Get an exclusive NordPass deal plus 1 additional month for FREE here: nordpass.com/rex or use code rex the checkout! F.A.Q Section Q: Do you take aircraft requests? A: I have a list of aircraft I plan to cover, but feel free to add to it with suggestions:) Q: Why do you use imperial measurements for some videos, and metric for others? A: I do this based on country of manufacture. Imperial measurements for Britain and the U.S, metric for the rest of the world, but I include text in my videos that convert it for both. Q: Will you include video footage in your videos, or just photos? A: Video footage is very expensive to licence, if I can find footage in the public domain I will try to use it, but a lot of it is hoarded by licencing studies (British Pathe, Periscope films etc). In the future I may be able to afford clips :) Q: Why do you sometimes feature images/screenshots from flight simulators? A: Sometimes there are not a lot of photos available for certain aircraft, so I substitute this with digital images that are as accurate as possible. Feel free to leave you questions below - I may not be able to answer all of them, but I will keep my eyes open :)
How about decoy aircraft of WW2, when what looked like a squadron of planes on an airfield were plywood or inflatable dummies? I don't know exactly what for, to keep a real airfield safer? To make the enemy think an attack was going to be launched from that site?
Thoroughly enjoyed that. I'm very proud of the fact my Dad was a WW2 Lanc pilot. But he was also a Wellington pilot, when he and his crew were training up at an OTU based at Silverstone. On one particular training flight, cloudbase was very low and they had to stay at about 1000ft AGL. One of the engines lost power then stopped, and they were concerned about the other one as they struggled to maintain height. The navigator was also concerned that high ground might soon be ahead in the form of the Peak District. Suddenly my Dad saw an airfield appear out of the gloom and made an immediate decision to put the Wellington down, wheels up as they needed to act very quickly plus the extra drag of the deployed u/c gear could have had fatal consequences. And because Wimpy's could catch fire easily when sparks were flying, he opted for the grass alongside the tarmac runway as his landing option. it all worked perfectly and the only injury to crew was a torn shoulder lapel on the jacket of one of the crew. For his valiant action, he was bawled out by the station commander for having damaged one of His Majesty's aircraft. His crew though, thought he was a bloody hero as they had no doubt they would probably otherwise have been killed. The airfield turned out to be Castle Donnington. The navigator was Len Smee who, if you google him, went on to have another extraordinary crash survival adventure after the war. My Dad and his crew remained lifelong friends after the war.
I was born in 1981, and have eternal thanks for spending the earlympart of my life being raised, guided and supervised by the men and women who had survived the war. Their pride in Britain and British heritage was superb.
I recently found out that my Uncle was a Wellington pilot when he died on a mission, apparently over Germany. The plane made it home and he's buried in a cemetary in Northeast England. I had thought he'd been Lancaster pilot until I found his RCAF record online.
I knew someone who served as a tail gunner on a Wellington bomber in ww2. He said “you don’t know fear until you experience trained soldiers who are good at what they do and are there for the sole purpose of trying to kill you” Thanks for your service R.I.P. Pat Quinn 😢
Fascinating stuff. My dad was a Wimpy pilot from 1943, completing a 35-sortie tour over Burma. I've always found it remarkable and so disappointing that none survive even close to airworthy.
Excellent - really enjoyed this one. The longer format gives us something to really get our teeth into. The odd thing about this plane is that I thought I knew so much about it but not that it was built by Vickers! Even weirder when you consider that my dad worked there. Thanks to your channel, I now also have a very different understanding of where a plane like this came from. As an immediate postwar child, I grew up with all the famous WW2 planes as just being there, as if they'd just appeared out of nowhere. But now, thanks to watching hours of your videos, I now understand how such planes evolved from those that came before them.
@@sugarnads that's just the problem - I'd never heard it called that, it was always just "the Wellington bomber". Plus I had this idea that Vickers always chose names beginning with 'V'!
I thought I was gonna fly with a Whimpey at Duxford but it was the old Lancaster which is a thrill nevertheless. I retired from the air force recently due to an injury. I have to settle with piloting WW2 fighters. A friend of mine flies Spitfires for a museum in the middle west. They have a world sensation a "J-22" from Sweden in a flying condition which was a sensation for its time (1942). The J 22 outclimbed a Mustang or Focke wolf at the time.
