Date:	Wednesday 4 November 1953
Time:	night
Type:	English Electric Canberra B.2
Owner/operator:	231 OCU RAF
Registration:	WF910
MSN:	71097
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 1 / Occupants: 2
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Beck Row, near Mildenhall, Suffolk -   United Kingdom
Phase:	Initial climb
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Bassingbourn, Cambridgeshire
Destination airport:
Confidence Rating:	Information is only available from news, social media or unofficial sources

Narrative:
English Electric Canberra B.2 WF910, 231 OCU, RAF Bassingbourn, Cambridgeshire. Delivered 8/8/1952. Written off 4/11/1953: Both engines failed on climb out from night GCA (Ground Controlled Approach) from RAF Lakenheath, Suffolk. At an altitude of 1,000 feet, both engines failed, the pilot pointed his aircraft towards nearby RAF Mildenhall, and sent out a MAYDAY distress call. However, the Canberra lost altitude rapidly, and the aircraft undershot in a forced landing at Beck Row, 500 yards short of the runway at RAF Mildenhall, Suffolk. According to a contemporary local newspaper report ("Cambridge Daily News" 5 November 1953):

"The navigator of a RAF Canberra jet bomber was rescued when the plane crashed into a cafe at Beck Row, near Mildenhall. The pilot was killed. The proprietor of the cafe said the plane destroyed the back of his premises, smashed his kitchen table, flattened his car and plunged the whole place into darkness. The jet finished up in his back garden, straddling a chicken run and churning up his vegetables. It must have missed the roof by inches and it was a miracle no one in the cafe was killed."

Of the crew of two, one was killed, and one survived

Crew of Canberra WF910:
Pilot Officer Harold Roy Saunders, RAF (pilot, aged 22) - killed in service 4/11/1953
Pilot Officer P J C Smith, RAF (Navigator) - survived with injuries

1. Halley, James (1999) Broken Wings – Post-War Royal Air Force Accidents. Tunbridge Wells: Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd. p.151 ISBN 0-85130-290-4.
2. Last Take-off: A Record of RAF Aircraft Losses 1950 to 1953 Colin Cummings p 423
3. Royal Air Force Aircraft WA100-WZ999 (James J Halley, Air Britain, 1985)
4. "Cambridge Daily News" 5 November 1953
5. Cambridgeshire Aviation Scrapbook 1897 to 1990 by Mike Petty: https://archive.org/stream/CambridgeshireAviationScrapbook1897To1990.doc/Cambridgeshire%20Aviation%20Scrapbook%201897%20to%201990.doc_djvu.txt
6. http://www.ukserials.com/results.php?serial=WF
7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beck_Row

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
07-Jun-2008 12:35	JINX	Added
12-Nov-2018 21:24	Nepa	Updated [Operator, Operator]
21-Apr-2021 16:26	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Time, Total occupants, Location, Departure airport, Source, Narrative]
20-May-2021 23:10	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Source, Narrative]
20-May-2021 23:16	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Narrative]