大象传媒

This story was ssent to me by Stan Bradford whom I met at a Squadron reunion.

After a somewhat action-packed period of training we were posted to 57 Squadron at Scampton which was also the base of 617 Squadron, the famous Dambusters.

After a brief settling-in period to squadron routine, we found ourselves on Battle Orders. On the night of the 27th August 1943 we were briefed for an attack to Nuremburg that night and instead of returning to Scampton to land at East Kirkby, our new base which had just been completed. We took off at 21.00 hours and proceeded slowly to gain our operation height of 20,000 feet. It wasn't long before tension was increased by a large thump, fortunately for us, all our power units continued to function correctly. It was discovered on our return that we had picked up a seagull in our airtakes. It was a christening that will always remain in my memory. During the operation we were attacked by German night fighters on several occasions. Between our rear-gunner and myself in the mid-upper position, we bagged a ME109 and a JU88. Worse was to come, we managed to get in the way of flak, which seriously affected our navigational equipment. Our navigator,putting his training to good use, read the stars for guidance. Believing that we were approaching the English coast our skipper started to use the May Day distress call when suddenly all hell was let loose, we had strayed over the Channel Islands which was under German control. Fortunately our distress signal was picked up by RAF Exeter and we were escorted by a Typhoon fighter plane to the runway where we landed on two engines owing to a lack of fuel. We returned to East Kirkby the next day with a battered Lancaster.

Within 72 hours we were at it again, this time to Berlin, the first of that winter's onslaught by Bomber Command. Having survived numerous trips, including being hit by bombs from a Lancaster above us whilst carrying put a raid on Berlin in which 420 Lancasters took part with a total of 1,356 tons of bombs, another slight hiccup occured. After being attacked by fighters, (again) our skipper was a little bit hard on the controls when we were completely turned upside down fully loaded with the night's bombs. Losing 10,000 feet we went on and gained a maximum height of 19,000 feet before bombing.

On our penultimate trip, and it was our fourteenth time to bomb Berlin, we hit big trouble, it was the night of the big winds and this seriously affected navigation. Being blown off our original course by a considerable amount we found ourselves over the most heavily protected of Germany, the dreaded Rhur valley. It wasn't long before we were coned by searchlights for 35 minutes, miraculously our skipper through the plane about in all directions and we escaped, at a price. We had used up a lot of fuel we had to choose whether to get back on course or go back over the North Sea and risk ditching in the sea. We were lucky again and made it back to RAF Cottishall with a minimum of fuel.

Wondering if our luck would last one more time, you can imagine our inner feelings, when on the 30th March 1944 we were briefed to carry out a raid where we had been fortunate to survive our first sortie. Yes, Nuremburg, where Bomber Command suffered its heaviest defeat, losing 96 bombers with the loss of 672 aircrew.

Phew, I was only 20 years old when we'd finished

Stan Bradford DFM

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