ASN Wikibase Occurrence # 15759
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| Date: | Tuesday 18 April 1944 |
| Time: | |
| Type: |  Bristol Beaufighter Mk VIF |
| Owner/operator: | 68 Sqn RAF |
| Registration: | V8740 |
| MSN: | |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 2 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed |
| Location: | 1mile of RAF Fairwood Common, Glamorgan, South Wales -
 United Kingdom
|
| Phase: | Take off |
| Nature: | Test |
| Departure airport: | RAF Fairwood Common, Wales |
| Return. |
Beaufighter V8740: Tookoff for Night Flying Test. 18/04/1944
During take off Beaufighter on engine trouble. Engine lost power and the airplane on belly landed in base.
Crew:
P/O (161.347) Miroslav ŠTANDERA (čs.pilot) RAFVR - ok
W/O (787816) Karel BEDNAŘÍK (čs.nav.) RAFVR - ok
Details:
V8740 wasbuilt in the middle of the 13th batch consisting of 46 aircraft built to type out of a total of 600 units ordered from the Bristol Aeroplane Co’ at Filton, Bristol. To contract 30264/39, delivered between March 1942 and May 1943. The break down comprised of, 125 to mkIF, 75 mkIIF and 400 mkVIF.
She was sent to 68 squadron, the first RAF squadron to bear the number was formed at RAF Catterick on the 7th of January 1941 as a night fighter squadron equipped with the Bristol Blenheim. Becoming operational on the 7th of April. In May 1941 No. 68 converted to the Bristol Beaufighter and in March 1942 it moved to RAF Coltishall in Norfolk.
From July 1941 No. 68 Squadron always had a strong element of Czechoslovak airmen in exile, with up to eight flying crews consisting entirely of Czechoslovak personnel.
V8740 arrived during the month of June 1943 when the squadron were based at RAF Coltishall. Her first patrol took place on the 14th of that month and flown by F/O L. Bobek DFC and W/O B. Kovarik. She was involved in a number of sorties and being flown by F/Lt P.F. Allen DFC & Bar, & his Nav’, F/O N.H. Josling. On the night of the 11th/12th of August they intercepted a Dornier Do-217 and succeeded in damaging the enemy aircraft, which was claimed as a ‘Probable’. On the night of the 17th/18th they were able to shoot down another Dornier which was listed as ‘Destroyed’ it came down 30 miles East of Happisburgh, this was the fourth E/A shot down by the squadron that night. Allen and Josling were to Destroy a Messerschmitt Me-410 on the night of the 3rd of October but V8740 was ‘grounded’, undergoing maintenance checks.
On the 29th of January 1944, she took off at 18:00hrs to conduct G.C.I. practice (Ground-controlled interception, is an air defence tactic whereby one or more radar stations or other observational stations are linked to a command communications centre which guides interceptor aircraft to an airborne target.) Flown by F/Sgt L.W. Neal & Sgt E. Eastwood when they were diverted onto an active hostile E/A in the area. After two goes the E/A, which was identified as a Junkers Ju-188 was shot down and confirmed as Destroyed two days later. The Ju-188 had come down at Shrubland Hall, NNE of Ipswich, with three of the crew taken prisoner, one was injured and hospitalized, they were on a Feindflug (operational sortie) to London, as part of Operation Steinbock.
On the 1st of March 1944, the squadron moved to RAF Fairwood Common to rest and re-build. During their stay here bad weather interfered with the training and even when called upon to provide interception patrols. On the 12th of April, V8740, along with ND239, were scrambled to re-enforce No.9 group, but ‘No Joy’!
Strangely, on the 18th of April there is no entry, or remarks as to what happened when V8740 took off for a night flying test when almost immediately the starboard engine burst into flames, at a height of only twenty feet, this left the Czech pilot no option other than to make a crash landing into a small space just beyond a wooded feature known as ‘Hams Wood’. Both Czechoslovakian crew were uninjured. As for the Beau, a combat veteran with two destroyed and two damaged E/A to her credit, she was a write off!
A few days later, on the 27th of April, during take-off in V8592 (WM-E) at 17:05hrs for a test flight, a tyre burst. They had to spend the next 80 minutes circling the airfield until the last of the day fighters had returned from a sweep over northern France. Štandera then made a belly landing at the airfield and again both crew escaped uninjured.
Crew:
P/O Miroslav Štandera 161347 (Czech) RAFVR. Pilot. Safe.
W/O Karel Bednarik 787816 (Czech) RAFVR. Nav/W/Op. Safe.
Wreckage:
Not known.
Additional Information:
January 1944, the German Luftwaffe began an air campaign of bombing raids against London and other cities in England, which was to be the largest since the ‘Blitz’ of 1940-41. Named Operation Steinbock by the Germans, it was to be the final large-scale campaign of manned-aircraft bombing raids against England.
The Luftwaffe assembled over 500 bombers for the campaign, some withdrawn from Italy. These were mainly Junkers Ju 88s, Junkers Ju 188s and Dornier Do 217s, along with 30 of the large, new and troubled Heinkel He 177s. There were also 20 of the fast twin-engine Messerschmitt Me 410s “Schnellbombers” and 25 Focke-Wulf Fw 190s.
