From Jan Hagens’ excellent biography of KLM in wartime (translated here):
‘Nobody was happy with Heston as a base. The Technical Department had no hangar space for maintenance, doing all work outside in the weather. Operations hated the field as passengers had to commute to and from London and crews and aircraft had to be ferried back and forth from Whitchurch. BOAC was unhappy because of possible extra costs for the ferrying. … The decision to abandon Heston fell on September 20th (1940), with safety as the final straw. (the Germans had intensified the bombing of fields around London) KLM was ordered to move its operations to Whitchurch. It was during this transitional phase that the first KLM machine was lost in England…”
“Saturday. Early morning captain Tepas flies Reiger from Whitchurch to Heston. Weather predictions are poor. Apart from his crew a relief crew is on board. … On approach to Heston it turns out that Whitchurch’s pessimistic weather forecast had been on the optimistic side. Thick fogs encloses the field. This information could not be relayed due to a moratorium on radio use, and the lack of a codebook for codes used this day. … After half an hour an opening appears in the fog. Tepas decides to land. West of the field are barrage balloons. The northside is home to a gas holder. Tepas tries to land along the hangars towards the east. Flaps and undercarriage are lowered rapidly and power is reduced a tad early. The DC-3 undershoots the field, bounces, hits poles tearing off the undercarriage and most of one wing. It slides to a halt with no injuries to the crews.”
The other DC-3 was partially burnt in a German blitz raid on Whitchurch, which also saw shrapnel damage to Ibis and Buizerd that was quickly repaired.
Sign In
