Crash

After the war German captured documents who had a connection with a certain MACR (Missing Air Crew Report were connected with each other.

So we can find in the MACR 7255 from this bomber, German documents related with this bomber and are named KU2520.

Some German documents in the MACR are originals other documents were left in Germany and only a transcribed document of it is in the MACR.

 

What happened?

 

In the MACR  we can read the statements made by most of the crewmembers.

In this MACR there are also many documents from the German Flak (anti aircraft battery) who claim the shot down of the aircraft.

However, I have my doubts that the German Flak was the cause that this aircraft is crashed...

No crew member declares in the MACR that they have been hit by FLAK!

In the German reports we read that the plane was shot down on the way back 100 km after they left the target area.

But I would like to base myself on the statement that Gordon Morehead wrote to me in his letter  in 1978:

 

...we were on the final bomb run and No. 1 engine lost power and the propellor could not be feathered and was windmilling! 

We jettisoned our bombs and started immediately to our base at England.

It seemed as though about 5 - 10 minutes later No. 2 engine did the same and +/- 10 minutes later No. 3 engine reacted the same as the first two!

With three windmilling propellors and one outboard engine with power, the plane was impossible to keep on altitude or on a steady cours.

As we were down to 7000 Ft altitude with solid cloud layers above and below us and after flying an erratic course our navigator only guessed we were over Belgium.

Not knowing wether there might be low mountains we thought it wiser to bail out rather than hit the site of a mountain...

 

The pilot gave the signal to bail out and all the crewmembers left the airplane.

He set the auto-pilot and he was the last to leave the cripple bomber.

The plane flew alone back in the direction to Germany for about 30 Km´s loosing hight very qiuck.

Finally it crashed at Heusden (see plan below) 

 

 

These are the positions of the crewmembers in the aircraft and the way they had to leave it.