WITH less than 24 hours notice, a team of personnel from RAF Brize Norton flew out to lead the Government’s aid effort in the Philippines following Typhoon Haiyan.

But Squadron leader David Blakemore – who captained the flight – said it was all in a day’s work.

He returned from the disaster-stricken country this week and has spoken of his pride at being involved in delivering 200,000lbs of digging equipment, cutting tools and tents.

At least 4,000 people are thought to have been killed and four million people left homesless following the typhoon 14 days ago. Sqn Ldr Blakemore, 36, said: “It is nice to be able to help out and see the direct effect of putting equipment on the ground.

“Those tents are now being used by people who did not have shelter before.

“We are really proud to be helping out.”

He and his team began putting the operation together from Singapore on Wednesday of last week, just two days before the C-17 took off from RAF Brize Norton.

Sqn Ldr Blakemore said: “We had pretty much less than 24 hours’ notice to fly out to Singapore. We were waiting for the aircraft to come to us.”

The C-17 was flown first by another crew from Brize, before it stopped to refuel at an airbase near Dubai and again at Paya Lebar in Singapore. There Sqn Ldr Blakemore’s team took over and flew to Mactan Cebu airport in the Philippines.

The crew made two trips, the first on Saturday carrying 100,000lbs of equipment.

They then flew back to Singapore, where they got a night’s sleep before flying back in to deliver 14 palettes of tents on Sunday. As the team flew into Cebu, their view was restricted by cloud cover, but Sq Ldr Blakemore said the flooding was still visible.

He said: “When we arrived there was a lot of aid waiting to be distributed, alhtough the British ambassador was really keen to emphasise the British aid was already earmarked to go out. To be fair, it was just a day’s work for us, but it is a new part of the world that we rarely operate in.

“There was the challenge of operating in unfamiliar part of the world, and there were a few thunder storms in the area – but that is standard weather for the area. It went very, very well.”

Witney Rotary Club ran an emergency collection for typhoon victims on Saturday to raise £3,201 for Shelterbox tents, which included donations of £228 from the churches of Wychwood and £161 from St Mary’s, Witney.