22-28 December 1944

Overview

There were 2 missions this week, to Koblenz and Bonn in Germany, with one aircraft and all its crew lost on their return to Wickenby following the Koblenz attack. The aircraft crashed near the station bomb dump and it is fortunate that there wasn’t a more serious incident as it still contained most of its bomb load.

Also of note is a SECRET message in the Station Diary about a possible mass escape from POW camps- I would have thought that the Station Diary is not the place to record that sort of information!

Extract from Station Diary

‘Easy Two’

Lancaster NG244 was delivered to 626 Squadron at RAF Wickenby on 22 October 1944.  On 2 November 1944 F/O Preece and his crew of ‘A’ Flight 626 Squadron took over flying Lancaster NG244, which had been given the 626 Squadron designation code UM-E2 and the call sign ‘Easy Two’.  The crew flew 10 of their 21 missions in Lancaster NG244.

22 December 1944

On the afternoon of 22 December 1944 the crew of Lancaster NG244 ‘Easy Two’ climbed aboard their aircraft in preparation for their twenty-second mission, they took off at 15.23 hours with 13 other 626 Squadron Lancasters on a sortie to bomb the railway facilities at Koblenz in Germany.  They were to be part of a 166 strong Lancaster force on this raid.  Some time after take off the aircraft’s port inner engine failed and the pilot was forced to abandon the mission.  He turned the aircraft around and returned to base.  By now the weather at RAF Wickenby had turned bad with poor visibility due to heavy rain and fog was starting to form over the airfield, it was also now becoming dark.

Just after 17.30 hours, on approaching RAF Wickenby and joining the airfield holding circuit, the crew received instructions from the Control Tower to divert to RAF Leeming in Yorkshire where the weather was better.  However, shortly after this transmission the personnel in the Control Tower heard a very loud explosion which, according to records “…shook the camp…”, but because of the bad visibility they could not tell where it had come from.  They had also lost radio contact with ‘Easy Two’.  It was assumed that, whilst making a turn over the airfield, the aircraft had inexplicably stalled and crashed into the ground.

It transpired that, at 17.36 hours whilst flying with only three engines and still with the full load of bombs on board, ‘Easy Two’ lost a second engine whilst turning to land and had crashed into the bomb dump bays on the edge of the station main bomb store.  The aircraft with its bomb load exploded and, according to RAF Wickenby station diary, “…an enormous crater was made and the bomb dump was lucky to not have received a direct hit…”.  All seven members of the crew were killed.

It is thought that the loss of the two engines, the bad weather and poor visibility, and the stresses of flying under these conditions could all have contributed to the crash.  The real cause will never be known.

The incident was a major disaster for RAF Wickenby and the Station prepared to implement evacuation procedures.  Eyewitness accounts talk of many acts of bravery on the ground as Aircrew and Ground crew fought to get as many bombs as possible away from the fires to minimise the danger of a complete explosion within the bomb dump.  Should this have happened it would have put the local population at risk as well.  All 626 and 12 Squadron aircraft on the Koblenz raid were diverted to other airfields on their return.  The airfield remained closed for operations for some time afterwards. 

Because of the ferocity of the explosion, no remains of the crew were found at the time however, records recently discovered state that some days after the crash the remains of “one or more of the crew” were discovered in the crash site area, but they could not be identified. These remains were taken to Market Rasen Cemetery where they were buried with military honours on 31 December 1944. 

Extract from 626 Sqn Appendix to Operational Record Book