Date:	Friday 22 April 1949
Time:	day
Type:	Gloster Meteor F Mk 4
Owner/operator:	222 (Natal) Sqn RAF
Registration:	VT233
MSN:
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 1
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Thorney Channel, off RAF Thorney Island, Hampshire, England -   United Kingdom
Phase:	Manoeuvring (airshow, firefighting, ag.ops.)
Nature:	Military
Departure airport:	RAF Thorney Island, Emsworth, Hampshire
Destination airport:	RAF Thorney Island, Hampshire

Narrative:
Gloster Meteor F.4 VT233: Delivered to the CFE (Central Fighter Establishment) RAF Wittering 10.8.48. To 222 (Natal) Squadron, RAF at unknown date in 1948-49.

Written off (destroyed) 22.4.49 when abandoned in an inverted spin during aerobatics on a sortie to and from RAF Thorney Island. Meteor VT233 crashed into the Thorney Channel, off RAF Thorney Island, Emsworth, Hampshire. The pilot had been practicing aerobatics for just over an hour. The aircraft then entered an inverted spin to starboard, from which the pilot could not recover

Pilot Flying Officer A S Davis RAF bailed out, and survived uninjured.

1. Halley, James (1999) Broken Wings – Post-War Royal Air Force Accidents Tunbridge Wells: Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd. p. 95 ISBN 0-85130-290-4.
2. Final Landings: A Record of RAF Aircraft Losses 1946 to 1949 by Colin Cummings p 493
3. Royal Air Force Aircraft SA100-VZ999 (James J Halley, Air Britain, 1983 p 84)
4. https://air-britain.com/pdfs/aeromilitaria/Aeromilitaria_2009.pdf p.175
5. 222 Squadron ORB for the period 1-1-1946 to 31-12-1950: National Archives (PRO Kew) File AIR 27/2745: https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C2505113
6. http://www.ukserials.com/results.php?serial=vt
7. https://www.hampshireairfields.co.uk/hancrash.html
8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No._222_Squadron_RAF#Entering_the_jet_age
9. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Thorney_Island#Post-war_units

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
30-Mar-2023 01:12	Dr. John Smith	Added