On arrival back at Mitchell Field, on the 18th of August there were final opportunities for sight seeing and shopping, but from the 20th the groundcrews were hard at work carrying out a full service to radar gear and general preparation for the return home.
The aircraft departed Mitchell Field on the 22nd for Gander where there was further maintenance work carried out. On the 23rd 'A' Flight departed for Lagens and then on the 25th left for St Mawgan.
Also on the 25th of August, 'B' Flight took off from Gander for the trip to Lagens. The squadron departed at night (TL Q took off at 2335 hrs) and unfortunately there was an incident that involved fatalities. TL R (TW870), piloted by F/L Pete Stockwell, had to return to Gander after twenty minutes in the air as he had problems with his DR compass. He was cleared to land but mistook two directional green lights which marked the leeward end of the runway for glide path indicators. As a result the aircraft bounced on the raised road which was parallel and twenty yards from the leeward edge of the runway. It was also marked with red lights as a prohibited area but there were some civilians standing there. The aircraft's starboard wheel hit some of them, killing three men and one woman and injuring a fourth man. The Lancaster was damaged and had to remain at Gander. On investigation, Stockwell was exonerated of all blame (source mostly Alan Cooper).
The squadron spent three days at St Mawgan where I've no doubt the customs took a keen interest in the aircraft. On the 29th August the remaining fifteen Lancasters departed St Mawgan for Graveley, flying in formation following a coastal route before turning north over Brighton for a flypast accross London and a warm reception at the home base.
Squadron arrival at Graveley on completion of American tour, August 29th 1946. All that sun is just a memory.
Final parade at Graveley, August 29th 1946.
Marching on for inspection by American ambassador at Graveley, August 29th 1946.
The squadron left Graveley for Stradishall on the 18th September 1946.
35 Squadron, Shallufa Canal Zone, Med. January 1948.
Fate of TW870
In the heavy landing at Gander, the aircraft suffered damage to the centre section and undercarriage and was declared Cat AC on 29.8.46. In the event, probably due to cost and difficulty of repairs on site at Gander, and the large number of spare Lancasters in store, TW870 was re-categorised to Cat E and struck off charge on 31.10.46.
It remained virtually derelict at Gander until October 1950 when it was sold as scrap to Hercules Sales of Toronto, then to Freight Lift Inc (Doug Siple/Don McVicar). After the minimum work necessary, the aircraft was flown from Gander to Dorval (the engineer who rebuilt the Lancaster flew as flight engineer on the trip via Summerside to Dorval. He records that he didn’t have much to do ‘as vandals had stolen most of the instruments’). At Dorval it was converted to become a fuel tanker, including the fitting of a streamlined nose section (this nose cone had once been part of Trans Canada Airlines Lancaster X Passenger Plane KB702/CF-CMT, and had been used as a chicken coup after CF-CMT was scrapped. It was rescued, cleaned up and fitted to TW870!) The plane was then transferred to World Wide Aviation. On 6.5.52 it was registered as CF-GBA and moved to Seven Islands, Quebec where it was used to transport fuel to the outposts of the Iron Ore Company of Canada. On one of these flights the pilot, Capt AR Iba, lost control during an overweight landing in a crosswind on a gravel airstrip at Menihek, and the Lancaster hit a rockpile, caught fire and was burnt out. Both crew members were unhurt. The manifest showed a load of 2,150 gallons of diesel, 300 gallons of petrol and 800 gallons of Avgas (source Bob Hornby).
For more and slightly different information, see here:
Lancaster Bomb Tragedy