RAF St Eval explosion

I remember going around St Eval church about 25 years ago, inside it had several memorials connected with the the airfield.

I have a recollection that the building had been severely shaken by a large explosion during the war and still had cracks in the walls.

DD

That’s the place Pete.
Apparently the aircraft hit each other and the able crew were in the process of extricating the injured before the depth charges in the Lib ignited, which would explain the higher casualty rate on that aircraft.
I would like to know which runway it happened on, an absolute guess is that it was the N-S one which would back up some reports of the bomb stores being ignited aswel.
If you click on the Cornwall crash log site above it gives the names of the crew killed and injured.

If Bear Downs is the hill where the windfarm is currently situated, you have a good view over St Eval. I can’t think of any other high ground nearby. I’m amazed that some crew managed to escape, it sounds like the explosion was not immediate.

Has anyone found out the date of the hangar being bombed yet?

The best I can do at the moment is by going off two aerial images of the station that I have on my PC, one is dated 1941 and shows the hangar, another dated early ’42 shows the remains of the hangar, so it was destroyed in that time scale, a bit too early for your friend’s recollections?

This FIDO test burn pic shows the bombed out hangar, at extreme left. Note the Liberators parked all around the place.

It’s also interesting to know where the nearby hill was.

Same thoughts here, St Eval is high up on a plateau and looks over St Mawagn in one direction and over the north Cornish coast at Porthcothan the other (in fact its church served as a shipping day mark), the only bit of higher ground is the exposed and windy Bear Downs which is 2 miles to the east, St Merryn lies 2 miles to the north.
Even an explosion in the arms stores would have been quite isolated as they were remotely sited to the south.
I don’t doubt it was a massive explosion to have witnessed, but the numbers etc are definitely exagerated.

It’s also interesting to know where the nearby hill was. I lived at St. Eval in the mid seventies and I’m struggling to remember much high ground in the immediate area. There may have been slightly higher ground nearby, to call it a hill was a bit of an exaggeration. Difficult to remember where you could overlook the airfield anywhere in that area. I also find it highly unlikely that any explosion damaged buildings in St. Merryn, it’s almost as far as Padstow! If damage was felt that far away then St. Eval would have been flattened! Always interesting to see how the story about real events change over time, makes you wonder how factual our so called “known history” is.

Hi Dave, very little chance of that I think.

It seems that it was a lone 10 OTU aircraft taking off, there is certainly no easily found record of any other aircraft, apart from the Liberator, being involved or any other aircrew injury or fatality. Maybe other Whitleys were involved in the operation, but certainly no info of any more being involved in the crash.
I have checked the 10 OTU website (http://www.rafabingdon10otu.co.uk/id7.html), The Cornish Crashes website (http://www.boscastle-online.co.uk/rafdm/pages/crash_log/crashlog43.html. and all St Eval publications.
Note the crash info in the link gives good information on the crew that were involved with both aircraft, however according to American sources the B-24D info is incorrect as that aircraft was lost while serving with a BG at a different time.
The Action Stations book shown in another post was written by Chris Ashworth, personally I consider that there was no greater authority on St Eval than him, however the date of August and the info about the B-24 taxing appear to be wrong.
I really need to get to the TNA and view the St Eval Operational Records books sometime and hopefuly they will clear some small inconsistancies up.

On another point it is staggering how many Whitleys were lost from St Eval. 10 OTU were based at Abingdon and Stanton Harcourt but their St Eval detachment lost far more aircraft and crews in a comparable time frame.

My hunch is that these stories are the result of a well meaning exageration of a dramatic accident.

I’m away from my sources at mo but will post up hangar info when I can.

Interesting stuff. Is there a possibility that the original story told to me was accurate, that the Whitley was one of several taking off, and that after the first collided with the Liberator that perhaps others did have accidents trying to avoid the wreckage? Maybe the author of that book missed that detail? No book is infalible after all. Just a theory, I can’t prove it but if someone can get the crash report they could prove or disprove it I suppose.

Has anyone found out the date of the hangar being bombed yet?

Hi Brian, nice to have extra input.

The figures of 200 people aboard the two, let alone one aircraft, are way too high even if they were troopers, however it might have been possible that there were 200 fatalities/casualties involved in total (ie aircraft and ground personnel)?

In regard to the aforementioned accident of January 10 (not Aug) 1943, Whitley V Z6464 JL-G, 10 OTU, of the six crew two were killed.
Liberator believed to be of the 1st Sqd of the 480th Anti-Submarine Group, four of the twelve man crew were killed instantly, others were very badly injured.
The Whitley swung on take-off striking the Liberator which was holding while waiting its turn to enter the runway.
I really need to research the accident more though as there are conflicting accounts.

I have’nt heard of an aircraft incident at St Eval as severe as either the original post or the one above mentions.
The odd thing is though both stories seem to be linked by men watching from a nearby hill, the only one I can think of in the area is on Bear Downs which is a bit of a distance away towards St Columb.
I’m wondering if this accident has entered local folklore (with maybe a mixture of the hangar destruction by bombing?) and has just been embelished on the way, it must certainly have been a very dramatic accident to witness due to the severe explosions caused by the arms on board the Liberator.

St Eval

I’m coming a bit late to this correspondence, but I was talking to my uncle, who was stationed at St Eval in the war, and he told me a story which might relate to this.

He claims that he was watching with a friend from a nearby hill, when the friend said that there was a plane taking off at the same time as a plane was landing. Both men watched as the planes collided. According to my uncle, 200 troops aboard one or both of the planes were killed. He remembers seeing lines of lorries waiting to take the bodies away.

Does this ring any bells? My uncle isn’t one to fantasise, and although in his eighties he has an incredible memory.

Brian Eves.

However the first aircraft didn’t get off the ground and others in the formation hit it and they all blew up on take off. He said the explosion was so intense it blew all the windows out at their nearby FAA base (which I’ve forgotten the name of.

Funny how stories can grow with time.
The event oulined above would be the one, it was a well known collision between a Whitley and Liberator. The explosion of carried ordnance was massive and it damage some of the camp and caused injuries quite far away within it, however I haven’t heard of damage off the station and it would take some doing to reach St Merryn.
Another major explosion was when one of the C hangars received a direct hit, I can’t dig out details at the moment though. I believe it was never rebuilt and the concrete base just used as an MT parking area.

Thanks Stan.

I’m sure this must be the incident that Ian remembered, these 66 years later.

No too much in Action Stations I’m afraid- but it is the only incident mentioned that fits.

Thanks, that’s definately the place.

I looked up St Eval and Wikipedia says there was a collision between a Whitley and a Liberator on the runway that caused a massive explosion, but that was in August 1943. As Ian, who told me the story, was working out the time frame due to being on shore and not on a ship, I’m wondering if he got mixed up between tours onboard and he was actually there at the earlier date of August 1943. Does anyone have more on the incident at that earlier date please?

He said the explosion was so intense it blew all the windows out at their nearby FAA base (which I’ve forgotten the name of), .

That would be St Merryn.

Have heard this story before, think it may be mentioned in one of the Action Station books or similar.