FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1953
1953 - 0518.PDF
5'4 FLIGHT ^ t*Atti>L Y PA6£ UAMPPtN t 940 . No. 207 Squadron A V HO L A H C AS-T £ K 19 4 2 .,: HISTORY OF A FAMOUS BO BAD weather at the end of 1941 restricted operational flying, and this uneventful period persisted into 1942. Then, at the end of January, came the news that No. 207 Squadron's Manchesters were to be replaced by Lancasters. At Bottesford, No. 207 Conversion Flight came into being and the first Lancaster arrived on the 25th. Replacement crews from twin-engined medium bomber units were required to put in 40 hours' flying on Manchester^ and Lancasters, finishing up with an eight-hour trip—half in daylight and half in darkness—with full war load at 20,000ft. Only "circuits and bumps" were made on Con version Flight aircraft; for cross-country work the squadron aircraft were used. On the other hand, Conversion Flight crews and aircraft were required to operate during maximum efforts by Bomber Command. For the first 1,000-bomber raid—on Cologne, on the night of May 30th, 1942—No. 207 had 12 Lancasters detailed for the attack; it was the first time the unit had operated so many aircraft. All of them attacked the primary target and all returned to base. Bombing was done from between 14,000 and 15,000ft. All the crews on their return spoke of the inferno below. ; . . . one huge fire and hundreds of others scattered around . . . incendiaries lost in a maze of fires . . . impossible to locate any individual bomb-burst ... a mass of flames, with a smoke pall up to 10,000ft . . . defences seemed completely bewildered . . . fires seen from the Dutch coast." These were some of their recorded comments. The second 1,000-bomber raid, two days later, was against Essen; but this time the squadron was not quite so fortunate. Fourteen Lancasters were detailed, but four returned with engine trouble. It was a successful raid, but observation was difficult owing to fog. On the third 1,000-bomber raid, on June 25th, 15 Lancasters of No. 207 joined in the attack on Bremen—primarily to hit the Focke-Wulf aircraft factory. This raid was handicapped by complete cloud cover over the target. Bombs had to be dropped by D.R., but extensive fires were observed through the clouds. Conditions above cloud were like daylight; there was a brilliant moon and the Northern Lights were playing. In August the unit moved to Swinderby. The use of Lancasters had soon put a different complexion on operational flying, and by September the squadron had settled down to a period of really hard work. During the month no fewer than 83 sorties were made on targets such as Saarbrucken, Karlsruhe, Bremen and Duisberg. "Gardening" (sea-mining) was also done. Although many of the Lancasters came back in damaged condition, only two were lost. In the next month came the big daylight raid on the Schneider armament works at Le Creusot in France. The first Lancaster left at mid-day and was over the target at 1809A hr, attacking from 4,500ft. The remainder of the force of 13 arrived at short intervals and, in conditions of good visibility, the target was accurately attacked. The only opposition appears to have come from a partridge, which hit the port outer Merlin of "C" and "0" Orange on dis play in Trafalgar Square in March 1943, in aid of "Wings for Victory" week. The C. 0., W'C. Jeffs, wishes aircn (Top) WIC. F. R. Jeffs, D.F.C., who com manded No. 207 Squadron in 1942. (Lower) S/L W. D. 8. Ruth, D.F.C. and Bar. who also served with the squadron in 1942. rendered it unserviceable. The round trip in daylight took nearly ten hours. An even longer daylight raid, this time to Milan, was made a few days later. Ten Lancasters took off shortly after noon, but one returned with its intercom us and front hatch gone, and another came back because its rear turret was out of action. "B" was lost. The remaining seven were over the target from 1700 hr onward and attacked from heights varying between the lowest at 4,500ft ("Q") and the highest at 12,000ft ("T"). No. 207 seem at this time to have made a corner in Italian targets, for in November Genoa and Turin were each attacked more than once. A busy year finished with a ten-tenths cloud attack on Munich. Most of the Lancasters released their bombs after a time-and- distance run from Lake Wurmsee. Of the 12 Lancasters participating, one failed to return. Essen and Berlin seem to have been the main targets for January, 1943, by which time the pathfinder technique was well established. The positioning of the T.I. markers came in for as much comment as other results seen during the attack. It was on a Berlin raid on the night of January i6th-i7th that the first 250-lb target-indicator was used. For this raid No. 207 contributed 13 Lancasters. In February came another change in command, W/C. Parselle taking over. Most of the raids during the month were against Germany—they were particularly heavy on Nuremberg—but Turin, Lorient and Milan were also visited. Of the 90 sorties flown, 76 were successfully completed and 11 were abortive; three aircraft failed to return. Tust over 287 tons of bombs were dropped and flying hours (day and night) totalled 707. By March, T943, the intensity of Bomber Command's attack was being rapidly stepped up. Almost every evening saw eight, ten and sometimes eleven of No. 207*s Lancasters disappear into the eastern sky. During the month no fewer than five failed to return—a loss of 35 aircrew. These operational sorties were made in addition to quite an amount of training flying—including practice with Gee, which was then coming into general use. This aid first appeared in March, 1942, but more than 12 months later it was still suffering badly from unserviceabihty.
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
