A neighbour has just loaned me a folder with copies of the Navigators log, gee chart and personal notes that tell the story of three Lancaster missions from 227 squadron based at Newark. (Balderton)
1. Marshalling yard at Heilbronn 4/5th Dec 44 – Lancaster ND342 E for Easy
2. Dortmund Ems canal – Laderbergen 7th Feb 45 – Lancaster PD348 B for Baker
3. Politz oil plant Stettin – 8th Feb 45 – Lancaster PD348 B for Baker
On the last mission the aircraft took off with the two inner engines failing immediately and a load of 14 x 500 lbs and a 4,000 lb Cookie.
The safe height for dropping the 500 lbs was 700 feet and 6000 feet for the cookie. Unfortunately the full load, two engines only meant that she could only reach 500 feet and dropped the 500lbs in two sticks into the sea. She then crash landed with the cookie onboard at Heath farm, Sandringham. All crew legged it safely and the cookie was defused the following day.
Is this information in the public domain any where else ?
I found it informative to read about Gee plots, Lorans, window dropping etc.
Edit added a couple of images of pages.
By: lanc35 - 28th June 2017 at 15:57
The publications at the time refer to it as a Gee fix, so this ‘Gee Box Fix’ is probably just used to summarize the log at that point.
Depending how the cookie was armed, they probably weren’t able to drop it ‘safe’ either even if they had they reached 6000ft.
On one mission that G-George (W4783) 460 Sqn RAAF flew, they were over the target at 6000ft and dropped their 4000lb bomb and it buffeted the aircraft so much that it popped out one of escape hatches.
I’ve also read of a ditching where they dropped one at 4,500ft which must have been pretty bad.
The chart you’ve posted is also the Navigators plotting map which shows all his workings such as fixes, wind and air and ground positions etc.
A Gee chart or lattice chart would typically be in 3 different colours and have arcs coming out of the various stations, like ripples in a pond.
Thanks for posting the information.
By: TwinOtter23 - 28th June 2017 at 15:47
Brian, it might be worth following the link on the NAM website to the RAF Balderton book/research project. They have access to the Ray Searle 227 Squadron history, ORBs etc., I will flag it up to them as well. When I was last in Hangar 2 their
Cockpit-Fest display that logged all of the station losses was still on display – currently I do not have access to my PC/files.
By: AndyY - 28th June 2017 at 12:19
Fascinating!
I find it intriguing that it always refers to ‘Gee Box Fix’ as opposed to simply ‘Gee Fix’. It’s always good to know the terminology of the time.
Andy
By: scotavia - 28th June 2017 at 12:10
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/boards/topics.Military.uk.raf/17.2.1.2.1.1.1.1.1.1.1/mb.ashx
There might be a contact among these posts which deal with the same unit and mentions the crash.
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June 28, 2017 at 10:35 am