Mustang AG588 damaged in the air at Haxby, landed at Clifton airfield.
On 23rd February 1944 this 430 Squadron Mustang was being flown on a photo-recce when it clipped high tension cables near Haxby, York. The collision brought down a pylon which blocked the Scarborough to York railway line in both directions. The aircraft remained in the air and made it back to Clifton where the pilot crash landed the aircraft. Clifton's ORB, for this date, lists a Mustang as force-landing on the airfield at 09.00hrs "trailing 20 yards of HT cable from a wing". The aircraft was damaged in the incident and was originally assessed as sustaining Cat.B/FA but this may have been lowered to minor Cat.A(c)/FA after further assessment. The 430 Squadron ORB lists all the damage to the aircraft though this would suggest it was more serious than the minor Cat.A.
Pilot - P/O John Head Taylor RCAF (J/7426).
Mustang AG558 was built by North American at Inglewood, Dallas to Purchase Contract 15471 and was delivered by sea to the UK, arriving in the UK in March 1942. After erection and acceptance at MU it was issued to 239 Squadron at Gatwick in May 1942 when the unit converted from Hurricane MkIIc's to Mustang MkI's. It then moved with the unit to various airfields during 1942 (Detling on 19th May, Gatwick on 31st May, Twinwood Farm on 30th August, Cranfield on 21st October, Odiham on 18th November, Hurn on 6th December). In early 1943 it was transferred to 4 Squadron at Clifton and then shortly afterwards to the newly formed 430 Squadron RCAF at Hartford Bridge where the unit worked up to operational readiness before moving to Gatwick. The unit was rested from Ops. and moved to Clifton on 9th February 1944 where it suffered this Cat.B/FA mishap on 23rd February 1944. It was repaired in works and on completion of repair it was issued to 168 Squadron at Odiham in April 1944 from where it took part in the D-Day operations. The unit moved to France in June 1944, firstly to Sommervieu on 29th June, then to St.Horrine on 14th August, then on 1st September 1944 the unit moved to Avrilly and on 20th September to Diest/Schaffen. The aircraft's final base was Eindhoven, where it moved on 2nd October 1944. It was struck off charge after inspection on 12th December 1944.