Missing allied aircraft from WW2

[tubby linton]

Out of all of the allied aircraft lost on operations in Western Europe in WW2 ,how many have never been found and are still missing?

[Old-Duffer]

I would think that's almost impossible to answer without a very detailed research of all the loss records.

Of course those aircraft shot down etc would be 'missing' initially but some would be quickly pinpointed from eye witness statements of other crews.

It was only as the allies moved through the occupied countries and later Germany that the Missing Research & Information Service (not the correct title) could start trying to locate casualties, statements could be taken from repatriated personnel and locals who could poiint out wreck sites.

The North Sea and the Baltic must have many hundreds of aircraft in them.

The Runnymede Memorial commemorates over 20000 personnel with no known grave in the European Theatre. Even at the rate of - say - five to seven in a crew, the tally goes to 3500 plus, never mind the single and two seaters and the light bombers.

Try the Pen & Sword book by Stuart Hadaway, which deals with the work of the recovery teams, who worked for years after the war to try to find the crews who were lost.

Old Duffer

[Fareastdriver]

If all the aircraft that went missing had conveniently crashed between Dover and Calais they would not have had to have organized D Day.

The could have walked across.

[critter592]

Hi tubby,

Although by no means an exhaustive list, a good place to start are Chorley's Bomber Command Losses series of books.

There is also a Fighter Command Losses and also a Coastal Command Losses series.

To my knowledge, no-one has yet compiled a list of the USAAF. etc losses. I am happy to be proved wrong on this though! :8

Cheers,

Don

[finestkind]

Hi Tubby.

The numbers are significant and I wonder just how many the total is for all lost aircrew.

[Old-Duffer]

Some statistics taken from Stuart Hadaway's book.

Missing at the end of hostilities = 41881

Accounted for by known burials = 23881
Formally recorded as lost at sea = 9281
No information = 6745
Totally unaccounted for in the statistics = 1974

Hadaway presents the statistics in a variety of ways and the figures I have quoted above appear not to include deaths/presumed deaths where the files were already closed because of the evidence found as the war progressed.

Drifting away slightly, one of the officers involved for several years in trying to trace missing airmen (and some women) was Flt Lt J N L Canham DFC. Jack Canham had won his DFC as a Warrant Officer navigator. He was later to serve as an SAR crewman and it was his crew (Trevor Eggington and Eric Smith) who rescued the crew of a French trawler off the rocks below Lands End in 1962 and in the full glare of the cameras and press. Jack went to Borneo with 225 Sqn flying the Whirlwind. At the very end of his tour in Sep 65, he was killed when the aircraft in which he was flying broke up and crashed. Perhaps, fittingly, the crew; Jack, Fg Off Sam Smith and lookouts SACs Langley, Galbraith and Evans were engaged on a search mission for a missing Army Scout helicopter. A sad and unjust end to an officer who had spent many years of his life bringing comfort to others, by tracing their loved ones or more actively saving lives on SAR sorties: Jack was 43.

Old Duffer