Brilliant. I can attest to the strength of the Wimpy even in model form! I was building an Airfix kit of the Mk 1C in the Late 1970s when I came across a problem of fitting the front Turret. No matter how Hard I tried I couldn't get it to fit properly (of course the turret had to swivel and the guns had to be able to raise and lower). After a long time messing about with it my preteen anger (I was 12 years old) got the better of me and I launched it across my bedroom where it hit the wall and bounced across the bed. I stormed off and left it where it landed. Later I came back a little ashamed of my actions and picked it up and inspected it. No Damage! I couldn't believe it and the most mysterious thing of all was the front turret slotted in without problem. I completed the model and painted it and it hung from the celling of my bedroom on its nylon fishing line hangers where it "flew" for many years until I left home in my late teens. I think my mum passed it onto someone after I left home with all my other models. (Or dust gathering junk as she used to refer to them!) I still have a huge soft spot for the indestructible Wimpy!
Ha ha. I could also lose my rag at Airfix kits that wouldn't go together. My planes hanging on fishing line from bedroom ceiling got shot down by accident in a pillow fight with my brother. I'd have been 14 or 15 by then and was quite glad. But I had got pretty good at building and painting by then
Christ, I had to check to see if I wrote that ages ago lol. So similar to me, I used to literally test the aerodynamics if the model kit got the better of me too.
Great anecdote. I built Airfix kits in the 50s and left one freshly and painstakingly finished on my bed, only to find my baby sister had been playing with it and broken it beyond repair. I had to be physically restrained by my dad!
I was a test pilot for Airfix in the late 1970’s. My resume is impressive even if I do say so myself. Everything from Bf109 to the Boeing 747! Unfortunately most of my collection ended on a tragic Guy Fawkes night in the ‘80’s. This my have coincided with an early experiment with alcohol. Happy days.
I had seen in bios and other texts that pilots considered the Welly to have the very best, most comfortable pilots seat, positioning and how easily the controls fell to hand, unsurpassed by any other aircraft, back then. Small detail, but it did reflect the generally overall good ergonomics of this cockpit. Also, unlike, say a DC3, the glazing didn’t leak. The Welly was also praised for minimal vibration, unlike a four engine bomber which shook like a dog shitting razor blades. Queenslander.
After a lecture given by Barnes Wallace in the 60's I had the honour of meeting him. He had shook hands with every apprentice, some 100+. He was a quiet unassuming gentleman, grey haired but still so full of vitality. We don't seem to breed men like him anymore or maybe they are stifled.
Stifled. If they know what's good for them. If they keep quiet long enough for their minds to mummify, they get promoted to management. If they don't keep quiet, they get fired when the embalmed-brains need someone to blame.
An Canadian friend told me a story about himself and his father and their visit to England to see his old base where he had flown out of during the war. His father had flown Wellingtons. He started his story by saying "my dad was king over there". They took a taxi to some museum and the driver was keen to hear about his father's recollections and expressed Britains thanks to Canada for their help and loyalty. When he dropped them off the driver said that it was a small museum and he would wait for them and he did. He returned them...no charge. When it was time to visit his old base (which was still an RAF base) they arrived out front and my friend asked security if his father could possibly get to see airfield he flew from and was told by the guard that he had no authority but would make enquiries. They waited a while and he then he saw an officer with an NCO marching towards them. The NCO opened the door and then to quote my fried "then that officer saluted my dad". They got the full treatment and his father was greeted enthusiastically by all. I will never forget that phrase "my dad was king over there".
Something to note: In this video you talk about an attack on the 'battlecruiser' Nürnberg. Nürnberg was about the furthest thing from a battlecruiser, being instead a light cruiser.
A very good and in depth look at the Wellington medium bomber. I have a book on the Wellington and one of the things mentioned repeatedly in aircrew memories was of the reliability of the engines and I think that the radial Hercules engines played a significant role here because a radial engine didn't require the radiators and plumbing that an in-line engine did. Loss or damage to the cooling system of an in-line engine would result in the loss of the engine and this could result in the loss of the aircraft. So the geodetic structure and radial engines combined to make a legend of the Wellington's capacity to absorb considerable battle damage and still return home when others would have been lost. This is not to say that the Wellington was immune to losses, it wasn't but if you could survive the attack or the flak then you had a good chance of getting back home. Another thing that pilots would rave about was just how comfortable the pilots seats were. Mark from Melbourne Australia
Wow I am astonsihed! I am German and always just heard something like this in historical accounts: after the first disastrous day-time attacks, the Welly got relegated to second-line duty. End of story. There one can see the effect of gross simplification, didn't expect the Welly to have had such a distinct service career! Can't wait to hear about the Humpback-Welly! :D
Rex, the Wimpy was the catalyst for the 60 series Merlins as fitted to the Spitfire Mk9 and the P51D Mustang. Vickers were developing a high altitude version of the Wellington and required an engine that could operate at 30000 ft. Rolls Royce rejected the use of a turbocharger and went for the two stage two speed route utilising the Vulture centrifugal supercharger as the second stage. The high altitude bomber went nowhere but Lord Hives suggested that they put the resultant engine into a Spitfire and the rest is history
My Grandad was employed making these aircraft during WW2 he never had a bad word for them and I can remember as a kid him trying to explain the geodesic frame to me. He also told me about fitting the Frazer Nash turrets. My only regret is that I didn't ask him more questions because this is a great often overlooked aircraft that was a credit to our Airforce.
