"Mick" Martin took command temporarily, before Leonard Cheshire took over as CO. George Holden became commanding officer (CO) in July, but he was shot down and killed on his fourth mission, Operation Garlic in September 1943, in an attack on the Dortmund-Ems Canal he had four of Gibson's crew with him. 617 Squadron in 1943Īfter the raid, Gibson was withdrawn from flying (due to the high number of raids he had been on) and went on a publicity tour. Guy Gibson also owned a black Labrador named Nigger, who was the mascot of the squadron for some time but who was run over and killed outside the base on the evening of the raid. 617 Squadron, Wing Commander Guy Gibson, was awarded the Victoria Cross for his part in the raid. The squadron's chosen motto was " Après moi le déluge" ("After me, the flood"), a humorous double entendre on a famous saying of Madame de Pompadour to King Louis XV, made on the loss at the Battle of Rossbach by the French. The squadron's badge, approved by King George VI, depicts the bursting of a dam in commemoration of Chastise. The squadron had to develop the tactics to deploy Barnes Wallis's " Bouncing bomb", and undertook some of its training over the dams of the Upper Derwent Valley in Derbyshire, as the towers on the dam walls were similar to those to be found on some of the target dams in Germany. The plan was given the codename Operation Chastise and carried out on. It included Royal Canadian Air Force, Royal Australian Air Force and Royal New Zealand Air Force personnel and was formed for the specific task of attacking three major dams that contributed water and power to the Ruhr industrial region in Germany: the Möhne, Eder and Sorpe. The squadron was formed under great secrecy at RAF Scampton during the Second World War on 21 March 1943 on Avro Lancaster heavy bombers. 617 Squadron was allocated the unit identification code MZ for the period April to September 1939, even though the unit did not actually exist at the time. History Between the wars Īccording to the squadron's entry in Flying Units of the RAF by Alan Lake, No.
0 kommentar(er)
