On the 9th of August 1943 the crew of this Anson were undertaking a night cross country navigation exercise, a number of other Anson's were in the air doing the same exercise. In bad visability this aircraft strayed off its intended course and struck close to the top of Green Gable. Of the five on the aircraft one was killed in the crash and the pilot died in hospital. One of the two survivors managed to find his way down to Seathwaite Farm in Borrowdale to get help. The wreckage was later buried on the site. All were taken to Fuse Hill Hospital where the pilot later died. Three other Ansons from the same unit crashed in the Lake District on this night, incorrect meteorogical reports were said to be "a contributing factor" to all of the crashes.
Pilot - Sgt Waclaw Panasik PAF (P794954), aged 28, died in hospital. Buried at Dumphries Catholic Cemetery. He was born on 3rd October 1914 at Zelwa, in Wolkowysk District, Poland.
Air Bomber - F/Sgt Eruin A Loppe RCAF (R/176010), aged 19, of Oxbow, Sask, Canada. Buried Troqueer, Dumfriesshire. (Erwin on CWGC) (Ervin in other sources)
Nav - F/O John P (Jack) Calder RCAF (J/4695), of Goderich, Ontario, Canada. Shock and broken leg.
P/O C E Peake RAF (135917), injured.
Sgt Chowney RAF (1600232), injured.
The Green Gable incident was not Jack Calder's only mishap; on 25th October 1941 he was
serving with 103 Sqdn.
Wellington T2506 was badly damaged on a raid to Frankfurt and in a strong tailwind overshot England and Wales. The crew later baled out over land
and the aircraft crashed near Kilihill, Quilty, in Co.Clare, Ireland. The crew of six were interned but Calder and two others
were able to escape and arrived back in Canada in September 1942. He would later arrive back in England in July 1943, just under
a month before the incident on Green Gable.
A book, written by the pilots son, Ralph Keefer, described the events. Calder was a Canadian Press reporter, reporting on the National Hockey League
before enlisting. F/Lt John Calder was sadly killed on 21st July 1944 when flying in 571 Sqdn Mosquito ML984. The aircraft was hit by flak and he sustained
injuries in both legs. He bailed out but did not survive. He was 29 years old and is burued in Kiel War Cemetery.
His pilot F/Lt D L Thompson RAF became a PoW. There is plenty on the internet regarding Jack Calder and as there is already a book detailing
his career I will not reproduce it here.
Green Gable - to the right. The Anson hit the very top of the mountain.
I visited the crash site with Will Lund in October 2002, not much remains today. We located the possible impact site
and a few bits of wreckage. We found some small peices of glass, alloy and rusted peices of metal.
The photograph above shows Will Lund with the majority of the remaining wreckage that we found on our first visit to the crash site, a number
of small peices were found in the gravel to Will's right. The summit is in the background.
My thanks to Alan Clark for the names of the crew involved in this incident.