The historic wreckage that lies beneath Middleton St George

Because of the pandemic, it is the first time for three years that the top brass of 419 Squadron of the Royal Canadian Air Force have been able to come over for the ceremony that marks the bravery of Pilot Officer Andrew Mynarski, who was awarded the Victoria Cross after he died training to rescue a comrade from a stricken Lancaster bomber.

Today’s service begins at the Mynarski memorial at 10.15am, and all are welcome.

The Canadians might also bear in mind that somewhere beneath the airfield are the remains of a plane that they once intended to take home and put on display in a museum.

KB-900, also known as the “Ruhr Express”, was the first Lancaster bomber to be built in Canada, where a shadow company called Victory Aircraft Ltd was established safely away from the long reach of the German bombers.

Crowds surround KB-700, the "Ruhr Express", as it is rolled out of the factory in Canada on August 1, 1943, the first of 430 Lancasters to be made in Canada

It employed 10,000 people and there was great pride when KB-900 was rolled out of the factory in Ontario on August 1, 1943. It was the first of 430 Lancasters that Victory Aircraft built, and the company also manufactured 3,197 of the smaller Avro Anson planes.

KB-900 was flown amid great fanfare by Canada’s most decorated pilot to England, and it ended up stationed with Mynarski’s 419 “Moose” Squadron at RAF Middleton St George.

KB-700, the Ruhr Express, was the first of 430 Lancaster Mk X bombers built in Canada and so it was intended to take it back as a monument. Picture courtesy of Geoff Hill

On January 2, 1945, it was returning from its 49th operation over Nuremberg – a brutally successful operation with 414 industrial buildings, including a large Siemens factory, destroyed along with 2,000 preserved medieval wooden houses. And 1,838 people on the ground were killed.

As KB-900 came into land at MSG, it suffered hydraulic failure so its wheels didn’t lower. Instead, pilot Flt-Lt AG Warner successfully managed to land it on its belly, although he overshot the runway and came to rest in a farmer’s field.

No one was hurt so he decided to taxi back to the runway. It was 11.38pm on a January night and, in the pitch blackness, one of KB-900’s wings struck a trench-digging machine and burst into flames.

With ammunition exploding and flares firing off, the crew quickly abandoned ship as the flames took hold, and the Ruhr Express was burned out.

“The loss was particularly sad, especially when viewed from years later, because the plans were to fly the “Ruhr Express” back to Canada following its 50th operation, for a triumphant return and for it to become a memorial to the Canadians who built and flew Lancasters,” says the Bomber Command Museum of Canada.

Two Canadian airmen pose amid the wreckage of KB-700 at RAF Middleton St George in 1945. Picture courtesy of Geoff Hill

Instead, the wreckage was left at the end of the Goosepool runway.

“They used it as a ‘Christmas tree’,” says the airfield’s historian, Geoff Hill. “If another plane needed any bits and pieces, they would go to the Christmas tree and pick things from it.

“When the Canadians left at the end of the war, they buried it inbetween the two runways, so she’s got to be still down there somewhere.”

The burned out wreckage of KB-700 at the end of the runway at RAF Middleton St George. Picture courtesy of Geoff Hill

Also still buried there somewhere are the remains of the Wellington bomber that crashed during the second airshow at MSG, held in 1949. We told last week how the climax of the show was an attack on the airport’s control tower, with tanks on the ground being supported by bombers flying overhead. To make the display realistic, dummies were released from the Wellington’s bomb doors and once they landed, men dressed as parachutists jumped up and augmented the tank attack.

Unfortunately, some of the cord that had held the dummies in place got wrapped around the tail of a Wellington, bringing it down. The six airmen on board, two of whose wives were watching in the crowd, were all killed.

“That plane was also buried on the airfield,” says Geoff, “over on the south side. For years, there was 14ft of its bomb bay sticking out of the ground, so we got permission to excavate it, but there was only the bomb bay there, nothing else. The rest of it must be buried there somewhere as well.”

The sorry end for KB-900 came on January 2, 1945. On January 11, 1945, KB-793 crashed into a field belonging to Lingfield Farm at the east end of Yarm Road, Darlington. That plane was piloted away from the houses of Darlington by another Canadian, Pilot Officer William McMullen, who sacrificed his own life to avoid hitting those below. McMullen Road is named after him.