My grandad was a foreman at Sywell repair station, that specialised in Wellingtons, I have his hand written note book correcting the errors in factory electrics manual, plus various wiring diagrams, (bomb doors etc)
I'm from America and all I got to say is simple: You brits were ahead of your time with the Vickers Wellington and it's a damn shame that you only have 2 left remaining. One being preserved thank god. I mean, the Vickers Wellington from what I'm hearing was basically the RAF's version of the B-17 but better due to it having more flexibility to fit more roles.
OMG you are covering something a bit more mainstream... I could but dream! Your attention to detail on the better known aircraft of this era = colour me pleased :) Looking forward to part 2 - excellent work!
I can't imagine how much time you spent on research for this. I've learned more about WW2 in the last six months than the previous 40 years, a large part of that because of your channel. Thank you for another look into the history of aviation.
You can learn literally all of this from ordering one or two decently in depth books on the Wellington. What is there to "research",? He is basically summarized what the books say. They are the ones who dug through the primary sources and archives, etc. You think some dude with a RUclips channel did all the primary research himself?
In Oct 1971, I was posted from training, to RAF Little Rissington. A local pub, The Duke of Wellington became my local. It was run by an ex-Sqn Ldr called Jack ‘Baggy’ Sach, DFC, Wellington (amongst others) pilot. Fascinating bloke, look him up, he had an amazing career.
Fine comment yes and I too am attracted to this channel for similar reasons and despite the dreadful quantity of #ADVERTS if one perseveres it's rewarded with some of the finest factual research and presentation I've yet seen.
Great doc so far...the humourous story of moving from the biplane to Wellington illustrates the massive technical advancements made in those war years.
My father was RCAF but as an early arrival in Europe was posted to RAF squadrons as a navigator thus he served with RAF 150 and 196 squadrons for most of the war before heading to RCAF Lancasters in late 1944 through 1945. He loved the Wellingtons he flew in and often spoke of them so just no operational details.
Fantastic in depth video, thank you. The Wellington is perhaps a little overlooked. Your video makes it clear that it was in fact a true workhorse. The design was brilliant as it allowed efficient mass production and plenty of scope for development and modification.
Really enjoyed this longer format. I would love to see similar videos on the B26 Marauder and B25 Mitchell, especially the models fitted with the 75mm cannons. I have seen numerous videos on them but none in such detail and of such good presentation quality.
At 44:00 minutes I was stoked to see my father Frederick J "Popeye" Lucas (third from right) and my Godfather Air Commodore Maurice Buckley (seventh from right) who was CO of 75 Sqn at that time. Dad finished the war as a Wing Commander DFC & Bar having completed 57 ops with 75 (NZ) Sqn RAF and 25 ops with 487 Sqn RNZAF (Mosquitos). His 36th op (and the end of his first tour) was the first 1000 bomber raid over Berlin. My family are very proud of him.
The Wellington would save Barnes Wallis's life. He was a passenger in one which was flying along the south shore of the River Humber one night when one of the wings hit the cable from a barrage balloon. The pilot tried all he could to break lose but to no avail. While at the same time the cable was cutting through the wing. Now the wings were held on by a spar and once it cut through the spar the wing would come off and the aircraft would crash. But as it turned out the spar was rather substantial than the cable and it was the cable which was cut through not the wing. The managed to make and emergency landing and once it was repaired the aircraft flew home.
A longer video that describes the history of the bomber Wellington very well. I look forward to Part 2, when its versatility in other roles, already mentioned, will get the same treatment. Excellent work.
@@bradyelich2745 my father-in-law (1st marriage) was a tank driver and drove across France after D Day. He lost two tanks, but survived. Both were destroyed while the crew were sleeping. Apparently, some crew would sleep under their tanks to keep dry (and warm?), but, luckily, my father-in-law never did, so lived to tell the tale. One funny consequence of all this was that he drove all his adult life, without ever taking a driving test, as in those days you could get a driving licence purely on the strength of having been a driver in the forces - any sort of driver! You can imagine the jokes every time he had an accident or even had trouble parking!
