Meteor WH190 near Muston, Filey.
On the 27th August 1954 the pilot of this aircraft was undertaking a training
exercise, he was the pilot of one of three Meteors that were flying similar sorties from the same unit. This aircraft was practicing a tail chase with
another aircraft and during which the aircraft broke away and went into a vertical dive. With 4,000 feet to spare the pilot attempted to bale
out but his parachute rip cord caught on part of the canopy on his way out and deployed too early at high speed. This caused the chute to tear
in a number of places and on his way down the pilot partly fell out
of a loose fitting parachute harness he was wearing and sadly he was killed on striking the ground.
He was found lying on the Scarbrough to Filey railway line. The aircraft continued for a short while
before partly coming out of its
dive and crashing on farmland to the north
of Muston at 11.00hrs, twenty five minutes into the flight. One of the aircrafts engines struck a tree (shown in the photograph below) damaging it. The other continued over
a further field before coming to rest in the River Hertford.
The location widely quoted for this incident is a couple of miles south of Filey but this is not correct. Press reports stated
the pilot was found on the railway line and the location of the aircraft impact is known and neither are south of Filey. An
investigation was carried out and
recommended that pilots should not borrow other pilot's harnesses, something which may have occured in this case.
The Scarborough fire engine attempted to attend to the crash site and over turned in a ditch on the way there.
Pilot - P/O Edmund P Aston RAF (3515081), aged 23. Burial location not known.
I located the site on a very cold January day in 2009 with air historians Dick Barton, Albert Pritchard and Ken Reast through talking
to the landowner Mr Winter of Muston. The site is on very wet ground and whilst a handful of peices were found being able to see any writing any of them to
be able to identify any was not possible. The aircraft had just missed houses in Muston and crashed a couple of hundred yards from the village. Mr Lee Norgate
of Filey had carried a similar investigation in the years before our visit.
The closest we came to a peice with any lettering on.
Edmund Aston received his short service commission on 27th May 1953 (with his period of
service to count from 14th January 1953) to Acting P/O on probation. He was graded as a P/O on
24th March 1954.
We would like to thank Mr Winter of Muston for allowing us to visit and for recounting his memories of the incident to us.