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Lincolnshire airfields flypast to mark 80th anniversary of Dambusters raids

BBMF BBMF Lancaster PA474BBMF
The UK's only airworthy Lancaster bomber - PA474 - will fly past 28 bases in an ambitious sortie

A Lancaster bomber is to conduct a special flypast of Lincolnshire's wartime RAF airfields to mark the 80th anniversary of the Dambusters raids.

The Battle of Britain Memorial Flight (BBMF) aircraft will tour 28 ex-Bomber Command bases on Tuesday to commemorate the daring attacks on German dams.

The famous raids were launched from RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire on the nights of 16 and 17 May 1943.

Eight of the 19 bombers involved were shot down and 53 airmen were killed.

Getty Images April 1943: The crew of a Lancaster bomber walk away from their plane after a flight while ground crew check it over.Getty Images
A crew of a Lancaster bomber one month before the raid

Weather permitting, the BBMF Lancaster PA474 will fly past each of Bomber Command's former airfields in a 69-minute tour beginning at Spitalgate at 18:58 BST and ending at RAF Coningsby - where the aircraft is based - at 20:07 BST.

Flt Lt Giles Croft, BBMF's operations director, said the route would take in "far more than we would normally plan in a single sortie" to "commemorate the unsung heroes of Bomber Command".

"I personally can't wait to see our Lancaster over her home turf, against the same backdrop she would have had in the 1940s," he added.

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Battle of Britain Memorial Flight route and timings

  • Spitalgate - 18:58 BST
  • Fulbeck - 19:02
  • Swinderby - 19:04
  • RAF Waddington - 19:07
  • International Bomber Command Centre (IBCC), Lincoln - 19:08
  • Skellingthorpe - 19:12
  • Scampton - 19:15
  • Dunholme - 19:16
  • Wickenby - 19:18
  • Faldingworth - 19:19
  • Ingham - 19:21
  • Hemswell Cliff - 19:22
  • Blyton - 19:24
  • Elsham Wolds - 19:30
  • Kirmington - 19.31
  • North Killingholme - 19:32
  • Grimsby - 19:37
  • Binbrook - 19:39
  • Ludford - 19:41
  • Kelstern - 19:42
  • Strubby - 19.47
  • Spilsby - 19.51
  • East Kirkby - 19:53
  • Bardney - 19:58
  • Fiskerton - 20:00
  • Metheringham - 20:03
  • Woodhall Spa - 20:05
  • RAF Coningsby - 20:07
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PA474 is one of only two remaining airworthy Lancaster bombers out of 7,377 built. The aircraft will fly over the RAF Museum in Hendon, northwest London, at 18.01 BST to commemorate the anniversary before returning to Lincolnshire for the tour.

Commanding officer of the BBMF Sqn Ldr Mark Sugden said: "The Dambusters raid was one of the most audacious raids in the history of the Royal Air Force, and we at the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight are proud to commemorate the bravery, dedication and sacrifice of all those involved."

RAF A map showing the location of 28 former Bomber Command airfields in LincolnshireRAF
The Lancaster bomber will tour the location of 28 airfields in Lincolnshire

The raid - formally known as Operation Chastise - was intended to flood a vast area of Germany's Ruhr Valley by damaging dams with "bouncing bombs".

A total of 19 bombers left RAF Scampton, near Lincoln, in three waves on the night of 16 May 1943. The first headed to the Möhne and the Eder Dams, the second and third to the Sorpe dam.

The Sorpe dam was only damaged but the Mohne and Eder Dams were destroyed, flooding the valley and killing an estimated 1,300 people, mostly civilians.

Seen as a major coup for Britain's military, the action was immortalised in 1955 film The Dam Busters.

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