Date:	Friday 27 October 1950
Time:	day
Type:	de Havilland DH.100 Vampire FB Mk 5
Owner/operator:	203 AFS RAF
Registration:	VZ348
MSN:	EEP/42...
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 1 / Occupants: 1
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	near Cottam, 4 miles east of Sledmere, East Yorkshire -   United Kingdom
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Driffield, East Yorkshire
Destination airport:
Confidence Rating:	Information is only available from news, social media or unofficial sources

Narrative:
de Havilland DH.100 Vampire FB.Mk.5 VZ348, 203 AFS (Advanced Flying School), RAF: Delivered 25/4/1950. Written off (destroyed) 27/10/1950 : The aircraft was seen to spiral out of cloud and to crash in a field near Cottam, East Yorkshire. It is presumed that the pilot lost control and failed to recover the aircraft after it had entered a spin. The reasons for the loss of control, and the failure to recover were never determined by the RAF Board of Inquiry. The pilot was killed

Crew of Vampire VZ348:
Flying Officer Alan Morgan BASSETT, RAF (pilot, Service Number 2600214, aged 22) - killed on active service 27/10/1950

The report crash location of Cottam is a hamlet and civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. The hamlet is west of the B1249 Skipsea to Staxton road, and in the Yorkshire Wolds. It is 16 miles (30 km) north from the county town of Beverley, and approximately 4 miles (6 km) east from the village of Sledmere, at approximate co ordinates
54.068375°N 0.481665°W

Note that the serial VZ348 was allocated TWICE - once to the above De Havilland DH.100 Vampire FB.Mk.5, and also to a Hawker Sea Fury T.Mk.20 (delivered 03/05/1950, sold 18/02/1952 at RNAS Anthorn to Hawker Aircraft Ltd, then sold to the Iraqi Air Force as 328 in 1952).

1. Halley, James (1999) Broken Wings – Post-War Royal Air Force Accidents Tunbridge Wells: Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd. p107 ISBN 0-85130-290-4.
2. Royal Air Force Aircraft SA100-VZ999 (James J Halley, Air Britain, 1983)
3. Last Take Off; A Catalogue of RAF Aircraft Losses 1950 to 1953 by Colin Cummings p.92
4. http://www.ukserials.com/results.php?serial=VZ
5. http://www.airhistory.org.uk/dh/_DH100%20prodn%20list.txt
6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottam,_East_Riding_of_Yorkshire
7. https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/38748/supplement/5181/data.pdf

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
04-Jan-2021 21:25	Dr. John Smith	Added
05-Jan-2021 09:31	Dr.Roup	Updated [Operator, Operator]