45-year-old John Turner-Bone served as a Royal Navy weapons mechanic for eight years and a policeman for ten. He’s also been a handyman and now has his own garden machinery maintenance company. In his spare time he flies out to disaster zones to help rebuild schools and bring aid to people stricken by hurricanes and flooding. Our reporter Steph Woolvin asked how he finds the time.
John can fix a wide range of mechanical equipment - from guns on navy destroyers to mowers and strimmers! He says people come into his repair unit grasping all kinds of broken items - sometimes even vacuum cleaners! He learnt his skills early as he left school at 16 and went straight into the Royal Navy. He was a fast learner and soon got the job as a weapons engineer mechanic onboard warships. “The biggest ship I served on was HMS Manchester where I shared a mess with 52 shipmates.” John would start his day at 8am and finish at 4pm. There wasn’t much to do in his spare time so he would walk around the ship a good few times a day! “It makes you much more appreciative of open spaces when you’re on a ship for months on end. I did miss not being able to walk down the street or visit the local shop.” Whilst with the Royal Navy John visited Tanzania, Kenya, Singapore, Sri Lanka and most of Europe but was made redundant in 1996 when they began combining operations and engineering jobs.
When he arrived home John felt it was a natural progression to move onto the police force and soon became a constable in Hampshire. After the excitement of the military he looked for opportunities to get involved in the more dangerous activities becoming an advanced driver (so he could do car chases) and learning how to deal with public disorder with riot gear. He says there were few opportunities to actually use the riot gear in Hampshire - just the odd Portsmouth football match brawl! But he found his ‘heart racing moments’ in other ways. Part of his job included late night house warrants, looking for drugs or stolen property. “The build up was always more exciting than the actual event! You would be getting your kit on at 4am wondering who would be in the house and whether they’d put up a fight. But nine out of ten times you wouldn’t need the battering ram as they just opened the door and let us in!”
Nonetheless this fast paced life suited John and his wife Mel, who was also a police officer at the time and all went well until 2003 when John was called to an incident which would end his police career. “I don’t remember much about that day or three days before it. I remember getting in the car and that’s it.” John came off the road and hit a tree at high speed, he damaged his brain and both his lungs collapsed. He was in a coma for a week, then he had brain surgery and spent a month on a neurological ward. After he returned home he had to work with an occupational therapist to see if he could return to the police. Three months passed and he tried to go back but couldn’t bring himself to put the uniform on or get in a car. His superiors suggested office work but even that was too much for John who kept forgetting things as he filled in the various police reports. He was offered medical retirement in 2006 and decided to accept. It was then that he and Mel upped sticks and moved to Dartmouth.
Over the past 10 years the pair have settled into the more relaxed way of life here with John setting up his garden machinery maintenance company in Townstal and Mel working in Seasalt.
He’s in his unit a few days a week mending pretty much anything that’s brought to him and says the best part is meeting the people. “There aren’t many surprises - you roughly know what’s going to happen each day.”
As much as John enjoyed the new pace of life there was a part of him that missed the adrenaline fuelled car chases, late night police raids and overseas military exercises. So last year when he heard a BBC Radio 2 documentary about a charity called Team Rubicon UK (TR UK), which takes military and emergency services veterans out to disaster zones to help rebuild people’s lives, he instantly signed up. Less than a month later Hurricane Matthew hit Haiti, killing 900 people and destroying whole villages. John knew this is exactly the kind of event TR UK members would get involved with, and sure enough the first email came through within days: “It said a recce team was being sent and they would follow up with a full group in the next week. I thought I’d never get picked as I hadn’t even done my induction but I might as well reply with a ‘yes’ to show willing.” Six days later John landed in Haiti.
Each team has an assignment, John’s was to remove debris and build four new schools in villages destroyed by the hurricane. “We stayed in a hotel, well, I use that term in the loosest sense of the word,” smiles John. “We had one room between 12 of us with four fans constantly running! The food wasn’t bad but it was pretty much the same two choices every night for two weeks - goat or chicken with plantain.” John says the worst part of the role is seeing the absolute devastation a natural disaster can bring: “People’s homes were literally flattened but they’re still trying to live in amongst the remains as they have no where else to go. It means so much to them when we show up. I enjoy talking to the children who have so many questions and get very excited when they see a smart phone - they always want to flick through all your photos to get an idea of what life is like in England.”
Most recently, in June, John spent a month in Uganda as Incident Commander with TR UK, building new outdoor kitchens in seven schools in refugee settlements. The majority of residents were fleeing from conflict, natural disasters or famine in the Congo or South Sudan. John says even in the settlement life was very hard for them: “Some huts, and they weren’t big, housed up to 13 people - all crammed in. It was mainly women and children as husbands were often lost during conflict. They’re given land and have to fend for themselves with few handouts.” John says without the school kitchens women have to carry massive pots of food on their heads into the grounds where they heat them on a huge open fire – and if it rains the children don’t eat that day.
When he isn’t rebuilding lives abroad John spends his time training other members of TR UK, maintaining his 27-year-old VW Golf GTi, walking his seven-year-old Rhodesian ridgeback cross Jasper and fishing on his boat. Over the last three summers John has removed, restored and double-glazed all of the original sash windows in his 1910 home. He says he has to admit he does get excited when he hears the ping of a new email wondering where he might be sent to next. He enjoys the uncertainty of waking up not knowing whether he will be heading into town for a pint of milk or for some malaria tablets!
Just as By The Dart went to press with this article (late September 2017) we learned that John had very recently been deployed again with Team Rubicon UK, this time to the Caribbean. Team Rubicon volunteers are on the ground in the Turks and Caicos, the British Virgin Islands, Antigua and Barbados. We understand that John has been sent to Barbados to help with the essential assessment work needed to identify the vital tasks required to help the islands devastated by Irma get back on their feet. An additional 38 volunteers were sent to the Caribbean on the 19th September to support this work and these included John’s partner Mel. With Hurricane Maria threatening to wreak more havoc and disrupt relief efforts as we went to press, Team Rubicon UK’s staff are carefully monitoring the storm’s progression and helping islanders prepare for a second potential hit. More information at www.teamrubiconuk.org
Team Rubicon UK has launched an emergency appeal to fund its work in the Caribbean - www.teamrubiconuk.org/donate/
Have a look also at John’s Total Giving page at https://www.totalgiving.co.uk/mypage/johncaribbeanrum
First published in By The Dart Magazine October 2017
