Date:	Friday 22 November 1946
Time:	dusk
Type:	Douglas Boston Mk III
Owner/operator:	ATDU RAF
Registration:	AL467
MSN:	2849
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 4
Other fatalities:	8
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	near RAF Locking, Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset -   United Kingdom
Phase:	Approach
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Llandow, Glamorgan
Destination airport:	RAF Locking, Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset

Narrative:
From 1946, RAF Weston-super-mare provided accommodation for ground crew and aeroplanes of the Aircraft Torpedo Development Unit (ATDU) although its pilots were based at RAF Gosport, Hampshire.

Towards dusk on 22nd November 1946, a twin-engine Douglas Boston Mk. III bomber, AL467, of the Aircraft Torpedo Development Unit returning from RAF Llandow, near Cardiff, prepared to land at RAF Locking, Weston-super-Mare. It is reported to have taken an initial run to assess the condition of the grass runway before making a low approach from the east to fly over the road that passed along the perimeter of the airfield.

There were signs on the road cautioning drivers about the possibility of low flying aircraft to avoid alarm at their approach. Since it was a Friday, at the same time, men from RAF Locking were getting away on weekend leave in a convoy of three Bristol Tramways' buses.

The middle double-decker bus, fully loaded with 57 airmen, happened to be travelling towards the local railway station when the undercarriage and starboard aircrew of the descending aircraft hit it. The roof was ripped off and seven airmen were killed on impact, whilst another one died later. Fourteen more suffered serious injuries and others cuts from flying glass and bruises.

The severed nose-leg dropped off just inside the airport boundary and the aircraft landed on the grass runway over to its port side with the port undercarriage ripped off. A crew of three in the aircraft emerged uninjured with the pilot and flight engineer claiming to have been partially blinded by the setting sun.

Photographs of the damaged bus and aircraft appeared in the Western Mercury as reproduced in Ted Johnson's Weston Super Mare and the Aeroplane, 2013. A report of the incident appeared in The Times of 23 November 1946: the bus remained upright on the correct side of the road with windows on the lower deck intact and the driver and conductor unharmed.

The eight airmen who lost their lives in the incident were:
BELLAMY, Eric Wilfred - AC.1 - 1598231 - RAFVR. Buried Hull Northern Cemetery, Hull, Yorkshire.
DAVIS, James Ithel - AC.2 - 3059401 - RAFVR. Buried Llandeilo Fawr (St. Teilo) Churchyard, Carmarthenshire.
FAIRWEATHER, Sydney Gordon - AC.1 - 2291223 - RAFVR. Buried Mortlake Cemetery, London SW
HALLIDAY, James - AC.1 - 2291411 - RAFVR. Buried Dumbarton Cemetery, Dumbartonshire.
JACKSON, Edward - AC.2 - 2260394 - RAFVR. Buried Manchester (Gorton) Cemetery, Lancashire.
LAWTON, Roy - AC.1 - 2285878 - RAFVR. Buried Bromborough (St. Barnabas) Churchyard, Cheshire.
PEARSON, Ernest Henry - AC.2 - 2296456 - RAFVR. Buried Ewell (St. Mary) Churchyard Extension, Surrey.
WILSON, Frank - AC.2 - 2258573 - RAFVR. Buried Upperthong (St. John) Churchyard, Bradford, West Yorkshire.

The crew of the Boston all survived the crash of their plane when the damaged undercarriage leg collapsed on touchdown on the airfield. The pilot of Boston AL467 was the co-pilot of Avro Lincoln B.2 RE285, which had crashed on 8 November 1946 near Chilton, Wiltshire (see separate entry).

1. Halley, James (1999). Broken Wings – Post-War Royal Air Force Accidents. Tunbridge Wells: Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd. p.56. ISBN 0-85130-290-4.
2. The Indian Express 23 November 1946, p 5
3. The Times of 23 November 1946
4. Weston Super Mare and the Aeroplane, by Ted Johnson, 2013.
5. Final Landings: A Summary of RAF Aircraft and Combat Losses 1946 to 1949 by Colin Cummings p.247-248
6. http://www.freewebs.com/raflocking/apps/forums/topics/show/2991026
7. https://www.baaa-acro.com/crash/crash-douglas-db-7-boston-iii-raf-locking-8-killed
8. http://www.epsomandewellhistoryexplorer.org.uk/NewsletterJul2015Web.pdf
9. http://www.rafcommands.com/forum/showthread.php?23363-461122-Unaccounted-Airmen-22-11-1946&p=135963#post135963
10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Locking

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
23-May-2013 21:30	angels one five	Added
23-Jan-2019 15:16	TB	Updated [Location, Nature, Source, Narrative]
31-Jan-2019 14:54	Nepa	Updated [Operator, Departure airport, Narrative, Operator]
18-Nov-2019 03:21	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Time, Cn, Operator, Total occupants, Location, Departure airport, Destination airport, Source, Narrative]
18-Nov-2019 22:04	Anon.	Updated [Operator, Operator]
25-May-2023 15:36	Dr. John Smith	Updated [[Operator, Operator]]