RIP the last operational Singapore pilot

George Hitchcock, who was the last known pilot to have flown the Short Singapore operationally, passed away earlier this week.

George was the last of the small band of pilots who flew the lumbering giant flying boat operationally keeping Fiji and Tonga’s waterways safe in WWII with No. 5 (GR) Squadron.

George Condor Hitchcock OBE, DFC, MB ChB, MD, FRACS, FRCPA, NZ412006, was a professor of medicine. He had also flown operationally in Bomber Command’s Pathfinder Force from Britain after serving on Vildebeest in Singapore, and RNZAF and US Navy Catalinas the Pacific war. he later flew Catalinas. His was a varied and probably unique career in RNZAF terms.

He was 87.