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On 15th February 1942, Consolidated B-24A-C Liberator AM918 (G-AGDR) was shot down by friendly fire off the Eddystone, south of Plymouth.

Type

Consolidated B-24 Liberator C Mk I

History

Three Liberator I heavy bomber aircraft (AM915, AM918, and AM920) were converted to Liberator C (Cargo) Mk.I type and operated by the BOAC to carry priority passengers and to ferry crews across the Atlantic.

On 24 and 25 January 1942, B-24 Liberator AM918 flew the first nonstop flight from RAF Hurn to Cairo in Egypt.  Strong headwinds repeatedly delayed the return trip so this was not attempted until 14th February.  In such conditions, the Liberator would have run out of fuel on the traditional route across the Bay of Biscay around Brittany and along the English Channel from the west.  The captain, Humphrey Page, therefore suggested a direct route across occupied Europe at night.  The Air Ministry in London signalled approval for the route but conflicting messages were received from RAF Transport Command, which was against it, and from BOAC which appeared to be in favour. After asking BOAC to confirm its position, and getting no reply, the Liberator took off on the evening of 14 February.

The next morning as it reached the coast of northern France, near St Malo, the aircraft appeared on British radar screens, initially registering as hostile.  At 08:15, Polish pilots F/Sgt Stanislaw Brzeski in spitfire AD308/JH-T and Sgt Jan Malinowski in AR279/JH-R of 317 Squadron based at Bolt Head airfield, near Salcombe in south Devon, were ordered to intercept the unidentified aircraft.  

As they closed in on the grey-coloured aircraft, one pilot saw a bright flash coming from a glass turret and at the same time - he told the subsequent inquiry - the aircraft turned and began to dive into cloud.  At 08:50 both Spitfires opened fire, the Liberator's right engine was hit and started smoking, and it disappeared from view. Shortly afterwards, emerging beneath the cloud, the pilots saw a large patch of oil and disturbed water about five miles southwest of the Eddystone Lighthouse

Among the remains recovered were some socks belonging to the flight's first officer, some bags of diplomatic mail - which should have sunk, but for some reason floated - and a leather bag belonging to one of the passengers, Griffiss. Crew and all passengers were lost and no bodies were recovered.

The court of inquiry blamed the Spitfire pilots, Stanislaw Brzeski and Jan Malinowski for failing to identify the Liberator as a friendly aircraft before opening fire, and recommended a court martial - but it was later decided there was insufficient evidence to proceed.  Controllers who knew that a Liberator would be arriving on a path over occupied France on the morning of 15 February were also reprimanded for not warning the Exeter fighter sector.  The question why the Liberator was not immediately identified on radar screens as a friendly aircraft went unanswered - either its friend-or-foe identification transmitter was not working or it was not switched on.  The flashes of light from the Liberator were assumed to be a Morse-code message flashed from an Aldis lamp. But technically the Liberator should have signalled its friendly status by firing a colour-coded flare.

One of the key lessons learned from the tragedy was that fighter pilots needed better instruction in the recognition of aircraft - both military and civilian.  "In view of the important personages carried in civil aircraft, more attention should be paid to the identification of civil aircraft," the court of inquiry recommended. Stanislaw Brzeski, the first of the Spitfire pilots to shoot, told the inquiry he had never seen a Liberator before, he mistook it for a German Focke-Wulf 200, another four-engined aircraft which is usually grey in colour.

Despite the attempt to hush up the incident, a report about it appeared in The Times newspaper.

Crew:
Pilot Cpt. John Alexander Stuart Hunter
Pilot Cpt. Robert Humphrey Page
Flight Engineer Horace Reginald Spicer
First Officer Richard John Williamson.

Passengers:
Lt. Charles L.M.Vine RNR
Lt. Colonel Townsend Griffiss USAAC
Brigadier Frederick Morris CB RAOC
Captain Robert Humphrey Page (BOAC)
Harold E. Bell (BOAC).

Griffiss was the first American officer killed in Europe after their entry into the war just weeks earlier.  Griffiss Air Force Base in central New York State was named in his honour in 1948.

Location

Please note that all aircraft in UK waters that have crashed during military service are protected under the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986.

Last updated 29 Aug 2021