Wartime flying boat to visit Wick for 80th anniversary VC commemoration
A wartime flying boat is due to stop off in Wick this week in honour of two Catalina pilots who each received the Victoria Cross 80 years ago.
On July 17, 1944, Flt Lt John Cruickshank won his VC for action flying a Catalina of 210 Squadron RAF out of Sullom Voe in Shetland.
A few weeks earlier, on June 24 that year, Flt Lt David Hornell, from Toronto in Canada, had been awarded a posthumous VC for his action flying a Catalina of 162 (Bomber Reconnaissance) Squadron RCAF out of Wick.
These were the only Catalina VCs and to commemorate the 80th anniversary a flight is planned from the Imperial War Museum at Duxford, in Cambridgeshire, to overfly several RAF Coastal Command bases.
It will land in Aberdeen – where 104-year-old John Cruickshank lives – before continuing to Sumburgh. A flight is planned over Lerwick and Sullom Voe before returning to Duxford via the former RAF Coastal Command stations at Wick, Invergordon, Alness, Inverness and Oban.
The aircraft being used is G-PBYA, a PBY-5A Catalina flying boat, and the whole trip will take five days, weather permitting. It is being called Operation Shetland 2024.
The flight is due in Wick on Thursday, July 18, and the crew will visit sites on the Caithness At War heritage trail which was launched in April this year.
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The aircraft is owned by Catalina Aircraft Limited, operated by Plane Sailing Air Displays Ltd and supported by the Catalina Society.
To support the flight a crowdfunding page has been set up at GoFundMe.
Flt Lt Hornell and his crew attacked and sank the German submarine U-1225. Despite the starboard engine and wing being on fire, they pressed home their attack and managed to sink the submarine with depth charges.
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Through what were described by his crew as “superhuman efforts”, Hornell managed to bring the burning aircraft down safely on a heavy swell but he didn’t survive.
The story of what happened is told on one of the Caithness At War panels at Wick John O’Groats Airport.
Flt Lt Cruickshank and his crew attacked the German submarine U-361. Cruickshank was hit in 72 places, with two serious wounds to his lungs and 10 penetrating wounds to his lower limbs.
He refused morphine so that his judgement would not be affected, and he needed a blood transfusion before he could be taken to hospital.
Cruickshank was 24 at the time and turned 104 in May this year. He is said to be the last surviving World War II VC holder.
The launch of the Caithness At War heritage trail has been described as “just the first step” in commemorating the county’s role in the fight against Nazi Germany.
The trail, featuring 46 information panels located around Wick and the Sinclair’s Bay area, is phase one of the project. Phase two will centre on the creation of a Caithness Allied Air Forces Memorial at the airport entrance along with a life-size replica of a Spitfire as a “gate guardian”.
The memorial will be a place of remembrance for 544 aircrew and service personnel who lost their lives operating from the county’s three RAF stations at Wick, Castletown and Skitten.
The project is being delivered jointly by Sinclair’s Bay Trust and Wick Development Trust with funding from the Caithness Beatrice Community Fund. The trusts are supported by Alistair Jack, Caithness Voluntary Group’s chief officer.
Mr Jack said: “We are delighted to be involved with this very special occasion to honour these two brave men and their crews.
“A slight twist to the tale is that, although now called a Catalina, G- PBYA is actually not a Consolidated Catalina but is in fact a Canadian Vickers Canso 1A which is the same model of aircraft that was based at Wick. It will be amazing to see this aircraft at the former RAF station once more and when it does a flypast of the town.
“I would like to take this opportunity to thank Wick John O’Groats Airport and Mackays Hotel for their support on the Wick leg of Operation Shetland.”