The bombing was largely ineffective, and the Luftwaffe lost 329 aircraft during the campaign along with hundreds of its aircrew, many of whom were amongst its most experienced aviators. The majority were shot down by RAF night-fighters, and others by the anti-aircraft guns. Overall, the losses amounted to 63 percent of the German aircraft committed to Operation Steinbock, at an average rate of 77 aircraft lost each month. This was simply unsustainable, and the bombing campaign ended in May 1944. Worse still for the Germans was the fact that the Luftwaffe bomber force was now so sadly depleted that it could do little to interfere with the growing concentrations of troops, equipment and shipping massing on the English south coast for the forthcoming invasion of France. Nor, when D-Day came on 6th June 1944, could it do much to resist the Allied invasion.
The squadron moved back to East Anglia and RAF Coltishall where they converted over to the DeHavilland Mosquito mk XVII & XIX, just in time for the new threat of the V-1 Flying Bombs.
The following is taken from historical sources.
“Miroslav Štandera (5 October 1918) flew combat missions for the French Air Force and the Royal Air Force. Štandera was one of the final two surviving Czech combat pilots who flew for the Allies throughout the entire period of World War II. He was also the last surviving Czech pilot who had flown for France during the war.
Miroslav Štandera returned to his native Czechoslovakia following the end of World War II. However, he was expelled from the Czechoslovak Air Force by the new Communist government after the 1948 Czech coup d’etat. The Czechoslovak Socialist Republic was seeking to purge members of the armed forces who had served for Western European countries during the war. Štandera fled to the United Kingdom in 1948, where he rejoined the RAF. Štandera retired from the Royal Air Force (RAF) in 1955.
Štandera became a Silversmith in Britain after retiring from the RAF. He retired in the early 1980s.
In 1984, Štandera moved from Britain to Bavaria, West Germany. He returned to the Czech Republic in 1994 to live with his daughter's family in Plzen.
Miroslav Štandera died in Plzeň, Czech Republic, on 19 February 2014, at the age of 94. His death was announced by officials from the Plzeň city hall and his funeral was held at the Cathedral of St Bartholomew in Plzen on 26 February 2014.
Karel Bednarik (19 December 1920). Born in Holešov in the Moravian region of Czechoslovakia. He too managed to escape the German invasion and also joined the French forces, in his case, the French Foreign Legion before escaping to the UK and joining the RAF.
Karel returned to his homeland in August 1945 aboard a Liberator bomber from 311 Sqn. Initially he remained with the new Czechoslovak Air Force. On 1 January 1946 he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant, but he chose to be demobilised which happened on 13 March 1946. He returned to his native Holešov and was employed as the manager of a cinema. His plans were dramatically changed following the Communist coup of February 1948. On 27 February 1948, the President of the Workers Union came to Karel at the cinema and told him that this was his last day of work at the cinema. About an hour later the President returned and said that he would be permitted to continue working until his replacement had been trained. Bednařík refused and immediately left his job. He quickly got himself a job as a sales representative for a local textile company. Bednařík realized that under the new regime there was little chance for those who had fought in the West, for the liberation of their homeland, and decided to go into exile again.
On 15 March he was in Prague and visited his friend Josef Machek, together they discussed the possibilities of escaping to the West and started to make their escape plan. Machek then travelled to Aš, a town near Chleb, Czechoslovakia which was close to the German border. His inquiries there found that there were possibilities to covertly cross the border to Germany.
Machek returned to Prague and Karel and he decided that they would try to cross the border on 25th March 1948 and invited a 3 close friends to join them. Karel married his fiance Anděla Hajniková on 23rd March 1948 and the following day the seven members of the escape group – Karel with his wife, Machek with his wife Vlasta, Miloslav Kratochvíl, ex-310 Sqn Pilot with his Jaroslav and Fr. Vojtěch Rygal – travelled to Aš. On arrival there, they contacted the man who was due to help them cross the border. He advised them that he had been tipped off that he was due to be arrested by the StB for facilitating illegal border crossings to the West and that they would be better to cross the border on their own.
Following the ‘Velvet Revolution’ in 1989, he along with his former Czech RAF colleagues were Politically Rehabilitated on 13 September 1991 in Prague. Karel was promotd to the rank of Colonel (retd.) in the Czechoslovak Air Force.
He died in his native Holešov on 26 February 2011, aged 91.”
Sources:
1.History 68 Squadron RAF
2.ORB 68 Sqdn RAF
www.fcafu.com
www.britishaviation-ptp.com
www.rafcommands.com
www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
www.memorialflightclub.com
Revision history:
| Date/time | Contributor | Updates |
|---|---|---|
| 13-Mar-2008 00:22 | Nepa | Added |
| 17-Feb-2010 10:36 | NePa | Updated [Operator, Narrative] |
| 28-Mar-2012 02:11 | Nepa | Updated [Location, Departure airport, Source, Narrative] |
| 28-Mar-2012 02:13 | Nepa | Updated [Narrative] |
| 14-Jun-2014 15:38 | Nepa | Updated [Location, Departure airport, Source, Narrative] |
| 08-Dec-2015 16:35 | Heil | Updated [Location, Narrative] |
| 09-Nov-2019 11:59 | Nepa | Updated [Source, Narrative, Operator] |
| 18-May-2021 18:08 | Anon. | Updated [Location, Operator] |
| 28-Jan-2022 18:03 | Nepa | Updated [Location, Departure airport, Source, Narrative, Operator] |
| 28-Mar-2024 06:35 | Davies 62 | Updated [Destination airport, Source, Narrative] |
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