Captain Schaffner story Binbrook 1970's(Merged thread)

RAF Binbrook (Sept. 8, 1970)
At six minutes past ten on the night of 8 September 1970, a single Lighning Jet Fighter took off from RAF Binbrook, the North Linclonshire base near Grimsby.

Ground crew on the flight line were accustomed to Lighnings being scrambled in a hurry ant time of day or night. Binbrrok, after all, was a front-line fighter station and its aircraft shared QRA – Quick Reaction Alert – duty with other East Coast airfields to provide cover should any unidentifiable aircraft appear on the radar screens.

The pilot was Captain William Schaffner of the United States Air Force, who was on his second tour as an exchange pilot with the RAF.

Schaffner was a vastly experienced jet fighter pilot with combat experience behind him in Vietnam. He had been at Binbrook for some time and his wife was living on the base with him.

The aircraft, XS894, a Lightning F6 of 5 squadron, whose call-sign that night was Foxtrot 94, turned out over the North Sea – and disappeared into what is fast becoming one of the great aviation puzzles of recent times.

Early the following morning, XS894 ditched in the sea off Flamborough Head.

The ditching was witnessed by the crew of a Shackleton reconnaissance aircraft. Flares were spotted by the Grimsby trawler ‘Ross Kestrel’. But no trace was found of Captain Schaffner was ever found.

More than a month later the wreckage of the aircraft was found on the sea-bed by Royal Navy divers. Despite earlier reports to the contrary, the cockpit was empty and the canopy closed.

Captain Schaffner had vanished.

The chain of events which led to the jet crash starts at Saxa Vord, one of the chain of radar stations whose task it was to spot unidentified aircraft approaching the North sea, or the sensitive ‘Iceland Gap’.

This was 1970 when the Cold war was at its height and Russian aircraft made regular sorties into the North Atlantic and along the British Coast to test the reaction of NATO fighters.

ON this particular night, a radar operator at Saxa Vord picked up the blip of an unidentified aircraft over the North sea halfway between the Shetlands and Alesund in Norway.

The contact was monitered for several minutes at a steady speed of 630 mph, at 37,000ft holding altitude and on a south-westerly heading.

The Saxa Vord noted the conact was turning through 30 degrees to head due south. It increased speed to 900mph and climbed to 44,000ft.

Radar contollers at Saxa Vord flashed a scramble message to the QRA Flight at the nearest NATO airfield, RAF Leuchars on the east coast of Scotland, not far from Dundee.

There, two Lightning interceptors, ready for just an alert, scrambled and within minutes were airborne and heading out over the North sea.

After checking the position of their tanker, a Victor K1A, the two fighters were guided north by Saxa Vord.

But it was then that the radar plotters on the Shetland Islands saw something on their screens which they found impossible to believe.

The contact they had been tracking, at speeds and altitudes consistant with modern Russian warplanes, turned through 180 degrees on a due north heading, and within seconds disappeared off their screens. Later they calculated that to do this its speed must have been in the region of 17,400mph.

During the next hour, the mystery contact reappeared several times, approaching from the north. Each time the Lightnings were sent north to intercept, it turned and diappeared again.

By now two F4 Phantoms of the US Air Force had been scrambled from the American base at Keflavik in Iceland. They had much more sophisticated radar than the British Lightnings and were able to pick up the contact themselves.

But when they too, tried to get close enough to identify what was by now beginning to cause some alarm to NATO commanders, they found they were just as impotent as the Lightnings.

The alert had reached such a level that the contact was being monitored at the Ballistic Missile Earling Warning System at Fylingdales.

The information they were collecting was relayed to the North American Air Defence Command at Cheyenne Mountain and the US Detection and Tracking Centre at Colorado Springs.

RAF staff at Fylingdales heard ominously that the Stategic Air Command HQ at Omaha, Nebraska, was ordering its B-52 bombers into the air.

It was an order that could only have come from the highest level. What had started as a routine sighting of what was believed to be a Russian aircraft had nw reached the White House and, presumably, President Richard Nixon.

At around 21.45 a request made from a high level within North American Air Defence, through Strike Command’s UK headquarters at High Wycombe, for RAF Binbrook to send Capt’ Schaffner to join the Lightnings looking for the mystery contact.

NATO forces were being brought up to full alert by a mystery object picked up by radar over the North Sea. At first it appeared to be yet another Russian aircraft out to test the reflexes of Allied air forces. But the object began behaving in a way which baffled radar controllers.

At 22.06 Captain Schaffner blasted off from Binbrook’s main runway into the night sky.

By now the mystery contact which involved the five Lightnings, two Phantoms, three tankers and a Shackleton being scrambled over the North sea was being tracked by the radar controllers at Staxton Wold.

The contact was flying parallel to the East Coast 90 miles east of Whitby at 530mph at 6,100ft – an ideal course for an interception by a Binbrook Lightning.

Whats follows next is drawn from what I have been told is the official transcript of the conversation between Schaffner and the radar station at Staxton Wold:

Schaffner: I have visual contact, repeat visual contact. Over.

Staxton: Can you identify aircraft type?

