Hi,
The Night raid report no.762 (Bomber Command Report on night operations 6/7th.November , 1944 – AIR 14/3412) mentions “One Lancaster from Koblenz crash-landed in Florennes after its engines had failed; and another undershot on return from Gravenhorst, and was destroyed.”. The same report also mentions Lancaster I 1 a/c Cat.E in Florennes – engine failure.
The only possible aircraft is HK621 which is mentioned in the ORB of 622 Squadron (AIR 27/2138) as : Notice has been received that this aircraft force landed in France. Crew are safe and have returned to United Kingdom.
However no crashlocation of this aircraft was found in France (see
https://francecrashes39-45.net/page_...av.php?id=1511).
The files available on the NAA (Australia) website for the 3 Australian crewmembers don’t mention any information regarding this crash.
An USAAF report (Daily Diary for 6 Nov.1944, 429 FS, 474 FG, AFHRA Reel B0625 p.124) supplied the following info :
Maj.Hedlund and Lt.Johnston took off at 1803 and by the time they had climbed to 8,000 feet, it was pitch black and flying formation was hard (edited by myself) . It is still a question as to who got lost from who but Lt.Johnston’s load got heavy somewhere between Euskirchen and Gelsdorf and he dropped his bombs on lights somewhere in that area. No explosion nor fire was seen. Major Hedlund flying alone, set course for home.
In the meanwhile over this field, “Limey” crew members of a Lancaster were parachuting down all over the place. On an RAF night mission against Cologne, flak had knocked out two of their engines. The crew had thrown out their guns, ammunition, and even pocket change overboard to lighten the load but their old boat just couldn’t make the grade. So they bailed out and the pilot took his chances in going down with his ship. He circled our field once and shot all the flares he had left at the control tower operator. Then he threw his very pistol at him and came in and belly landed. In doing so, the huge plane tore up 50 feet of runway lights and before grinding to a stop, doing so, half on and half off the runway. The pilot fortunately unhurt. There was no time to clear the wrecked Lancaster from the field before Maj. Hedlund and Johnston returned and with the lightning system knocked out, they were instruction to land at A-92,St.Trond.
Best regards
Luc