RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

ALong with a friend I am preparing an article for a Norwegian magazine covering Mosquitos in action over Norway during WW2.
DZ592 was one of these, apparently belonging to the "RAF Film Unit". It took part in several Coastal Command raids along the Norwegian coast and ended up being brought down by the blast from an exploding U-boot in Skagerak April 1945.
DZ592 was apparently built as a B Mk IV but was converted to a PR.IV.

Was RAF Film Unit an autonome unit or did it actually belong to a squadron? 540 Sqn comes to mind, since these seems to have been very much involved in PR-missions over Norway.
I have skimmed through Nesbit's "Eyes of the RAF" and all my Mosquito books without coming up with anything. So far I don't have any PR ORBs and in my references the highest DZ-serial in 540 Sqn is 517.

Any information, any leads will be much appreciated,

Kyrre

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Hi Kyrre:

My info (which comes from the Air Britain series) says DZ592 was indeed on the strength of 540 Squadron.

Cheers,

Mark

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Mark,

I appreciate the info. This means we can rather safely assume that it was painted PRU blue... :)

Kyrre

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Not sure I'd make that assumption - the other film unit Mossies of which I've seen pictures had standard camo.

Cheers,

Mark

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Aha! Very interesting. And good thing you said that because I'd forgotten to ask about the Film unit mossies that flew with bomber command at times.
The natural thing would perhaps be that they were painted up in typical coastal command scheme though who knows if this particular Mosquito took part in other ops as well.
The PRU blue colour might not actually be unsuitable for low level operations towards the North in the winter. Which again leaves us speculating.

Kyrre

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Hi Kyrre:

Yes, the Film Unit mossies I've read about both with Bomber Command and 2nd TAF were camouflaged to match their fellows - I'd not like to be highly-visible as the "special" aircraft in a formation.

I don't know if the case on the April 1945 sortie, however on other sorties the Film Unit mossies also carried bombs and attacked the target. (In one case, the camera aircraft was the only one which actually found and attacked the target!)

Cheers,

Mark

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Not much help but a nice read:

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articl...17/ai_20032585

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

Hi

Was the RAF Film Unit the same as the FPU who took part in 2TAF operation.

Cheers Nick

Re: RAF Film Unit Mosquito DZ592. Which squadron?
 

RAF Film Unit

http://www.amps.net/newsletters/issue19/19_raf.htm

During the war, the Army and RAF formed film units in order to record events and activities of each of those services. Both units were based at Pinewood Studios, together with the Crown Film Unit, which produced public information films under the direction of the Ministry of Information.

I don't know how accurate this list is.

http://www.dehavilland.ukf.net/_DH98%20prodn%20list.txt