[Observer1940]

Hello Ed

Very, very, briefly the Whitley was to descend from 10,000 feet down to 5,000 feet over our coast as part of an ID ruling. The Whitley, kept losing height with all the last turns for 16 miles only to the right (Observer Corps plots), to eventually crash amongst the barrage balloons at Eastleigh.

Part of the wing was found two miles from the cable and Red Flares (a sign of distress over the sea) had been seen about 11 minutes beforehand to the South near Sandown, IOW. The Whitley was also on fire before striking the ground.

"Loss of control after hitting or avoiding obstacles in bad visibility" (being F6) was changed, becoming F9 Obsure or undetermined. Next F8 "Miscellaneous" Cause was then given, which was changed to F4 Flying into ground in cloud or fog. There is no Force Landing Form reference number. However a second Index Card exists for a former "U" file registry.

Other accidents with the "U" Index number reference have various causes from aircraft fire, airframe structural failure, wing failure, certain types of engine failure, icing, carbon monoxide poisoning, lack of oxygen, blacking out, or the aircraft diving (unable to pull out) until striking the ground.

I believe I have collected every reference to the crash I can possibly find and attempted to find all other Bomber losses that night, acquired all Squadron, Group, Command and Fighter 10 and 11 Group and Fighter Command ORB copies, but know that both the official file (AHB) and information I have, are missing some vital pieces of information.

Although I have some theories, research in official files is continuing, but how much better it would have been to have safely kept the file in full, rather than only keeping what appears to be a provisional summary, which it states, the exact time and other details were unknown.

Mark