During the afternoon of 17th October 1950 around five Vampires of No.203 Advanced Flying School, based at Driffield, undertook a formation flying training exercise around the general area over East Yorkshire. The pilots of the five aircraft contained one flying instructor and four pupil pilots. The exercise appears to have been drawing to a close and the five Vampires were flying in the circuit of Driffield airfield when two of the Vampires, VF270 and VF308, collided over Kirkburn village. The pilots were intending on making an approach to land and the formation leader / flying instructor (in VF270) gave the order to break formation. The leader then made a climbing turn to port. The aircraft flying a No.2 in the formation (VF308) then appears to have overtaken the lead aircraft (VF270) but the lead then struck it from below. Both aircraft fell to earth.
VF270 narrowly missed hitting the church as it fell and it crashed into the churchyard resulting in a explosion and the death of the flying instructor pilot. A significant fire developed in the churchyard. Owing to the direction it was heading when it crashed a proportion of the wreckage left the churchyard. A car was passing at the instance of the crash, the driver (Mr Harry Elvidge) and passenger (Mr William Paul) escaped unhurt but the car was peppered with mud and debris, and the roof caught fire. The car passed through the explosion at the time of the crash, the driver stopped clear of the site and put the fire out but received a minor hand injury. Beyond the road lay the village school in which some 43 children were at the time. Wreckage landed in the playground and on the roof of the building but the teaching staff led the children away via a back door and all escaped injury. Pieces of burning wreckage landed on the school roof which was later extinguished by a young airman who climbed up with a hand extinguisher and put out the flames. A fuel tank broke off the aircraft and landed in the front room of a house badly damaging it, it's owner was shopping in Driffield at the time.
The second Vampire, VF308, crashed into a grass field around a quarter of a mile south of Kirkburn, on the Southburn side of the village also killing the pilot.
VF270 Pilot - Sgt Reginald Marshall Willis RAF (574707), aged 27. Buried Ferryhill Cemetery, Durham.