. I walked fast and came to furnace No 3. I was soon climbing up the vertical steel rungs to the summit of the furnace. I was nearly drowned by the cooling waters but, not to worry, I was almost at the top.

I reached and pulled myself on to the platform. I passed through the safety rails and I soon saw the poor little bird.

I picked it up and shoved him, very gently of course, down my shirt front and soon was making my way down the side of the furnace.

Where I'd been was "strictly forbidden" unless all arranged and having specially trained safety officers in attendance.

There was a well-told story about a furnace workman who disappeared from the furnaces a few years before my time. He was working on the coke burners and just disappeared.

It was assumed he had fallen down the chute into the large skip, lost consciousness, then tonnes of coke and materials had been tipped on to him. He would then have been hauled up the rails to the summit and tipped into the furnace. He had clocked on as usual that morning but was never seen again.

I scuttled down the furnace staircase, up and over the gate and, with my bike to hand, set off for home.

I shouted for my wife, June, when I arrived and retrieved the little bird. We checked it over. It was blue-grey in colour. It was small and we were still not sure whether it was dead or alive. It had a wound the size of a half crown on its body which was caused by the collision with the wire at the furnace top. We treated that with antiseptic.

I took him to our dog kennel, placed him on the straw, left some drinking water and locked the door. We would wait and see.

At first light, the next morning, I went to check him out and we were delighted to see him on his feet. It made June and I feel good. I bought some pigeon meal, I put a perch up and he was kept in the quiet for a fortnight.

He started hopping on his perch. I then made inquiries with a pigeon trainer I knew in Trowell. I got the address of the Pigeon Racing Association, sent them the bird's racing number and included a stamped addressed envelope with my details.

Eventually, a letter arrived from the bird's owner who lived in Northumberland. The bird was an expensive one. I contacted him and told him the story. He came on a Saturday morning while June and I were out.

He took the pigeon, leaving me a lovely letter of thanks which ended with the words, "Yours in sport".

I read this over and over. Those three words meant everything. I just smiled.

It would need a king's ransom, in fact more than a king's ransom, to surpass my pure joy.