23 Sep 1944

United Kingdom
  • A V-1 flying bomb over flew the town of Newmarket, Suffolk, England, United Kingdom and crashed near Burwell in Cambridgeshire. The pilot, at the rank of flight officer, of the 501 Squadron had been chasing the bomb and had reached overtaking speed when the engine of his Tempest aircraft seized up. He had seconds to gain a little height and turn to the west to avoid the marshlands and bale out. He saw the aircraft crash into a barn and explode whilst he landed in a cherry tree outside the Leather Bottle Inn. It was there that he was rescued by a Royal Engineer Officer before being held in a Police Station for 2 hours awaiting proper identification. The fault in the Tempest aircraft was traced to an air lock when fuel tanks were switched over. ww2dbase [Tempest | V-Weapons Campaign | Burwell, England | HM]

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