SAVED A SQUADRON

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24808, 7 January 1942, Page 6

SAVED A SQUADRON

YOUNG FLIGHT LIEUTENANT LED PLANES THROUGH FOG RUGBY, Jan. 5. A 24-year-old flight lieutenant, who 18 'months before the war was a metropolitan police officer at Wapping, saved his squadron of Spitfires from landing all over the country in a fog a few days ago. says the Air Ministry News Service.. The sauadron had been on patrol over the Channel in murky weather, and as it returned to its base the weather rapidly deteriorated, so that <on the ground visibility was reduced to a few hundred yards. A little higher up it was nil. The flight lieutenant led in his own section and saw them safely landed. He then opened the throttle and " went upstairs" to find the rest of the squadron. He found them flying several thousand feet high, above a thick rrist. He called them up on the radio telephone and offered to show them the aerodrome if they followed him down. They went after him in single file, while he kept contact with them bv radio. When they were beneath a heavy bank of mist he circled the aerodrome until they had all landed, then came down himself. It took him about half an hour to complete the operations. The onlv casualty was a Spitfire, which landed just outside the aerodrome after running out of petrol.