Schaffner: Negative, nothing recognisable, no clear outlines. There is … bluish light. Hell that’s bright … very bright.

Staxton: Are your instruments functioning, 94? Check compass. Over.

Schaffner: Affirmative, GCI (ground control). I’m alongside it now, maybe 600ft off my … Jeeze, that’s bright, it hurts my eyes to look at it for more than a few seconds.

Staxton: How close are you now?

Schaffner: About 400ft, he’s still in my three o’ clock. Hey wait … there’s something else. It’s like a large soccer ball. It’s like it’s made of glass.

Staxton: Is it part of the object or independant? Over.

Schaffner: It … no, it’s separate from the main body … the conical shape … it’s at the back end, the sharp end of the shape. It’s like bobbing up and down and going from side to side slowly. It maybe the power source. There’s no sign of ballistics.

Staxtion: Is there any sign of occupation? Over.

Schaffner: Negative, nothing.

Staxton: Can you assess the rate?

Schaffner: Contact in gentle descent. Am going with it…50…no about 70ft … it’s levelled out again.

Staxton: Is the ball object still with it? Over.

Schaffner: Affirmative. It’s not actually connected … maybe a magnetic attraction to the conical shape. There’s a haze of light. Ye’ow … it’s within heat haze. Wait a second, it’s turning… coming straight for me… am taking evasive action…a few…I can hardl…

Staxton: 94? Come in 94. Foxtrot 94, are you receiving? Over. Come in 94. Over.

Radar controllers at Staxton Wold had guided the Lightning from Binbrook to the mystery contact which had been eluding its NATO trackers for almost four hours.

Just as the controller lost contact with Captain Schaffner, a radar operator who had been tracking the Lightning and the mystery object it had intercepted, watched in disbelief.

The two blips on the screen, representing the fighter and its quarry, slowly merged into one, decelerating rapidly from over 500mph until they became stationary 6,000ft above the North Sea 140 miles out of Alnwick.

Two and a half minutes after the single blip came to a halt it started to move again, accelerating to 600mph and climbing to 9,000ft, heading south back towards Staxton.

Shortly afterwards the single blip separated into two, one maintaining its southerly heading, somewhat erratically, at between 600 and 630mph and descending slowly, the other turning through 180 degrees to head north-westerly and vanishing at a speed later calculkated to be around 20,400mph.

While all this was going on a Shackleton MR3, which had been on patrol off the Firth of Forth, was ordered to hold station around Flamborough Head.

The Staxton Wold re-established contact with Captain Schaffner.

Schaffner: GCI … are you receiving? Over.

Staxton: Affirmative 94. What is your condition? Over.

Schaffner: Not too good. I can’t think what has happened… I feel kinda dizzy… I can see shooting stars.

Staxton: Can you see your instruments? Over.

Schaffner: Affirmative, but er…the compass is useless …

Staxton: Foxtrot 94, turn 043 degrees. Over.

Schaffner: Er … all directional instruments are out, repeat useless. Over.

Staxton: Roger 94, execute turn right, estimate quarter turn. Over.

Schaffner: Turning now.

Staxton: Come further 94. That’s good. Is your altimeter functioning? Over.

Schaffner: Affirmative GCI.

Staxton: Descend to 3,500ft. Over.

Schaffner: Roger GCI.

Staxton: What’s your fuel state 94? Over.

Schaffner: About 30 per cent GCI.

Staxton: That’s what we calculated. Can you tell us what happened 94? Over.

Schaffner: I don’t know. It came in close … I shut my eyes … I figure I must’ve blacked out for a few seconds.

Staxton: OK 94. Standby.

At this stage the Shackleton arrived over Flamborough Head and began circling before XS894 was vectored into the area by the Staxton controllers.

Schaffner: Can you bring me in GCI? Over.

Staxton: Er… Hold Station, 94. Over.

Several minutes then elapsed as Schaffner was left to circle the Flamborough area along with the Shackleton.

In the meantime, Strike Command at High Wycombe had instructed Staxton Wold to request Captain Schaffner to ditch his Lightning off Flamborough.

Although Captain Schaffner had plenty of fuel to reach either nearby Leconfield or his home base of Binbrook, it appears the reason for the descision to ditch was a fear that the Lightning had somehow become “contaminated” during its mystery interception over the North Sea.

It may well be the fear that the aircraft had suffered radiation contamination, although some weeks later, when the wreckage was examined at Binbrook, there was no trace of contamination of anything other than salt water.

Staxton: Foxtrot 94. Can you ditch aircraft? Over.

Schaffner: She’s handling fine. I can bring her in. Over.

Staxton: Negative 94. I repeat, can you ditch aircraft? Over.

Schaffner: Yeah … I guess.

Staxton: Standby 94. Over. Oscar 77. Over.

Shackleton: 77. Over.

Staxton: 94 is ditching. Can you maintain wide circuit. Over.

Shackleton: Affirmative GCI. Over.

Staxton: Thanks 77. Stanby 94, execute ditching proceedure at your discretion. Over.

Schaffner: Descending now, GCI. Over.

Between six and seven minutes then elapsed.

