Date:	Monday 12 March 1945
Time:	afternoon
Type:	Avro Lancaster B.III
Owner/operator:	106 Squadron, RAF
Registration:	RA508
MSN:	ZN-B
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 7 / Occupants: 7
Other fatalities:	0
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Ülfe 2, Radevormwald, near Düsseldorf, North Rhine Westphalia -   Germany
Phase:	Combat
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Metheringham, Lincolnshire
Destination airport:

Narrative:
Avro Lancaster B.III RA508/ZN-B of 106 Squadron, RAF Metheringham was one of two aircraft lost on operations during a daylight raid on Dortmund, Germany. (The other was Lancaster PB187). Target: Dortmund Marshalling Yards. RA508 took off from RAF Methingham at 13:30 hours local time, and the operation was Bomber Command's last Daylight Operation of WWII. Until 2024, the official story was the the aircraft had been lost on operations (with the loss of all seven crew) after being hit by flak and crashed into the North Sea.

However, on 28 November 2024 a number of newspapers ran a story that disagrees with the official account, stating that RA508 was hit by "friendly fire" - being struck by falling bombs from an other aircraft in the formation (possibly Lancaster B.III 'ZN-F', also of 106 Squadron), and crashed into a meadow at Ülfe 2, district of Radevormwald, near Düsseldorf, North Rhine Westphalia, Germany:

"Lancaster RA508 was one of more than 1,100 planes dispatched to bomb Dortmund on March 12, 1945 – and one of just two aircraft lost during the raid. Her seven crew were never seen again, and her final resting place remains a mystery, with official records saying she was lost over the North Sea.

But now her true fate may have been uncovered, after partially-burnt RAF maps were recovered from a crash site in rural Germany. Cologne-based researcher Manfred Weichert said he was '99.9 per cent sure' that RA508 crashed some 20 miles south of Dortmund.

He said: 'At the height of Cologne/Düsseldorf, the aircraft was most likely hit by flak. It veered off the approach route on the right while on fire, and crashed into a meadow in Ülfe 2, a district of Radevormwald, and exploded.'

Witness testimonies describe a four-engine plane coming down in the town that fateful day.Local historian Friedhelm Brack, who collected the testimonies, had himself inspected the crash site as a teenager, recovering some maps from the wreckage a day after its loss.

The partially-burnt maps, one of which is marked 'RAF', show Britain and mainland Europe, and include a flight path over Dortmund, with the city itself highlighted. Mr Brack later recalled how he and other local boys scavenged the wreckage under the noses of the Luftwaffe, taking ammunition and signal cartridges.

He wrote: 'Something white was peeking out from under a piece of the fuselage: navigation charts, printed in bright colors! They had survived the impact fire. 'We ripped them out, each of us boys trying to get as big a piece of them as possible.' Before his death in 2015, Mr Brack submitted the maps to the Radevormwald town archives, where Mr Weichert would later find them.

Mr Brack always assumed that the plane was the PB187, the only other aircraft lost in the raid. But PB187 actually crashed some 30 miles away in Duisburg, and with no other candidates, Mr Weichert believes the plane must have been RA508.

He said: “The wreckage of the plane, which had exploded on the ground, was probably scrapped after the war, but there are no records of this. The burnt remains of the crew were buried in a wooden box in a bomb crater and then the crater was filled in. Since Bomber Command never searched for the aircraft, the mortal remains stayed there. And if they were not accidentally excavated over the decades, they are still there today.”

The crash site today is now an industrial estate. Radevormwald is a municipality in the Oberbergischer Kreis, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the oldest towns in the Bergischen Land, formerly the County and Duchy of Berg.

Crew of Lancaster RA508
Pilot Officer Frank Ernest BAKER (49319)
Sergeant Donovan Yukin CARTER (1594696)
Flight Sergeant William Joseph COOPER (1577019)
Flight Sergeant Hunter GILLENDER (R/192634) (Canadian)
Flight Sergeant Herbert George HARDING (1601210)
Sergeant Kenneth Robert HAW (1595485)
Flight Sergeant George John Patrick O'BRIEN (423174)
All of the above were posted as "Missing in Action, presumed killed in Action". As none of the crew were ever found, they are commemorated on the Runnymede Memorial.

History of Lancaster RA508: Built by Metropolitan-Vickers to contract 6/Acft/2221. Delivered to the RAF 5 February 1945 and taken on charge by 106 Squadron, RAF Metheringham as 'ZN-B'. Lost on operations on the afternoon of 12 March 1945 as per the above. Struck off charge 27 March 1945.

1. Daily Mail 28 November 2024: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14135979/WWII-RAF-bomber-buried-crew-German-town-Lancaster-believed-lost-North-Sea-1945-crashed-land-maps-mystery-wreckage-suggest.html
2. The Sun 28 November 2024: https://www.the-sun.com/news/12984506/missing-ww2-raf-bomber-lost-north-sea-solved-germany/
3. 106 Squadron Operational Record Book 1 January 1945 to 28 February 1946: National Archives File AIR27/385: https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C2503473
4. https://wartimememoriesproject.com/ww2/view.php?uid=256442
5. https://forum.rafcommands.com/forum/general-category/309848-navigational-chart-with-marine-and-freshwaters-shaded-in-blue
6. https://losses.internationalbcc.co.uk/loss/100887/
7. https://caspir.warplane.com/pdoc/pn/600007266/
8. https://www.facebook.com/groups/255939627858660/posts/5714123362040232/
9. https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/36695
10. https://www.avro-lancaster.info/raseries/ra508
11. https://www.rafcommands.com/database/serials/details.php?uniq=RA508
12. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Metheringham

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
28-Nov-2024 23:28	Dr. John Smith	Added