Eastbourne Airshow

[DirectDrive]

A rare sight from the EB Airshow...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1560557632439537670

@tac might like this

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[tac]

A rare sight from the EB Airshow...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1560557632439537670

@tac might like this

Not a shadow of a doubt, tac LOVES this.

I'll do the same for you guys at the Imperial War Museum Duxford's HUGE 'Battle of Britain' show in 11/12 September.

Battle of Britain Air Show - Duxford Air Shows | IWM Duxford

On the ground, in the air, and even in the clothes you wear! Step back into summer 1940 at the Battle of Britain Air Show and see historic Duxford come to life.

www.iwm.org.uk

 

[DirectDrive]

I think of so many things when I watch that 44 second video.
What do you think about ?

 

[tac]

I think of so many things when I watch that 44 second video.
What do you think about ?

I think about the 55,000+ flyers in Bomber Command who died.

The brave men who flew RAF heavy bombers into the hostile skies over mainland Europe flew 364,514 operational sorties, losing 8,325 planes, 55,573 aircrew KIA (a 44.4% death rate), 8,403 WIA, 9,838 POWs, and 5,327 KIA in training*, with an estimated 15% of training aircraft destroyed by students.

This was in exchange for dropping just over 1 megaton of HE (1,030,500 tons) over six years onto Germany and the conquered nations of Europe. Today, the British have both nuclear weapons for aircraft and MIRV missiles for their subs. Just one warhead reentry vehicle (of four) from a British boomer today has as much as four times that firepower, plus 15 more missiles just like it.

A typical aircrew member had a worse chance of survival than an infantry officer in World War I. Taking an example of 100 airmen:

55 killed on operations or died as a result of wounds
three injured (in varying levels of severity) on operations or active service
12 taken prisoner of war (some wounded)
two shot down and evaded capture
27 survived a tour of operations

Here are four of the young Canadians whose graves I tend, who died when their Handley-Page Hampden Mk1, P1221, flying out of 16 OTU based at RAF Upper Heyford, unaccountably crashed and burned into the field about five miles from my house during their return to base, having landed at Col Jimmy Stewart's US8AAF base at RAF Polebrook to refuel, about five miles from where they crashed. All four died instantly - I hope.


The lady is the niece of the pilot, Sgt Don Lindsey, seen here in the middle - the other two are two other crew member, the photo taken by the fourth.




Typically, just about every detail involving locations here in UK is incorrect, whether intentionally or not, we don't know. Note, however, that the newspaper article contains the words 'killed in action' - over rural Cambridgeshire?

A revisit of the crash site in 2012 proved enigmatic, to say the least. Although they were on a night cross-country navigation exercise deep in rural England, it WAS wartime, and they WERE fully armed up with ammunition. The recovery team from Twin Trees Recovery unit discovered many hundreds of fired .303 cartridge cases. The reason was never mentioned. It can be surmised that they were the victim of a prowling Luftwaffe night fighter, like Sgt Nicky Van der Merwe - http://aircrewremembered.com/van-der-merwe-nicholas.html

Here we are at a recent Remembrance Day service -


Since Canadian service personnel are also members of HM Forces, they can be buried in the graveyards near where they crashed, and often are. Cambridgeshire has over 1500 Canadian war graves all over the county, due, no doubt, to the numerous air bases here, and includes some from WW1 as well, who died here after succumbing from their wounds, or, like the 126 buried in Bodelwyddan Churchyard in North Wales, victims of an awful typhoid outbreak in their holding camp, awaiting repatriation. Spanish flu got some, as well.

They are commemorated in church windows, too, like the on in St Mary's, Ramsey. I'll look up the story of that one, if anybody here in interested. As some of you here know, I also visit the Wall of Remembrance at the American Military Cemetery at Madingley, near Cambridge, to pay my respects to my namesake, 2nd Lt Thomas J Foley and his crew.

 

[Lilhigbee]

Thank you @tac !! I always appreciate your history lessons.

 

[DirectDrive]

Great post @tac !

As a yank and the son of a B-17 left waist gunner, I think of those White Cliffs.
So these are those cliffs that our aircrews were longing to see as they returned from missions over Germany and the occupied territories.
They made it home, almost.
Their landing gear could be shot out.
There could be dead or wounded on board.
Engines could be shot out.

Now to make the landing or should they bail out ?

The ol' man was due to ship out when Germany surrendered.
He always said, that I probably would not exist had he gone into action.