Oh I've been in a few scrapes like that mate. The worst one was when we hit a WW2 trench hidden in the grass on Salisbury Plain at 25 mph. The panzer stopped dead. I was in the gunner's seat and the gun bounced on impact so the sight hit me square on the forehead and knocked me out. I was saved from serious damage by my helmet. The crew commander had been foolishly holding on to the cupola hatch locking handle and it came down on his napper and knocked him out too - dropping him down on top of me. The driver was knocked out too and the loader dropped like a sack of spuds onto the turret floor but wasn't injured.
Unfortunately there was a fault in that particular mark of Chieftain (Mk 7A) which wasn't known at that time - the traverse gearbox baseplate tended to work loose (we later lockwired the bolts) and ours had been hanging off. On impact it fell off and the traverse pinion (about a foot long) dropped out. The turret then swung on its own accord and as it did so the pinion ripped the hull main junction box off the lower part of the turret, leaving us without electrics.
If that hadn't happened we could probably just have restarted the engines and drove off nursing our sore heads or at worst radioed for help. Not our day I'm afraid, we had to sit there with aching bonces for about an hour before the troop leader's panzer came back looking for us and we were able to get an ARV out to tow us in (and let us plunder their first aid box for aspirin).
That's one of many stories mate. Some of the night time ones are just as good
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam!
unfortunately I'm no longer in a position to arrange this anymore.
