HP42 crash in Berkshire??

Useful list from Fatcivvy. Thanks. ‘My’ photo goes on show soon and we’ll see if any local knowledge turns up to back up the yarn.

According to my source, the pilot was able to pancake in and was lucky enough to survive. The photo shows the aircraft at an alarming angle to the rising ground! 😮

If the picture does portray a HP42 in a vertical dive at only a few hundred feet above the ground I would seriously doubt that recovery to level flight, or even a small reduction in dive angle could be achieved before striking the ground, making any chance of survival impossible.

Richard

Maybe I’ve been shot a line…

The photo is 90 deg out and that’s not a hedge, but the edge, of a piece of tape on the neg or the edge of a part frame (last)if the strip has reached it’s end or indeed the corner of a building.
In my view it’s a normal pic of an HP.42 sedately flying along and “snapped” too late.

John

All sound reasoning. My source may be shooting me a line in that case.:rolleyes:

The photo is 90 deg out and that’s not a hedge, but the edge, of a piece of tape on the neg or the edge of a part frame (last)if the strip has reached it’s end or indeed the corner of a building.
In my view it’s a normal pic of an HP.42 sedately flying along and “snapped” too late.

John

I had considered the orientation of the picture – and will go look again. I don’t recognise the ‘horizon’ from anywhere around here, unless it’s a hedge.
Constructive thoughts, gents.

Wrong way up

I Tend to agree about the orientation the highlights on the clouds are on left hand side the cloud formation on the right appears to be Cumulus (2,000 to 20,000 feet) the cloud formation of the left Cirrus (25,000 to 40,000 feet).

[photo geek hat on]
Measure up the print – is it approximately 6cm by 4.5cm? If so it’s a contact print from a half-frame negative on 120 film, and you’re looking at it sideways. Even if it isn’t (you could get the kit for enlarging your own stuff at home by about 1900, so it might be an enlargement, though I’d bet on a contact print), I still think you’ve got a film format where the long axis of the negative is vertical – the same for a 127 print would probably be 4x3cm – and you’re looking at it sideways.
[/photo geek hat on]

I’m 99% certain John Ac has got it.

Adrian

No surely it’s just a spot of aerobatics. Wasn’t that what the H.P.42 was designed for? A quick loop, to keep the passengers interested, then pancake into the field, toodle off to the telephone box and call those nice chaps at Imperial for a charabanc to pick up the passengers, and take them on to Croydon, and whilst at it, send the engineeer down because the old girl might need a few things doing to her before she’s flown out of the field unladen!

Is that photo not 90 deg out and the end of a strip. Because if not that ‘aint a crash thats a disaster.

John

My thoughts too.

Richard

Is that photo not 90 deg out and the end of a strip. Because if not that ‘aint a crash thats a disaster.

John

Why don’t you post the photo, which may give some assistance in answering your question, Ian.

Good thinking, Batman, although I doubt that the photo will cast much light.
Thanks to all who responded. My own Googling on the topic made me wonder if the story was wholly true. (I like the Hannibal theory.)

There was a crash on the old airstrip at Penshurst, Kent, although this might also be the one referred to as Tonbridge in an earlier post.

Steve.

One other source of information might be the BA Archive at Heathrow. When I went there a couple of years ago they were VERY helpful and they have a BIG archive.

Laurence

appologies you already have !!

you could possibly rule in hannibal of course !! if the position of an early crash is known

1. AVIA5/13 (section 18) – Describes a crash the Hannibal had early on in its life. A single engine failed followed by the failure of one of the other engines. The aircraft made a forced landing in a field. Most of the damage to the Hannibal was sustained when it hit obstacles in the field. None of the passengers or crew were hurt.

Mine too. What if it turned out to be Hannibal, just slightly off course? Except it’s the wrong year.

I’ll get my coat, as they say.

Laurence

My early morning thoughts as well! 😉

I have been given a photo linked to the reported crash of a Handley Page HP42/45 airliner near Moulsford, Berks (now Oxon.) in 1934 or 1936.

Why don’t you post the photo, which may give some assistance in answering your question, Ian.

That’s the one. I even spent some time looking for it between Dibba and Sharjah but, not surprisingly, nothing to report.

Laurence

http://www.rrhobby.ca/flight_cw197.htm

O
G-AAGX (Hannibal) – Lost at sea over the Gulf of Oman on 01/03/40

Is that one still clouded in a veil of (Official) Secrecy?