F/O F G Durrant DFC RCAF and crew – 103 Squadron - RAF Elsham Wolds – 1944
Abandoned on Return - 12/13th July 1944 - Avro Lancaster III – ND990 – Op Revigny
F/O Durrant ( pictured above ) and crew were on their 9th operation which was a night attack on the French marshalling yards at Revigny. This aircraft was abandoned on return. They were diverted due to Carnaby due to rain and low cloud at base. They were however unable to locate Carnaby and were ordered to bale out by due to lack of fuel. They abandoned the aircraft over the Bridlington area and the aircraft crashed at Langtoft at 0630. All crew members are reported as safe.
The crew for this operation consisted of :-
F/O F G Durrant RCAF
Sgt J T Halliday
F/S D E Armstrong
Sgt L E Matte DFC RCAF
P/O G M Collard
W/O S G Webster DFM RAAF
Sgt G T Greenway
Durrant's crew were soon back on ops on the 7th August and finished their tour without further problems in early December 1944.
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12-Jul-44 - Revigny
103 Squadron detailed 19 aircraft for this attack on the marshalling yards at Revigny France. Weather for take off was fair, 5/10ths cloud, and for the route it was good. Over the target area it was covered with cloud and in the resultant mix up some crews bombed the glow of markers while other brought their bombs back. The Master Bomber was very poor and indistinct and all round it was a poor attack. 8 crews bombed from 2500 ft to 8000 ft. Some flak was encountered in the target area but most of our losses were thought to be due to collision rather than fighters as the assembly point was marked but the whole area was covered with cloud. On return to base the weather had closed down and all machines had to be diverted due to lack of fuel. F/O Durrant had to bale out on orders from Carnaby due to lack of fuel. Three other machines are missing. :- P/O Harrison, F/O Abbott and F/O Phillips.
Bomber Command detailed a total of 378 Lancasters and 7 Mosquitos of Nos 1, 5 and 8 Groups for this attack on railway targets at Culmont, Revigny and Tours. Culmont and Tours were accurately bombed but cloud interfered with the all-No 1 Group raid at Revigny and only half of the force bombed. 10 Lancasters were lost on the Revigny raid and 2 on the Culmont raid.
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Lancaster - ND990
ND990 was lost on its 24th operation. The first of these was with F/L Allwood and crew. See below :-
09-May-44 – Mardyck – Lancaster – ND990 – F/L D Allwood
Item compiled by David Fell. Photo via Phil Laviollette.
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