Nice thread creep; I could go on for ages about my explorations of the old trackbed,(Wootton Station is interesting as the GWR passed over on an embankment part of which still exists) but back to the original.
In the early 60s when I was a member of the ROC, one of the other members was actually a boffin at Westcott. He told us one or two 'juicy' tales which probably had 'D' notices slapped on them such as 'the one that got away' - a 'sounding' rocket being tested for thrust and it managed to break free of its tethering and get airborne, (they didn't actually fire rockets from Westcott - at least not intentionally anyway!) and how they were testing an RZ2 which was the rocket motor powering the 'Blue Streak' ICBM and it blew up, the explosion not surprisingly causing much confusion and consternation in the local area.
Last edited by chevvron; 15th Jul 2011 at 11:27.