Slightly off thread but can anybody enlighten on the Meteor that lost an engine on take off/overshoot at M.St G. and crashed into the West wing of the officers mess. The “ghost of the St.George Hotel story ?”

(Again off thread, but completed my Vampire night flying there (ex Linton) in 1962.) 😎

Sleeve Wing, is this the one?

24 Nov 51 VW297 Meteor F4 205 AFS Middleton St George

The aircraft made a normal single engine approach and landing and rolled along the runway for some distance before the pilot apparently attempted to take off again on one engine. However, in doing so he lost control and the aircraft ran off the runway and struck a building

The building was the Officer’s Mess and the pilot did not survive the accident. Details from ‘Broken Wings’ by Jim Halley and ‘Last Take-off’ by Colin Cummings.

The only reference to a Meteor crash at/near Croft between those dates that I can find is that of VW255. Details as recorded in Colin Cummings’ book ‘Last Take-off’ are:

25 Jan 51 VW255 Meteor F4 205 AFS Croft, Yorkshire.

The aircraft commenced a climb through cloud but shortly afterwards was seen to dive from cloud out of control.

The pilot was Flying Officer A A McKernan aged 24. He did not survive the crash.

As for the second query, could this be Meteor T7 WA719? This aircraft undershot an assymetric approach at Middleton on 12 Jan 51 and struck a railway embankment. Again, details from ‘Last Take-off’. Location is given as “near Middleton St George”.

I was looking through old air show reports on the Scramble website a couple of days ago and came across reference to the Manby team in a few entries.

Those that I discovered were:

Plymouth, 16 June 1962. Aircraft involved: WK876, WL181, WL191.

Cottesmore, 15 September 1962. Aircraft involved: WK876, WL161, WL181.

Acklington, 14 September 1963. Aircraft involved: WH208, WH291, WK914, WK968, WL181.

Alconbury, 23 May 1964. Aircraft involved: WK876/A, WL181/D, WH291/E, WK914/H

I was at the 1962 Plymouth Display and so must have seen the team. Grey cells aren’t what they were now though so have no memories of it.

I am sure that I have seen a photo of the formation recently. Trying to remember where.

I think you find that the NF1s of Black Flight, 827 NAS, did not sail to the Far East with the rest of the Sqn. They had originally been attached from 812 NAS and returned to that unit when Triumph sailed from Malta in August 1949.

According to “Squadrons of the Fleet Air Arm” by Ray Sturtivant and Theo Ballance, only the FR1s were on board Triumph when she operated in support of Firedog ops in what was then Malaya.

In the course of my research into Seafire FR47, VP441, I came across a very grainy shot of Triumph’s Air Group lined up on the pan at Sembawang, circa January 1950. Several of 827’s Fireflys are visible, but not in great detail.

If you PM me your email address, I will send you a copy.

I found this picture taken by my passenger celebrating? the closure of RAF Strubby in 1972

Hi Mike,

I remember that formation well. I was in the right-hand seat of the aircraft flown by “OC Three quarters of a Squadron”, Sqn Ldr Derrick Gillanders, on the right of the JP formation. My first JP ride and only formation jaunt which the weather very nearly spoiled.

I put my photos up some while ago and have just located them again here:

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=28140

My posts are towards the bottom of this thread.

Thats pretty spot on, spent most of my tour at Butterworth in the Air defence world with them, until 74 Sqn arrived at Tengah.

Happy Days 🙂

You and I must have been there at about the same time.

I was at 114 MCRU/’C’ Convoy from May 66 – Feb 67, then BG/Terendak UPS1 Det Feb 67 – Apr 68 and then back to Western Hill, Penang May – Nov 68. Also a scopey!

Bluenote

A final splitting-of-hairs point, and in no way disagreeing with Lauriebe: I believe that while Operation ‘Firedog’ covered operations by various units against communist insurgents in Malaya, the actual detachment of Lincoln units to Tengah was under Operation ‘Musgrave’. But I’m quite prepared to be proved wrong on that ….. .

Regards

Allan

Allan,

You are quite right, “Operation Firedog” was the code name used to cover all sorties flown by Commonwealth air forces against communist targets in the jungles of Malaya from July 1948 until July 1960.

The deployments of Lincolns, and later Canberras, to Malaya, were conducted under seperate operational codenames. Whilst in theatre, as I mentioned in my earlier post, they flew in support of 0p Firedog.

Has 97 Squadron ever ventured to the Far East after WWII?

I happened to chance upon a caption in the Archives of 97 Sqn in Tengah.

As a Lincoln squadron in the early/mid 50s, there is every likelihood that they were detached to Tengah in support of ‘Operation Firedog’, the bombing of communist terrorist targets in the Malayan jungle at that time.

I’ll have a look through one or two of the books I have relating to that and see if I can find anything that mentions them.