The story of 'Jimmy' Ward is almost too much to comprehend. What those kids had to go through...what they took on...just incredible and frightfully humbling.
The only known surviving Brooklands-built Vickers Wellington is N2980, known as "R for Robert". Built in late 1939, this Mk.1A ditched in Loch Ness in a blizzard on the last day of 1940. Sinking to the bottom of the deep Loch, the aircraft was found by "Nessie" hunters in the 1970s and salvaged in 1985. It has been restored to show the geodetic structure and is on permanent static display at Brooklands Museum in Surrey.
I'm constantly amazed at the incompetence and arrogance of those who made decisions whether writing totally impractical specifications or tactical decisions. It speaks volumes about the men who rose above this and got on with the job of winning the war, even with those handicaps....A friend of my family won a VC flying Wellingtons, Sgt Pilot James Ward. His exploits are well documented. Sadly he was killed a couple of months later over Germany. My parents were obviously very proud of him....(Should have written this AFTER watching to the end). Thank you for acknowledging James.
I think you need to go and do some more reading. Here's few things for you to muse over: 1. The Air Ministry was looking at 6 and 8 gun machine gun fighters before the first 4 machine gun fighters in service. 2. The Air Ministry didn't limit the wing span of the Stirling and Halifax so that it could fit into the hangars as the Type C hangar had doors that open to 120', that 20' more than the Halifax size was limited to. The reason for the wingspan limit was concerns that an aircraft with a larger span would be difficult for one pilot to control. 3. The Air Ministry had doubts about the RR Vulture engines not being as good as expected so they asked Handley Page to resign their proposal for P13/36 to take RR Merlins as an insurance policy leading to the 4 engined HP57 or Halifax. Hardly ignorant or arrogant. They also put in place the structures that saved this country during the Battle of Britain.
That was extremely interesting! As I had two uncles in WWII! One a pilot, the other a navigator! Sadly, the navigator died in his first 1000 bombing raid! the other, survived the same raid! I do not know which Wellington they flew! So thank you, for the extremely detailed account of that make! I certainly appreciated it! I will add this! The uncle that survived, flew Torpedo bombing raids down in the med and he told me what that was like! it made my blood run cold at what he had to do! R.I.P to the both of them! Sigh!! The uncle that survived WWII died of cancer! Thank you to all those that flew this aircraft otherwise I would not be here today talking to you all!!
Knew a little about Barnes Wallace and the Wellingtons' geodesic structure via some architectural projects I wrote-up, as a journalist, long ago. But this, wonderfully detailed and authoritative insight is something else, altogether. Congratulations, well done!
Since my childhood airplane picture collecting days a favorite photo is one of a Wellington. I noticed you have in Part 1 a half dozen photos of anti-submarine radar equipped Wellingtons. Those of course were part of the major campaign to protect the convoys from the wolf packs. I hope you cover those in detail in Part 2. Thanks for a great story.
Wow! That was 53 mins, and it was great.... I don't know if all planes deserve the longer format, but the Wellington certainly does..... and I can't wait for part two....
My uncle was a Squadron Leader and flew Wellingtons on missions in Egypt, Crete and Italy. He's no longer with us but spoke with affection about the aircraft and especially how tough it was under fire.
One of my favourite aircraft of all time. I have had the pleasure of visiting the Wellington Aviation Museum in Moreton-in-Marsh on more than one occasion. A small but extremely interesting attraction to any fan of the bomber. It's highly recommended. As are your videos Rex. I await part two, thanks a lot.
A friend of my mothers flew Wellingtons in Egypt , Noel Toms joined the RAF after travelling from New Zealand after working on a farm in his youth. After the war he came back and flew DC3s with Air New Zealand into the 50s but did not want to transition to jets so left.
Geez. Never realised that the Wellingtons were produced in even greater numbers than the Lancaster. Quite a robust aircraft to be able to receive so many hits from whatever ammunition.
My father trained as a navigator on the Wimpy in the war. Luckily for him / me, the war ended before he had to fly in action. He loved this plane. God bless his soul.
Thanks for the video Rex. Nearly 20 years years ago I met a guy who was a sergeant pilot on Wellingtons. He wrote an hilarious book about his life too.
Excellent presentation Rex. I honestly didn’t notice that nearly an hour had trotted by. You successfully filled in a couple of areas I was missing on very early variants & am certainly looking forward to your ‘one-offs’ video. I do hope you include the Mk.VII, the one with almost certainly the most powerful automatic weapon to ever be fitted in a dorsal turret on a bomber. Keep up the good work!
