During the afternoon of 7th November 1943 the crew of this 1663 Heavy Conversion Unit aircraft took off from Rufforth airfield at 14.00hrs to undertake a training flight. The aircraft returned there at 14.45hrs but on landing it swung off the runway, the undercarriage collapsed and the aircraft came to rest badly damaged.
Pilot - F/O Ronald George Spicer RAFVR (130968).
Ronald Spicer completed his training at 1663 HCU and was posted to 77 Squadron. He was killed flying with them on 15th March 1944 when Halifax LL229 on an operational flight to bomb railway yards at Amiens, France when the aircraft crashed near the target area after being badly damaged by flak. One member of his crew bailed out but six were killed, he and the other five who died are buried Mezerolles Communal Cemetery, Northern France. The crew flying with him in March 1944 may have been the same crew who were training with him at 1663 HCU four months earlier. His Canadian air gunner Lawrence John Pugh was posted from 1663 HCU to 77 Squadron on 7th December 1943 and probably was when the whole crew was posted to 77 Squadron.
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