Photos from old album

spartakle · **Posted:** Fri Jan 01, 2010 8:55 pm

Thought I would post some old photos from the album of R.H. Dibnah whose pictures I copied many years ago with permission. Dibnah was a Battle of Britain pilot with 1 & 242 squadrons and later with the RCAF. The photos date from about 1939 to about 1950. I'll post a few now & then starting with these 4 photos of DH Vampires.

No date on original photo but probably taken about 1948 showing RCAF De Havilland Vampire over a prairie landscape.

The De Havilland Vampire was Canada's 1st jet fighter and was taken on strength in late 1947 and served until 1958. Vampires were much loved by pilots of the day and served with 400, 401, 438 and 442 squadrons; in all 86 Vampires were aquired by the RCAF. This photo was copied with permission from the personal album of R.H. Dibnah, RCAF.

RCAF De Havilland Vampire peeling-off over prairie landscape.

RCAF De Havilland Vampire wheels-up landing in prairie field.

Close-up view of belly-landed RCAF De Havilland Vampire...Canada's first jet fighter.

more to follow.

JDK · **Posted:** Fri Jan 01, 2010 9:21 pm

Great stuff, keep it coming!

Obergrafeter · **Posted:** Fri Jan 01, 2010 9:25 pm

When your landing in the prairie no need for wheels, what about on concrete?

JDK · **Posted:** Fri Jan 01, 2010 9:46 pm

Obergrafeter wrote:

When your landing in the prairie no need for wheels, what about on concrete?

How about landing on rubber?

Ever come across the flexible deck landing trials with Vampires?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_deck#Flexible_decks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7Lu6LEQ0zo

k5083 · **Posted:** Fri Jan 01, 2010 10:08 pm

The one that was bellied in had the last laugh. It was preserved and was airworthy from 1992 to 2000, and is today displayed at the Comox museum in British Columbia.

August

rreis · **Joined:** Tue Aug 04, 2009 4:42 pm **Posts:** 441

JDK wrote:

Obergrafeter wrote:

When your landing in the prairie no need for wheels, what about on concrete?

How about landing on rubber?

Ever come across the flexible deck landing trials with Vampires?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_deck#Flexible_decks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7Lu6LEQ0zo

The americans also tried that later (the USAF and the US Navy). There is an interesting account of the US Navy side on the book "The wrong stuff: Flying on the Edge of Disaster" by J Moore

(thanks for the video, I wasn't aware of it)

JDK · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 6:52 am

rreis wrote:

(thanks for the video, I wasn't aware of it)

Me neither, it came up when I googled for refs. Dreadful soundtrack, but great archival footage.

MacHarvard · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 7:24 am

Interesting that the Vampire was photographed (first photo) from a Harvard!

Doug

Mgawa · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 7:42 am

This is excellent as well British machines are less present

spartakle · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 11:03 am

Good comments and I didn't notice that #1 pic was taken from a Harvard.

Visited the home of former S/L Rolland Dibnah back on May 8, 1988. Dibnah was a veteran of WWII, a fighter pilot, and was a Canadian with the RAF during the Battle of Britain; Dibnah flew with 242, 91, 1 squadrons. He kindly let me copy his pictures during our visit and arrange his service medals over this photo from his album. No description on photo (may have been on reverse but I didn't want to remove it from album to make copy) as to where & when taken but the Hurricane.

Former Squadron Leader Roland Didbah pictured holding his WWII May West floatation vest that he wore as a Battle of Britain pilot. Didbah was a Canadian in the RAF with 242, 91 and 1 Squadrons. I visited him on May 8, 1988.

The photo of this Hurricane is not all that great in of itself but pictured is Squadron Leader Tom Pinkham; Pinkham was involved in training pilots of the Finnish Air Force to fly the Hurricane and in February 1940 a ferry flight was conducted from the UK to Finland to deliver a batch of Hurricanes. Pinkam was a citizen of Britian and lost his life in combat during the Battle of Britain.

More to come...thanks for the comments and additional history!

spartakle · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 12:12 pm

A few more from Dibnah album...

Not sure of the service life of this hurricane but a Google search revealed it was damaged by "friendly fire" ... "RAF Hurricane V7209. 73 Squadron. Damaged in attack by a Spitfire over Tilbury. Aircraft hit in the radiator and Flight Lieutenant M. L. Beytaugh made a forced landing at West Malling without injury." 73 squadron was, during the Battle of Britian, based Debden.

