MISCELLANEOUS
By now Gee had failed and the navigator used another flame float to check drift. As AJ-H flew into the moon, height was difficult to judge, and just short of the Afsluitdijk the flight engineer noticed the altimeter registering zero. He was about to warn Rice, who later blamed himself for not using the spotlights to determine altitude, when a tremendous shudder shook the aircraft. Instinctively Rice pulled it up, and a second “violent jolt” occurred almost immediately. The impact buckled panels of the main section of the fuselage and water hit the roof of the cabin and sprayed over the navigator's charts, to a plaintive “Christ! It's wet at the back” from the rear turret and a terse “You've lost the mine.”
For when AJ-H struck the water, the mine had been torn off. Hitting the fixed tail wheel (the second impact), the mine drove it up through the main spar of the tail plane, shattering the Elsan toilet just forward of the rear turret. Meanwhile, as Rice put the aircraft into a sharp climb, water poured through the doorless bomb bay and down the fuselage. The rear gunner, Burns, up to his waist in disinfectant and salt water, might therefore be excused his mild expletive. AJ-H had cleared the polder (Afsluitdijk) and flew on into the Ijsselmeer before the full extent of its problem became apparent. Loss of the mine was verified as water drained out of the bomb bay once more and a damp rear gunner made himself marginally less uncomfortable.
With the mine gone, for this crew Operation “Chastise” had come to an abrupt halt. Turning back to the north-west at 2306, Rice flew over the polder once more and made an unorthodox exit between Texel and Vlieland ten minutes later. Alert defenders played searchlights across the gap and put up some flak, but AJ-H flew under this and set course for home. Approaching base, Rice sent the flight engineer to check the hydraulic system, and he reported that most of the fluid had been lost. The pilot therefore decided to use the emergency drill, under which an air bottle was used to lower the undercarriage. He feared however, from previous experience, that once the undercarriage had been locked down by this method, insufficient pressure would remain to operate the flaps fully. So the wireless operator warned ground control “aircraft damaged-possibly no flaps” and requested maximum landing room. Rice circled at 1,000 ft. for 20 minutes while the emergency procedure was carried out. Then he ordered all but the flight engineer into their crash positions, with their backs to the main spar and facing aft, as he prepared to set AJ-H down on the long runway. As he did so another Lancaster flew in below him to land: without means of communication, Munro could not call up the tower and had simply gone straight in.
Eventually at 0047 Rice “did a wheeler,” landing with the front wheels down and tail up. AJ-H crunched down on to its tail fins before turning off the runway. Rice switched off, scrambled out of the Lancaster and walked away “very depressed.” Whitworth, who had driven out in his truck, found him, told him to shake out of his mood and gave him a lift to debriefing. Although embarrassed at having made “a complete balls of things,” Rice stayed after debriefing to wait for the other crews. He noted when Gibson came in that the squadron commander’s hair was plastered down with sweat, even though he had flown in shirtsleeves. And later, when he arrived from Grantham, learning the details of Rice's misfortunes, Harris commented: “You're a very lucky young man.” There was, too, an interesting postscript which yet again illustrated the importance of accurate communication. Eaton’s “aircraft damaged - possibly no flaps” had caused consternation in the control tower. “What did you mean ‘without a clutch’?,” a puzzled W.A.A.F. operator asked Rice.
The fate of the lost mine remained uncertain. To the crew’s knowledge it did not explode. Most probably the hydrostatic fuzes failed to work because the water was not deep enough to activate them, the area in which the mine dropped being exposed mud flats or water to the depth of only a few feet. Although some channels could have contained water over 30 ft. deep, a British official source later concluded: “The chances are weighted fairly heavily in favour of it landing in shallow water.” But, armed at 2255, the self-destructive device ought to have worked, and it must therefore be concluded that the mechanism suffered damage during the mine’s unorthodox departure from the aircraft.’
According to his sister, Dorothy - and in common with his fellow ‘Dambusters’ - Burns was the recipient of flurry of local press attention; one journalist called at his parents home without notice, thereby curtailing the gallant Rear Gunner’s waltzing around their sitting-room in celebration of his immediate leave - and survival.
Beyond the Dams
Notwithstanding their adventures in mid-May, Rice and his crew were back in action in July, as operational plans for 617’s future took shape. Thus a long haul to attack the electric power station at Aquata Scriva in Italy on the 15th, with a stop over in Blida, Algeria; a strike on harbour at Leghorn on the return trip to Scampton on the 24th and a run to Turin on the 29th, with another stop over in Blida, in addition to Ras-el-Ma in French Morocco.
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