Ant,

Without looking back at my old FlyPasts, I think you’ve got the right chap. ‘Centre section’ is what I remember, though how big a ‘chunk’ the centre section was I don’t know.

Geoff.

The U-boats in by March 1943 could fire FAT (circling type) torpedoes, and they also had acoustic homing torpedoes, to home onto the engine noise from a ship. This could be countered by towing a pnumatic drill inside a watertight container behind a ship, which the torpedo would home onto instead.

On the Allied side, by July 1943 a homing torpedo, the Mk 24, (code name ‘Fido’) was in use, and in late 1944, the air-dropping of Sonobouys came into use.

Geoff.

Serge,

I’ll see what I can do, though it may not be until the begining of next week.

My email address is:

geoff@gkennell [followed by] .freeserve.co.uk

Just delete [followed by] and join the two halves up. I’ve done this to stop my e-mail address being ‘harvested’ by spammers. If you could do a similar arrangement on the BAHA forum that would be great.

Geoff.

geedee,

I think the film your thinking of is ‘Dark Blue World’ which is indeed out on DVD, my local branch of HMV has it in their current sale, though that’s not much use to you.

Geoff.

BRAF,

Can you be a little more specific about the sort of information you want re Gonay?

Geoff.

Very nice Dan, though I think I shall have to transfer the contract to your son, or is it a family firm?

Would it be easy to ‘convert’ your E-7 to other variants of the Emil? If so, how about having a go at this E-4 which crashed just under two miles from me. By the way, the pilot’s first name was Albert NOT Walter.

BTW I got hold of a copy of the pre-1966 Bexley MB crest, but it’s different to the one on Doll’s Spitfire. I shall have to re-check with the local archives, to see if there was yet another version during the war, or if Doll had his own version of the crest.

Now, how about a Heinkel 111P & H, and a Dornier 17Z?

Geoff.

Septic,

No 1331 CU was formed 1/9/44 in No 223 Group at Mauripur to train crews for ferrying duties and convert them to new types of aircraft; to Risalpur 4/9/44 (and absorbed Check and Conversion Flight there) in No 223 Group, later 229 Group; disbanded 15/1/46. [Reformed 15/12/46 from the Halifax Training Unit at Dishforth, U.K. The rest of the unit’s history is in the U.K. disbanded for good 5/1/48.]

A/C used plus a few examples (in FE) were Liberator III, IV (BZ925), Dakota I, III (FD883), Wellington XVI (DV920), Beaufighter VI, X (RD266), Mosquito III, VI (LR558), Thunderbolt I, II (KL344/A), Hurricane IIc (LA143), Harvard IIb (FE668) Spitfire VIII (JG375), Oxford (NM462/A) Vengance II, IV (AN666), Mustang IV (KM557/AA).

The above info comes from ‘Royal Air Force Flying Training and Support Units’ by Ray Sturtivant, John Hamlin, and James J Halley & is published by Air-Britain. In a nutshell, it covers all RAF units, other than squadrons, which had at least one aircraft. The above info on 1331 CU gives a typical entry. It really is a gold mine of information you can’t find elsewhere.

Sadly, I can’t help with info on 353 sqdn, sorry.

Geoff.

Septic,

I think you’ve misread the s/n, as Hurricane IIc KZ944 served with No 1331 Conversion Unit, based at Risalpur from 4/9/44. This unit disbanded 15/1/46, but KZ944 was not SoC until 8/10/46.

K2944 was a Vickers Vildebeast II, missing on a night navex near Horsboro’ Light, Singapore, 4/4/38.

Geoff.