The FAAAA was saddened to learn of the passing of W3110 John Leak on 27 October 2016. John lost wife Mandy recently and had gone down fast after that.
John passed away on 27 October 2016. There was a private family funeral at Kilcoy, followed on 2nd November by “memorial drinks” on the Gold Coast, arranged by his family and hosted by the Vietnam Veterans Golfers. A small Navy party (Rod Fayle, Gary Northern and Geoff Vidal) attended.
Rod Fayle recalled that John was one of his term at RANC, joining in 1959. Other members of that term were Andy Craig and Bob Salmon.
After leaving RANC, and the Navy, John later rejoined as an adult recruit but was quickly Commissioned into the Supplementary List (Aviation) and was one of the first contingent of helicopter pilots to go to South Vietnam, under Neil Ralph. He flew helicopter gunships, using the callsign ”Taipan”.
John sponsored an annual TAIPAN golf day for the Vietnam Veteran Golfers explaining that this was in memory of Tony Casadio and Darkie Phillips who were killed in a gunship in August 1968.
