Qualified "Average on Oxfords" 3(P)AFU - Nov. 1942

Pilot's Log Book Nov. 1942

1940's night flying training recruitment advertisement

By 23rd November 1942, my Grandfather, F/O H.C.Kelsey, was back at RAF South Cerney, No. 3 (Pilots)Advanced Flying Unit to show off his new found Beam Approach skills. A week of night flying followed, including landings and one Overshoot with F/Sgt Bartram, x-country with P/O Phillips and Precision Flying with P/O Walsh. Plus nearly 6 hours of solo night flights. An Overshoot is were an aircraft was unable to land and had to go around again and line up along the flare path. This would involve turns at night which could be very disorientating. 

These were all very dangerous requirements of night flying training and there were many crashes and fatalities of wartime trainee crews trying to find that friendly flare-path in the dark to touch down safely on terra firma. I'm not saying that my grandfather would have witnessed these crashes, but there's little doubt that he would have been aware that this was going on. Two such training accidents at about this time are documented here;

1. On 9th Nov. 1942 at RAF Chipping Norton 6(P)AFU. Time:03:50
   Aircraft, Airspeed Oxford, hit trees shortly after take-off and crashed to ground on a night training flight. Investigation found that a/c elevator trim wheel may have been incorrectly set for take-off.
   F/O (015144) H A KALLEND (Instructor) RAF - killed
   Sgt (1055351) James GREENALL (Pupil) RAFVR - killed "He rose on the wings of the morning to meet his heavenly Father"
2. On 11 July 1943 Airspeed Oxford HN781 of 3 (Pilot) Advanced Flying Unit (3 PAFU) with the crew RCAF Flying Officer George Schrman and Sgt Joseph S. Southall, who were both killed when the aircraft crashed on take-off 1 miles west of Long Newton, Gloucestershire.
   Details of crew from Commonwealth War Graves Commission website
   SCHURMAN, GEORGE MAXWELL Flying Officer J/16809 11/07/1943 26 Royal Canadian Air Force Canadian Plot 6. N.C. Row C. Grave 13. CIRENCESTER CEMETERY
   SOUTHALL, JOSEPH SAMUEL Sergeant 1577584 11/07/1943 20 Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve United Kingdom Sec. 3. Grave 3. WILLENHALL CEMETERY

Any internet search is littered with aircraft crash incidents involving Airspeed Oxfords on night flying training, which continued killing air cadets many years after the war. Indeed one course lost 6 aircraft in 14 nights, with many fatalities. The total blackout at busy airfields and lights out on the aircraft meant that there were also many mid-air training flight collisions. Added to this the  occasional attacks by the Luftwaffe, attracted by the lights of the flare-path, and it is clear that my Grandfather was lucky to survive his training.

The wood and fabric covered "Ox-Box", did not fare well in a crash

Remains of an Airspeed Oxford after training accident 

Despite all of the potential hazards, on 30th Nov. 1942, my grandfather qualified from 3(P)AFU, with his "Proficiency as a Pilot" assessed as "Average on Oxfords". He duly went home to London on leave to await news of his next posting. He arrived, no doubt, to a rapturous welcome from my Grandmother after an itinerant few months which had kept them apart. The reason why I am highlighting this leave is, not to make too fine a point of it, but my Mother was born almost exactly nine months later!

The War in general at this time continued to throw up astonishing stories. Not least of which happened on 27th November 1942, when the french navy scuttle their ships at Toulon after the Germans invade unoccupied Vichy France. The first news of the mass murder of Jews also started to reach the allies.