Wellington near Oulston.
This crew of this Wellington were carrying out an air test on the aircraft on the 19th of July 1943 when the port side propeller struck a tree near Oulston, north east of Easingwold.
The engine was then feathered but the pilot had no option but to force-land the aircraft which he did near Close House Farm, Oulston at 11.45 hrs. The flight had lasted for thirty minutes.
The force landing wrote the aircraft off, Cat E damage being sustained to the airframe and both engines. It was stated that the pilot was carrying out unauthorised low flying when he
struck the tree, for this he was court-martialed, the outcome of which is not yet known by myself.
The aircraft was built to contract B124362/40 by Vickers Armstrong's Ltd at Chester and delivered to MU for acceptance in June 1943
then immediately on to 432 Sqdn at Skipton on Swale. It was written off following this incident with Cat. E2/FA damage on 19th July 1943.
Pilot - Sgt Donald A Rae RCAF (J/17895), of Regina, Sask, Canada. At the time of his crash landing he had a total of 292 flying hours to his name, with 110 being on the Wellington.
Probable crew...
Nav - F/O Geoffrey Vernon Holmes RAFVR (129368).
AB - P/O David Thomas Lyng, RCAF (J/19590).
WOp/AG F/Sgt Edward Frederick Howe RAFVR (1380267).
A/G - WO2 William Henry Hoppus RCAF (R/105586).
I have not yet info regarding detailed crash location.
Sgt Rae was made a P/O later that year but was sadly killed on 14th January 1944 when the Lancaster he was piloting
crashed in Germany killing the whole crew. He was still only 21 years old. A Flak damage incident in which he and his crew were
involved in is also detailed in these 1943 incident in December 1943.