Date:	Thursday 22 March 1945
Time:	11:27
Type:	Avro Lancaster B Mk X
Owner/operator:	434 (Bluenose) Sqn RCAF
Registration:	KB832
MSN:	WL-F
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 7
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	RAF Croft, near Darlington, County Durham -   United Kingdom
Phase:	Take off
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Croft, near Darlington, County Durham
Destination airport:

Narrative:
Served with No. 434 Squadron, RCAF, coded "WL-F". Claimed an enemy twin engined fighter destroyed on 14/15 January 1945. Crashed at Croft, UK on 22 March 1945, swung while taking off for raid on Hildesheim. Bomb load exploded. According to a report in the Darlington & Stockton Times (26 July 2019 - see links #2 & #4)

"It was March 22, 1945. A Royal Canadian Air Force Lancaster bomber was blown off the runway by a strong crosswind. It slithered into mud where a tyre blew out, the undercarriage collapsed, and the port engine caught fire. The crew, led by Pilot Horace Payne, scrambled out…

“The Lancasters were going on a daylight raid – I had seen them bombing up the day before,” says Peter, now 88, and living in North Cowton, although he grew up on Pepperfield Farm overlooking the aerodrome which was about six miles south of Darlington. “My mother came out the back and said there was something wrong. We ran round and this Lancaster was turning on its belly, and all the Canadian airmen were running away from it, heading for the ditches and for the railway cutting.”

The East Coast Mainline ran in a deep cutting along the edge of the airfield, providing excellent protection when something went wrong.

“We ran down to the railway and about 25 minutes later it went up. Someone had a camera and got a photograph, but there was no bomber left – just a hole in the ground.”

It was 11.27am when the bomb went up although, as Peter remembers, the 1,500 4-lb incendiary bombs that the plane was also carrying exploded in the half-hour immediately after the crew had abandoned their stricken aircraft without injury.

The 4,000 lb cookie bomb was also known as a “blockbuster”. It was an unstable cylinder packed full of explosives, designed generally to cause immense damage but specifically to blow roof tiles off so that its smaller accompaniments, the incendiary bombs, could fall into the properties and set them alight.

It was so large that it had to be dropped from 6,000 feet (about 1,800 metres) – any lower and the plane would be dangerously caught up in its shock-wave. The Croft explosion was felt for miles around – imagine the damage it would have done to Hildesheim, a town in Saxony which today has a population of 100,000, so it is about the same size as Darlington."

Crew:-
Pilot : Flying Officer Horace F Payne RCAF J/41104
Flight Engineer : Sergeant J Housley RAFVR 2225273
Navigator : Flying Officer E A Bishop RCAF J/41426
Bomb Aimer : Flying Officer R H Pritchard RCAF J/39931 : Commission Gazetted Friday 19 January, 1940)
Wireless Operator / Air Gunner : Sergeant J Weston Johnston RCAF R/190092
Air Gunner : Sergeant G H Hall RCAF R/283615
Air Gunner : Sergeant W A Williams RCAF R/140833

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Croft#Incidents
2. Lloyd, Chris (26 July 2019). "Turning Point in History". Darlington & Stockton Times (30–2019). p. 54. ISSN 2516-5348.
3. http://www.rwrwalker.ca/RAF_owned_JP100.html
4. https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/history/17551322.when-a-4000lb-blockbuster-bomb-exploded-at-croft-airfield/
5. The Lancaster File (James J Halley, Air Britain, 1985)
6. Rob Davis Bomber Command Losses Database

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
24-Oct-2019 18:04	Dr. John Smith	Added
27-Oct-2019 22:13	Anon.	Updated [Operator, Operator]
22-Mar-2024 07:59	Rob Davis	Updated [Source, Narrative]