This is one of the best videos you put out so far, very enjoyable and - most probably - well researched. Nevermind the complaints regarding the long format, (if there are any) if the ample source material demands it, so it be. Great job. 👏
My Father delivered the first Wellington to the RAF (he being a serving RAF Officer). Somewhere, I have a Photograph of the Aircraft in Question which was White in colour. I also have a Photo of my Father debriefing Guy Gibson with a Wellesley in the Background. Thank you, a very interesting and comprehensive Film.
My stepfather Charlie Stewart was an Australian pilot flying for the RAF as was the Kiwis mentioned in the video. He liked the Wimpies but was bitterly angry about their lack of initial defensive armament. He flew for the entire war out of England, the Western Desert at the end of which he transited onto Liberators which he adored and flew in Italy. His Wellingtons were often hit by fighters and flak, the later Italian fighters he disliked the most due to their speed and the suddenness of the cannon attack. Because the Wellington was so robust he survived the war but unfortunately many of his crew did not. The plane was so tough that half the crew could be killed and their crew stations smashed yet it still got home and this took a heavy toll on him and he developed what we now understand to be a bad case PTSD. One of the things about the geodesic frame was that in an attack from the rear the cannon shells striking the fuselage were encountering essentially a solid wall of struts giving them plenty of opportunity to detonate among the crew, something German fighters soon realised. The worst situation he encountered he told me of was when a heavy flak shell detonated right behind the ship sweeping it with massive fragments. Only the crew forward of the wing remained uninjured and the whole structure was swaying and parts were falling off the aircraft the whole way home. The forward crewman went aft and found that some of the crew were severely injured yet still living. They nursed the Wellington back to the base but it broke up on landing and all the gravely injured crew died in the ensuing fire.
My Dad flew in Wimpy's through thWW2 in Coastal Command as W/Op AG. One of his more memorable missions was over the Bay of Biscay on Anti U-boat patrol. They lost an engine and spent 3 1/2 hours getting back to St Eval and were diverted due to heavy fog. The field they were diverted to (Portreath) was fogbound but on long finals the runway lit up with tall flames but they landed safely. Seems they were an impromptu test of FIDO
Glad to see good ol Squadron/Signal books getting so much love in your videos. I recognize the artwork and font. They're a far cry today from their glory days of the 70s-90s when Lou Drendel was a key contributor.
Excellent video and presentation, Rex. You have clearly done a great deal of research and dug out a range and variety of films and photos that I don't think I've seen before, so well done. I'd also like to praise your style and pace of delivery; you speak clearly with a good variation of pitch and pace, with the odd sprinkling of humour to maintain the listener's interest. Great content, I sincerely hope that your channel continues to grow. I'm looking forward to Part 2 of the Wellington story.
Great effort! Vickers is often forgotten when wartime bombers are talked about. My only personal experience was a passenger on the one of the last Air Canada flights of the Viscount. (my ears are still ringing)
I travelled all across Australia in a Vickers Viscount from Perth to Adelaide and on to Sydney. It was a great experience as a window-seat passenger, allowing easy viewing and clear panoramic photo opportunities, especially of the southern coastlines of WA and SA.
Wow a so detailed presentation ! Great job ! I discovered the Wellington when as a boy I was looking for my first "Big" aircraft kit. I found the Matchbox model with the dramatic boxart and immediately became a fan of this machine
11:30 the wellesley is such a cool plane for the 1930's I just love the mix of older and newer design features same for the wellington but to a lesser degree for me.
Thank you! The Wellington is closely connected with Czechoslovak 311.sqn. There are several photos of 311's planes in your video and above all, at 41:31 one of czechoslovak crews can be spotted, from left: Sgt Karol Valach (KIA 23.6.1941), Sgt Josef Filler, F/Sgt Josef Bernát, P/O Vilém Konštacký (KIA 23.6.1941), P/O Josef Horák and Sgt Jan Plzák. Czechoslovak machines carried KX code. Later PP after reassignment to the Coast Command. The reason for the transfer from BC to CC were losses during 1941 in excess of 40% which led to a loss of operational capability at the beginning of 1942. For this reason, the squadron was transferred under CC to carry out anti-submarine patrols. Wellington remained with the sqn. until the second half of 1943, when they started serving on Liberator GR.
Excellent video! Many thanks for that. Stepfather flew as navigator in a Wellington toward the end of the war. A search here on utube for "Hercules start up and run" yields a few videos with the engines on trailers at various shows. There is at least one video (about 4minutes 20 secs long) that has it run up to cruise power. If you can find that one turn the sound right up - stepfather was sitting between two of these with nothing but a bit of fabric between him and them. Really gives a feel for what it was like.