I couldn't detect a serial number on this Hurricane and there was no caption on original.

If anyone can identify the squadron that this Hurricane belongs to based on the "19" or partial serial number I would welcome comments.

avenger2504 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 3:55 pm

That last Hurricane photo looks like it might have also been taken from a very early MK1 Harvard?

JDK · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 5:57 pm

Very interesting. Some observations:

First Hurricane looks like a Mk.I (kidney exhausts?) with the trop Vokes filter in N Africa, Egypt or similar, combined with the background, Egypt looks most likely. Might be the single (unarmed) Hurri that was in the Mid East early on - 'Collie's Battleship'. Did he serve there?

EDIT- Just checked the Mason Hurricane book, it is another copy of 'the only known picture of Collie's Battleship' - Sydney Camm Collection.

Pic two looks pre-war, with the 'stick' mast and no fin flash etc. The DH Spinner and armour windshield makes it later than the very eraly ones. The dark band around the L2070 serial in very interesting. Never seen something like that. Mason gives 'No 11 Group Pool Nov '39' as the only entry for this one.

Hurricane V7209 with the longer spinner is a lter example. Mason again gives 'No 73 Squadron Castle Camps 9 /40. Slightly damaged by Spitfire 14/9/40Flt Lt MLFF Baytagh unhurt. Markings experts could perhaps give you a date, but the lack of fuselage band from '41 and apparently no squadron codes - coupled with the Miles Master on the left of pic makes me think this might be at an OTU or similar - Montrose, is of course Scotland, and wasn't a main station in the Battle. Genuine Battle of Britain Hurricane shots are very rare, so if this is, that'd be great.

Next one with fuselage band and two Miles Masters in the background looks like an OTU to me.

The last one is very interesting. Black port wing, plus thin yellow band on roundel plus sky band gives a tight date -for those that have the data to hand - I don't! The '19' is unlikely to be a main Squadron code, then - they were all XX-X in the period. I think I can see 'P36xx' in the serial. blunt spinner. I'll do a bit more looking, I hope that's of interest. I'd agree that's a Harvard wingtip.

Regards,

rcaf_100 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 7:26 pm

avenger2504 wrote:

That last Hurricane photo looks like it might have also been taken from a very early MK1 Harvard?

Yep. The wingtip gives it away. Notice how the wingtip panel 'steps in' towards the aileron at the trailing edge.

The only North American trainers to have that step and wear an RAF type 'B' roundel were the NA-49/61 Harvard Mk I and the NA-44 'Jeep' or 'Super Harvard'.

Since the wing has camouflage on it, it has to be an NA-49 Harvard Mk I.

Great photos BTW. I especially like the RCAF Vampires. We has a guest speaker at CHAA once who was on the 1948 'RCAF Flyers' Gold-medal Olympic Hockey team and was a mechanic on Vampires. He described an incident where a bunch of Vampires travelling from Chicago to Toronto hit some bad weather and had to set down all over southern Michigan. At least one bellied in like 17031. Neat story anyway.

:partyman:

spartakle · **Posted:** Sat Jan 02, 2010 8:07 pm

Greatly appreciate the comments and the wealth of knowledge offered that helps me and viewers know better what we are looking at. When I copied the photos they were taped into several large albums and time did not allow me to carefully remove the pics and copy them under more controlled conditions...the result was slightly bent photos or glare from sunlight (I copied them on his back sundeck). Most photos had captions but I did not have time to make those notations but in many cases I included the caption in the photo. My intent for copying these photos was driven by a need for referrence photos for my aviation paintings. A few more of the 65 yet to post.

A small collection of keepsakes that R. Dibnah showed me from his fighter-pilot days. I think the gunsites were from a Hurricane and the control-yoke from a spitfire.

From the photo collection of R. Dibnah showing the former Battle of Britain pilot long after the battle next to Spitfire.

This photo was copied from the personal album of former RAF & RCAF fighter pilot and former Battle of Britain pilot Rolland Dhibna. The caption on reverse read: Mustang I prang...stalled when attempting to go around and spun in from 150 feet, only injury was a scratched knee!

Comments and additional history welcome so that I can better caption these pics.

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