5 March 1940 – Blackburn Aircraft Ltd Brough Airfield – Blackburn Botha I - L6129 – F/O B R Rolfe – Test Flight.
Location – Dived into ground 300 yards north of Sheardown's Farm, Flixborough
F/O Rolfe was a decorated WW1 veteran and test pilot for Blackburn Aircraft Ltd. Together with Mr J B E Johnson BSc they were undertaking a test flight of a Botha from the Blackburn factory airfield at Brough. The aircraft crashed at Flixborough south of the Humber near the River Trent. The circumstances are unknown at the time of writing.
F/O Rolfe was killed and I believe Mr Johnson died a short while later of his injuries
F/O Basil Raynham Rolfe RAFO – Test Pilot – 45 – Blackburn Aircraft Ltd – Son of Frederick William and Rosetta Gertrude Rolfe and husband of Dorothy Alice Rolfe of Hessle – Elloughton St Mary Churchyard, Yorkshire.
Mr John Butler Edlington Johnson BSc – 39 – Civilian employee of Blackburn Aircraft Ltd
Address is shown as Coniston, West Ella Road, Kirk Ella, Haltemprice and place of death Brough, Elloughton on the same day as the crash. The CWGC site shows he was interred at Beverly Rural District with another civilian war casualty but it is not clear where that is located. He may have been buried in the Kirk Ella churchyard
In 1939 Mr Johnson and a colleague at Blackburn registered a patent for improvements to fuel management systems in aircraft engines.
Compiled by David Fell. Photo from my archive
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