Great episode thanks! I had no idea that so many were produced, I've seen the two surviving examples, at Hendon and Brooklands. My old neighbour was a Wellington navigator!
It’s amazing that with so many produced only two surviving examples remain, and one of those was dredged up from Loch Ness and is being left as it was found, the other is slowly being restored for static display.
The only surviving R.A.F. "Halifax" is the one fished up from a lake and left rusted but stablised: the Canadians fished up another from a Norwegian lake and did a more-thorough restoration job than the R.A.F. chose to do to theirs.
There are lots of ‘bits’ of Wellingtons about. A fuselage at Brooklands, a tail at Meoeton on the Marsh - a centre section somewhere in Norfolk and wings elsewhere - If seemed there ought to have been some initiative to assemble another complete airframe from these, but there seems to have been no interest in doing so…. Maybe if there were none left someone might have wanted to.
That was very interesting nice to see the old girl get some limelight often overlooked in favour of the Lancaster .would like to see some more of the aircraft involved in coastal command. Really well put together contents cheers mate.
I wouldn't have ecpected to really follow this up to the end but in fact I did in one session from beginning to end. I have to say I learned a lot about wartime airplane production and beeing able to put that into context with other wartime events and their timelines was helpfull too. Very entertaining!
We recently visited Brooklands Museum in Surrey, a wellington is on dispaly with the skinnremoved in various locations to show the geodetic structure. Museum is well worth a visit for aircraft, (includinng a Concorde) plus race cars, motor bikes and even a bus museum. Great for children also, with a lot of interactive activities. My son was allowed to sit in cockpits of a Harrier and a VC 10. Experienced volunteers explain things in detail.
Just recently watched a video from 'who do you think you are' minni driver's father ronny was in a Wellington in the battle of heligoland bight where he was awarded a DFM . Great video Rex. Looking forward to a halifax video. The Unsung hero of bomber command imo.
Well they had to scrap the R100 when the airship scheme failed, so they shrank it down and put wings on it. And Bob's your uncle we had us a very versatile aeroplane. Talking of, I know Rex's schtick is heavier-than-air-craft, but it might be fun to see a video about R100, and maybe some of the other lesser known airships. I.e, the Detroit ZMC-2, Shutte-Lanz airships, the French efforts in semi-rigids.
The Luftwaffe used the hula hoop on the Ju52. It was a mineclearing device against magnetic mines. The germans called it " Mausi-Schleife" ( mouse-loop).
My Grandfather had some amazing history with his Welly - as nav/rad/tail gunner - he survived amongst other things a fully loaded crash after take off into a field of poles (designed to prevent German landings) the Welly survived without fire or explosion but a prop came away, cut through the side and embedded itself in his desk right next to his arm - almost slicing his airman's beret in two - we still have the beret in the family to this day but sadly not Taid as he passed away some thirty years ago now. After his European theatre and Burma tours he used to train pilots for the special roles - particularly the intel flights, night training navigation through North Wales - on one occasion what I believe to have been a Polish pilot under instruction ignored his instructor (Taid) and flew his plane UNDER the Conwy Suspension bridge . There is barely enough space to do this at low tide so I've no idea how they did it but all hands survived including the airplane!
My father was a navigator/bombardier on Wellingtons in the Desert Air Force during 1942-1943. His first two missions were dropping bombs on the first night of El Alamein. He told me some interesting facts about the Wellington: 1) in flight the tail would corkscrew, and you could observe this phenomenon looking aft to the tail gunner's position from the navigator station, 2) the geodetic structure also meant that the aircraft would stretch several inches in flight, 3) parts of the geodetic structure were marked so that they could be chopped out with the fire axe, removed and tossed out of the plane to reduce weight if the aircraft was losing altitude. He also told me a rather amusing story about flying in Wellingtons. On every mission the crews were supposed to take a photo of the target, and since they were flying at night they had to drop a magnesium flare. This was done by attaching a wire to the cotterpin that acted as the safety for the flare, then rapidly shoving the flare down a tube. The weight of the flare would pull the pin, thereby activating the fuse, and it would drop free of the aircraft, going off and illuminating the target. On one mission, the crew were a bit tired and being a bit stupid. There were three guys at the flare station (I cannot now recall which positions they were, probably engineer, radio operator and one other), and they started goofing around. Anyway, they attached the wire, and placed the flare at the mouth of the tube. Then they started chanting, "A onesy, a twosie, a threesie, flare ... OH @*&#!" as the person dropping flare didn't hit it hard enough and the flare stuck partway down the tube with the pin half-pulled. As my father described it, one man, with great aplomb, ran screaming towards the cockpit. The second man, showing great presences of mind, pulled out his pocket knife and began trying to cut the steel wire. The third man, thinking quickly, grabbed the fire axe and, with a hefty swing, cut both the top of the tube and the wire holding the pin on the magnesium flare. The flare dropped free of the plane and exploded close enough to the aircraft to shred all the fabric on the underside of the fuselage.
