大象传媒

This contibution was made by Frank Laitwood, 6 Woodfield Close,Redhill, RH1 2DL

As a young boy I was standing in my garden as a Hurricane zoomed in very low from over the sea trailing black smoke. As he neared me I could see the pilot leaning out to one side of his cockpit whose windscreen was completely covered in some form of a liquid substance. As he passed over me he rose to clear the bank behind as the slow turning propellor finally stopped as he floated and crash landed in the field right beside the "Share & Coulter" pub. My very good friend John Barden who then witnessed the actual crash watched in disbelief as the pilot stepped out with just a scratch on his nose and a strained ankle.

This story was confirmed in the Daily Telegraph on 31 August 2000 and the following is an extract from the relevant section:-

"Fighting through the summer heat of the Battle of Britain, Constable Maxwell destroyed an ME 109 on August 28. But his Hurricane was so badly damged that he faced the choice of bailing out over the sea or gambling on getting home with a faltering engine. he took the gamble and the hurricane had just cleared the beach and the last of the houses at Hearne Bay when the engine glycol exploded, obliterating his forward view. After crash-landing he discovered the engine had fallen 25 yards behind him."

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