Shackleton: He’s down, GCI. Hell of a splash … he’s down in one piece though. Over.

Staxton: Can you see the pilot yet? Over.

Shackleton: Negative. We’re going round again, pulling a tight one.

Two minutes later.

Shackleton: The canopy’s up … she’s floating OK … can’t see the pilot. We need a chopper out here, GCI. No, no sign of the pilot. Where the hell…

Staxton: You sure he’s not in the water, 77. Check your SARBE receptions. Over.

NOTE: SARBE was the Search and Rescue Beacon Equipment carried by all RAF aircrew.

Shackleton: No SARBE yet. No flares either. Hang on. We’re going round again.

Another two minutes elapsed.

Shackleton: GCI. Over.

Staxton: Receiving you 77. Over.

Shackleton: This is odd, GCI. She’s sinking fast but … the canopy’s closed up again. Over.

Staxton: Can you confirm pilot clear of aircraft? Over.

Shackleton: He’s not in it, we can confirm that. He must be in the water somewhere.

Staxton: Any distress signals or flares yet? Over.

Shackleton: Negative GCI. Going round again. Over.

Ninety seconds later the crew of the Shackleton were back in contact with Staxton Wold.

Shackleton: She’s sunk GCI. There’s a slight wake where she was. Still no sign of the pilot. I say again GCI, we need a chopper here fast. Over.

Staxton: A Whirlwind’s on its way from Leconfield. Are you positive you saw no sign of the pilot?. Over.

Shackleton: Nothing GCI. The first pass we assumed he was unstrapping. He must have got out as we went round for a second pass … but why shut the canopy? Over.

Staxton: That’s what we were thinking. Maintain patrol 77, he must be there somewhere. Over.

Shackleton: Roger GCI. Over.

Shortly afterwards the search and rescue Whirlwind from nearby Leconfield arrived on the scene and began a systematic search of the ditching area. The aircraft was shortly joined by the lifeboats from Bridlington, Flamborough and Filey as the weather began to deteriorate.

The search continued well into the next day but there were no transmissions from the beacons carried by the pilot and on board the aircraft and the official reports say no distress flares were seen.

However, the following day flares had been seen about ten miles offshore and the Grimsby trawler Ross Kestrel, which was passing the Falmborough area, had gone to investigate but, even though more flares were seen, she found nothing.

Three weeks later it was reported that the fusalage of the aircraft had been located on the seabed and the ejection seat was still intact, “giving rise to the belief that the body of the pilot is still in the wreckage”.

On 7 October, divers from HMS Keddleston had inspected the wreckage and said Captain Schaffner’s body was still in the cockpit.

But what was the start of the biggest mystery of all. When the aircraft was brought to the surface and returned to Binbrook there was no trace of Captain Schaffner. Just an empty cockpit.

When the wreckage of XS894 was finally lifted from the seabed some five miles off Flamborough Head it was taken in secrecy straight to RAF Binbrook.

Many of the cockpit instruments were missing. These included the E2B compass, voltmeter, stand-by direction indicator, stand-by invertor indicator and the complete auxilary warning panel from the starboard side of the cockpit below the voltmeter.

This was a serious breach of regulations and although the Mod’s Crash Investigation Team was promised the instruments would be returned shortly they never were.

The ejector seat also seemed to be “wrong” and there was a suspision later among the investigators that it was not the one fitted to the aircraft when XS894 took off from Binbrook on its final flight.

They were even given and assurance by the commanding officer of 5 Squadron that the seat had not been tampered with. But some of the investigators were not convinced.

At the end of the day the investigation team was told curtly that as nothing useful had been discovered, their job was over.

The following day they were all called into the main office at Farnborough and told in no uncertain terms they were not to discuss any aspect of the ditching of XS894, even with their own families. The reason was simple – national security.

And that’s where the trail of the mystery of XS894 gets cold. Well, almost.

On the night of 8 September 1970, a couple and their daughter wre walking their dog along the coastal path at Alnmouth Bay, Northumberland – almost opposite the point where Captain Schaffner made his interception – when they saw and heard something strange.

“We had been walking for maybe 10 minutes when we heard a very high-pitched humming noise,” they said later to MoD personnel.

“The dog kept cocking her head to one side and growling. It seemed impossible to tell from which direction the noise was coming, it seemed everywhere. It lasted for maybe 10 to 15 seconds.

“About five minutes later the eastern sky lit up, rather like sheet lightning, only it took about 10 seconds to die down again.

“Over the following three minutes this happened many times but the lightning was only visible for a second or two at a time. It appeared very similar to the Northern Lights. The whole spectacle was completely silent.

“After two or three minutes there was another flare-up of “sheet lightning” which lasted about the same time as the first. This was followed by that awful shrill sensation, only this time it was worse. You could actually feel your ears singing.”

The family called at the local police station to report what they had seen and heard. There’s was one of many similar reports that night to both the police at the RAF at nearby Boulmer.

The time and the location fit in exactly with events going on 60 miles south at Staxton Wold and they could have been watching some kind of natural phenomena.

Maybe that holds the clue to what happened to Lightning XS894.