My father was an Airborne Radar Mechanic in Bomber Command (he serviced G & H2S sets but was also trained on Loran & Oboe etc.) and spent most of his war service at RAF Chipping Norton where Bomber Command formed up air crews, taking individually trained men and getting crewing Wellingtons. To show how strong the aircraft was he on more than one occasion entered an aircraft that had a hole in its fuselage bigger than a door but it had still returned! The only problem he had, as did all radar mechanics, was there were responsible for a cable that fed off the generator off one of the engines that powered the radar equipment. As this cable was at the rear of the engine it would eventually rot due to oil seeping from the engine and changing it was an issue - the space to do it was half the size of the issued screwdrivers! Luckily for dad one time he went on leave to London to see my mum (they didn’t marry until after the war), he went into an ironmongers shop in Streatham and found 6 stubby screwdrivers ideal for working on the back of the engine. With a bit of persuasion he purchased four and three of his friends received these gifts when he returned to his station!
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F.A.Q Section
Q: Do you take aircraft requests?
A: I have a list of aircraft I plan to cover, but feel free to add to it with suggestions:)
Q: Why do you use imperial measurements for some videos, and metric for others?
A: I do this based on country of manufacture. Imperial measurements for Britain and the U.S, metric for the rest of the world, but I include text in my videos that convert it for both.
Q: Will you include video footage in your videos, or just photos?
A: Video footage is very expensive to licence, if I can find footage in the public domain I will try to use it, but a lot of it is hoarded by licencing studies (British Pathe, Periscope films etc). In the future I may be able to afford clips :)
Q: Why do you sometimes feature images/screenshots from flight simulators?
A: Sometimes there are not a lot of photos available for certain aircraft, so I substitute this with digital images that are as accurate as possible.
Feel free to leave you questions below - I may not be able to answer all of them, but I will keep my eyes open :)
I have a request for the Ki84 a fighter from Japan used in the late war period.Another plane is also the Ki61 a kinda Japanese Me109
I second the Ki-84 Hayate, love that fighter. Same with the N1KJ Shiden.
How about decoy aircraft of WW2, when what looked like a squadron of planes on an airfield were plywood or inflatable dummies? I don't know exactly what for, to keep a real airfield safer? To make the enemy think an attack was going to be launched from that site?
😁
I really like the longer format. No doubt more work for you, but I for one, would really enjoy it.
Thoroughly enjoyed that. I'm very proud of the fact my Dad was a WW2 Lanc pilot. But he was also a Wellington pilot, when he and his crew were training up at an OTU based at Silverstone. On one particular training flight, cloudbase was very low and they had to stay at about 1000ft AGL. One of the engines lost power then stopped, and they were concerned about the other one as they struggled to maintain height. The navigator was also concerned that high ground might soon be ahead in the form of the Peak District. Suddenly my Dad saw an airfield appear out of the gloom and made an immediate decision to put the Wellington down, wheels up as they needed to act very quickly plus the extra drag of the deployed u/c gear could have had fatal consequences. And because Wimpy's could catch fire easily when sparks were flying, he opted for the grass alongside the tarmac runway as his landing option. it all worked perfectly and the only injury to crew was a torn shoulder lapel on the jacket of one of the crew. For his valiant action, he was bawled out by the station commander for having damaged one of His Majesty's aircraft. His crew though, thought he was a bloody hero as they had no doubt they would probably otherwise have been killed. The airfield turned out to be Castle Donnington. The navigator was Len Smee who, if you google him, went on to have another extraordinary crash survival adventure after the war. My Dad and his crew remained lifelong friends after the war.
Thanks so much for sharing this story!!!
I was born in 1981, and have eternal thanks for spending the earlympart of my life being raised, guided and supervised by the men and women who had survived the war.
Their pride in Britain and British heritage was superb.
I recently found out that my Uncle was a Wellington pilot when he died on a mission, apparently over Germany. The plane made it home and he's buried in a cemetary in Northeast England. I had thought he'd been Lancaster pilot until I found his RCAF record online.
Was that the Heligoland Bight raid?Uncle flew with Snowy Owl Squadron RCAF.
