Background
Messenger pigeons have played an important role in combat as a means of transmitting messages from behind enemy lines back to their home base. Around 250,000 war pigeons were used in WW2 as part of the National Pigeon Service.
There are stories of many lives being saved as a result of messages being relayed. On the 19th September 1944, William of Orange flew over 250 miles in 4.5 hours to deliver a message back to England which ultimately saved more than 2000 soldiers in the Battle of Arnhem. On 18th October 1943, another pigeon, G.I. Joe, saved up to 1000 men by flying 20 miles in as many minutes to alert Allied bombers that Calvi Vecchia in Italy had been captured and called off the imminent sortie. Paddy was recognised as the fastest pigeon to arrive back in England with news of the success of the D-Day invasion; flying 230 miles across the English Channel in four hours and fifty minutes. In total, 32 pigeons received the Dickin Medal in recognition of their gallantry and life-saving actions in combat between 1943 and 1947.
The story of the war pigeons came to light again in recent years after the remnants of a messenger pigeon were found in Bletchingley. The coded message attached to its body remains unsolved to this day.
The cache
It seems that ‘Geo Pigeon’ has arrived back in England and she is carrying an important message relating to a secret stash! To find the cache, you need to make your way to the published co-ordinates for some vital information and then complete a field puzzle in a similar way that encrypted messages were sent by some of the war pigeons using a numerical form of one time pad (OTP).
EDIT (15th April 2023)... the original setup involved a Chirp to provide the OTP, but that's gone missing in action... so here's the all-important OTP ... 253123175232402
Please note the attributes and D/T rating of the cache (although no climbing equipment was used in setting up the cache).
Look out for details of a bonus TB to discover along the way.
Waypoint averaging has been used to set the co-ordinates but tree cover may affect the accuracy, especially at certain times of the year. The path to GZ can become very muddy after heavy or prolonged rain.
You shouldn’t really need a checker, but just in case:
