Clik here to view.
Dambuster Crash Sites: a driver’s guide
Pic: Malcolm Peel Text and pictures by Malcolm Peel. On the evening of 16th May 1943, 133 aircrew in 19 Lancasters took off from RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire to attack the dams east of the Ruhr. Eight...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Guy Gibson’s 100th birthday
Guy Gibson with four of his Dams Raid crew. Left to right: Gibson; Fred Spafford, bomb aimer; Bob Hutchison, wireless operator; George Deering, front gunner; Harlo Taerum, navigator. The Dams Raid was...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Public viewing day for 1941 test model dam
Pic: BRE The UK-wide’s annual Heritage Open Day on Saturday 8 September means the public get their once-a-year chance to see the very first (and only surviving) test model of the Möhne Dam, used in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Dams Raid 75th anniversary: Canada remembers
Pic: Jim Heather Great picture of the Lancaster at the Bomber Command Museum of Canada in Nanton, Alberta, which organised an event to salute the Canadian Dambusters this weekend. The Lancaster’s code...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Wikipedia: a foundation stone for the free internet
Stepping away from the normal terrain for this blog, this is a personal plea for all readers to support the annual appeal for the wonderful Wikipedia operation. I use Wikipedia every day, and every...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Record number of Canadian Dambuster families gathered in Alberta
Dambuster families gather in Nanton, Alberta. Back row, left to right: Larry Heather (Earnshaw family), Dianne Young (Fraser family), Peter Brosinsky (Earnshaw family), Charlene Brosinsky (Earnshaw...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Fraser family donate stolen logbook damages to Bomber Command Museum
At the 75th Dams Raid anniversary event in Nanton last week (see post below), Mrs Doris Fraser and her daughter Shere made a substantial donation to the hosts, the Bomber Command Museum of Canada. The...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Dambuster Double signed book
‘Unique’ is a pretty overworked adjective these days, but here is something that I am confident is exactly that. It is a copy of my book, The Complete Dambusters, and it has been signed on the title...
View ArticleClik here to view.
More Canadian Dambusters families meet in Ontario
Left to right: Jim MacLean (MacLean family), Hartley Garshowitz (Garshowitz family), Cathie Somers (Glinz family), Milton Lewis (Garshowitz family), Bernie Wyatt (Oancia family), Marilyn McDowell...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Remembering Les Knight
Driving through the small Dutch village of Den Ham this afternoon I couldn’t help seeing the large number of houses with this poster in the window. It is part of the RememberingDambusterLesKnight...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Den Ham tributes to Les Knight
Seventy-five years ago last Sunday, the Australian pilot Les Knight died when the aircraft he was flying crashed on the outskirts of the Dutch village of Den Ham. The other seven men in his 617...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Jackson’s Dambusters film effectively cancelled
Buried deep in the recently-published book Anything You can Imagine, Ian Nathan’s new doorstep-sized biography of Peter Jackson and his Tolkien-inspired film trilogies, are two tiny mentions of the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Dam Busters final tribute to beloved Australian musician
Richard Gill. [Pic: Sydney Morning Herald] Graeme Jensen, an old friend of the Dambusters Blog, has alerted us to this lovely story from Sydney, Australia. Richard Gill was a well-known and much-loved...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Jackson backtracks: Dambusters may still take flight
Empire, December 2018, p.95 A few months ago, Peter Jackson let it be known that his projected remake of the 1955 film The Dam Busters had been effectively cancelled. It now seems that he may have...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Jackson deal with Holland significant step forward in Dam Busters project
Peter Jackson’s recent announcement that he is pressing on with his project to remake The Dam Busters film has been widely welcomed. “It’s just a great story. It’s always been a great story,” he told...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Remembrance Day tribute to Lewis Burpee at old school
Lewis Burpee Jr lays a wreath at a Remembrance Day ceremony at his father’s old school, Lisgar Collegiate Institute in Ottawa, on 9 November. [Pic: Aviator Rachael Allen] Dams Raid pilot Lewis...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Pointing the way to the Haldern memorial
The memorial to the crew of Dams Raid Lancaster AJ-E, which crashed on 16 May 1943 killing all the crew, is a few hundred yards off a quiet country road near a quiet country village in a quiet corner...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A seasonal reminder: The Complete Dambusters
A gentle reminder that this is the perfect seasonal present for the Dambusters aficionado in your life. The only book ever published with a biography of each of the 133 men who took part in the Dams...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A message of hope
This queue of Dutch citizens of Den Ham wanting to pay their own respects to Les Knight by laying a rose at his memorial took more than 15 minutes for them all to do so. (Pic: Wim Govaerts) On this...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Fred Sutherland
PIC: © Sutherland family BREAKING NEWS I am sorry to have to report that Fred Sutherland died on Monday 21 January, at the age of 95. He was one of the only two survivors of the men who flew on the...
View Article