ASN Wikibase Occurrence # 21897
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| Date: | Saturday 28 December 1940 |
| Time: | |
| Type: |  Supermarine Spitfire Mk Ia |
| Owner/operator: | 54 Sqn RAF |
| Registration: | X4650 |
| MSN: | |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 1 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed |
| Location: | Red Hall Farm near Kirklevington, North Yorkshire, England -
 United Kingdom
|
| Phase: | Manoeuvring (airshow, firefighting, ag.ops.) |
| Nature: | Military |
| Departure airport: | RAF Catterick, North Yorkshire |
The aircraft crashed after a mid-air collision at 12000 feet with Spitfire X4276, the pilot landed at Kirklevington Hall and his aircraft crashed on the banks of the River Leven
Crew:
Sgt Howard Squire (pilot) RAFVR baled out ok
My father, uncle and friend dug it put of the leven banks purely by accident as my father and Peter Aitkin the farm owner were clearing the farm drains, they called Ken Ward who advises them or was still the property of the raf who were them called. Some raf engineer's cameto have a look but said that they had no machinery that they could use to get to or as it was embedded in the bankside down a steep incline, they couldn't use a helicopter as there was to much tree coverage so they basically told my father it was down to him if he's wanted it loving and left..The same evening my father, my uncle's, Peter Aitkin and Ken Ward sent back to the crash site in a early Jacob jcb, my father's then reversed the jcb backwards down the banking as far as he dared to, toes the front buckets around a tree and moves the jcb lower down the banking with the hydraulics, he them scooped the v12 engine into the rear bucket pulled himself back up the bill with the front bucket hydraulics, untied the bucket from the tree and drive the jcb back to our house where the engine and reduction gear were sat on an old wooden door and washed off. There was only the engine and reduction gear left except some tiny frame pieces as the plane had snapped off at the bulkhead in it's original recovery as the engine was so deeply embedded and was left. The recovered part's were dispanded onto other aircraft at the time bit apparently only the browning machine guns were reused as everything else was scrap. The engine itself had hit so hard it smashed the engine block and crushed the crankshaft rendering the engine basically scrap with not much help being sat under water for 30 years, the engine actually still belongs to my father and was left at Ken Ward's hillside shed that was like a little museum of old aircraft part's in the good faith and gentleman's agreement he was to look after it but he sold it much to our despair and dismay as he didn't legally own it, my uncle has the photos from the night it was pulled out of the bankside, this plane is not an original plane at all asnext to the engine and reduction gear nothing survived of the original plane and as I've stated the engine was basically scrap it's purely a replica which was built from spitfire part's sourced from all over the British isles.
Found in 1976 in a river near Kirklevington, the restored X4650 is flying again on March, 9, 2012
Sources:
Spitfire production list
Fana de l'Aviation - 510 - April 2012
Media:
Revision history:
| Date/time | Contributor | Updates |
|---|---|---|
| 01-Aug-2008 10:29 | Anon. | Added |
| 30-Dec-2011 05:53 | Nepa | Updated [Aircraft type, Operator, Location, Departure airport, Source, Narrative] |
| 30-Apr-2012 12:11 | ThW | Updated [Source, Narrative] |
| 29-Aug-2020 11:27 | Iceman 29 | Updated [Embed code, Narrative] |
| 14-Aug-2021 06:01 | Anon. | Updated [Narrative] |
| 07-Jul-2022 23:53 | Ron Averes | Updated [Aircraft type] |
| 15-Jun-2023 21:05 | Nepa | Updated [[Aircraft type]] |
Corrections or additions? ... Edit this accident description
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