Halifax MZ356 at Skipton on Swale airfield.
There is an AM Form 1180 that states at 15.09hrs on 12th September 1944 Halifax MZ356 of 424 Squadron was stationary on the perimeter track at Skipton on Swale with the crew awaiting the order to take off for an operational flight (to bomb Dortmund) when it was struck by Halifax LW194. This, on the face of it is a simple accident to document. Unfortunately the 424 Squadron orb makes no proper mention of this incident and furthermore it lists both aircraft as flying the operational order on this date, with both taking off slightly later than other 424 Squadron aircraft. It does state that one aircraft failed to take off owing to a taxing accident but does not then go on to list the aircraft involved. Around this period No.6 Group HQ had a number of problems with errors in the 424 Squadron records and letters in the squadron records prove this. The squadron records states that MZ356 "P" was a borrowed 433 Squadron aircraft but this is not correct; MZ356's AM Form 78 gives this aircraft as being a 424 Squadron aircraft. "P" of 433 Squadron at this time was Halifax NP937. What I think happened is that MZ536 was indeed damaged at 15.09hrs. It's crew then exited and were allotted Halifax NP937 that was the 433 Squadron spare aircraft and took off at 15.57hrs. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, the 424 Squadron orb scribe got his aircraft muddled up and while he logged the 433 Squadron aircraft being borrowed he still listed MZ356 as being the one flown. Halifax LW194 "W" is also listed as then taking off for the operational order at 15.47hrs. This problem I cannot offer a suggestion to rectify the squadron records, this may simply have jumped into the spare 424 Squadron aircraft and used that to fly the sortie and the orb scribe had already noted they were in LW194.
Pilot - F/O James Alfred Partridge RCAF (J/25850).