Damn sorry to hear that 😯
I would like to pay my respects posthumously, we are grateful for the sacrifice that brave Canadians made.
sorry to hear of your loss and thank you to him for our protection back then! R.I.P 😢
Mine too (although not a pilot). Hit by flak over the dutch coast and went down in the English channel.
I knew someone who served as a tail gunner on a Wellington bomber in ww2. He said “you don’t know fear until you experience trained soldiers who are good at what they do and are there for the sole purpose of trying to kill you”
Thanks for your service R.I.P. Pat Quinn 😢
Fascinating stuff.
My dad was a Wimpy pilot from 1943, completing a 35-sortie tour over Burma.
I've always found it remarkable and so disappointing that none survive even close to airworthy.
Intersting Fact:
A Vickers Wellington LN514 holds the record of fastest construction in 23 hours and 50 minutes, and took off 24 hours and 48 minutes!
Oh wow
From the moment they received the raw materials or from the moment they received the parts?
There's a film of it being built and and its on youtube ..Link here ruclips.net/video/zlVLZ230iFs/видео.html
@@ToreDL87 probably as it entered the production process
7
Excellent - really enjoyed this one. The longer format gives us something to really get our teeth into. The odd thing about this plane is that I thought I knew so much about it but not that it was built by Vickers! Even weirder when you consider that my dad worked there. Thanks to your channel, I now also have a very different understanding of where a plane like this came from. As an immediate postwar child, I grew up with all the famous WW2 planes as just being there, as if they'd just appeared out of nowhere. But now, thanks to watching hours of your videos, I now understand how such planes evolved from those that came before them.
Clues in the name...
Vickers wellington
too many longer formats these days I really want less so I'll disagree
I totally agree with you on the video length.
@@sugarnads that's just the problem - I'd never heard it called that, it was always just "the Wellington bomber". Plus I had this idea that Vickers always chose names beginning with 'V'!
I thought I was gonna fly with a Whimpey at Duxford but it was the old Lancaster which is a thrill nevertheless. I retired from the air force recently due to an injury. I have to settle with piloting WW2 fighters. A friend of mine flies Spitfires for a museum in the middle west. They have a world sensation a "J-22" from Sweden in a flying condition which was a sensation for its time (1942). The J 22 outclimbed a Mustang or Focke wolf at the time.
Brilliant. I can attest to the strength of the Wimpy even in model form! I was building an Airfix kit of the Mk 1C in the Late 1970s when I came across a problem of fitting the front Turret. No matter how Hard I tried I couldn't get it to fit properly (of course the turret had to swivel and the guns had to be able to raise and lower). After a long time messing about with it my preteen anger (I was 12 years old) got the better of me and I launched it across my bedroom where it hit the wall and bounced across the bed. I stormed off and left it where it landed.
Later I came back a little ashamed of my actions and picked it up and inspected it. No Damage! I couldn't believe it and the most mysterious thing of all was the front turret slotted in without problem. I completed the model and painted it and it hung from the celling of my bedroom on its nylon fishing line hangers where it "flew" for many years until I left home in my late teens. I think my mum passed it onto someone after I left home with all my other models. (Or dust gathering junk as she used to refer to them!)
I still have a huge soft spot for the indestructible Wimpy!
Ha ha. I could also lose my rag at Airfix kits that wouldn't go together. My planes hanging on fishing line from bedroom ceiling got shot down by accident in a pillow fight with my brother. I'd have been 14 or 15 by then and was quite glad. But I had got pretty good at building and painting by then
Christ, I had to check to see if I wrote that ages ago lol. So similar to me, I used to literally test the aerodynamics if the model kit got the better of me too.
Great anecdote. I built Airfix kits in the 50s and left one freshly and painstakingly finished on my bed, only to find my baby sister had been playing with it and broken it beyond repair. I had to be physically restrained by my dad!
I was a test pilot for Airfix in the late 1970’s. My resume is impressive even if I do say so myself. Everything from Bf109 to the Boeing 747! Unfortunately most of my collection ended on a tragic Guy Fawkes night in the ‘80’s. This my have coincided with an early experiment with alcohol. Happy days.
I used to like the taste of the glue.
😋 and it didn't cause 🤪
When I was young my mum said to me that our local vicar flew in Wellingtons, so I said to her why didn't he wear flying boots like everybody else?
I had seen in bios and other texts that pilots considered the Welly to have the very best, most comfortable pilots seat, positioning and how easily the controls fell to hand, unsurpassed by any other aircraft, back then. Small detail, but it did reflect the generally overall good ergonomics of this cockpit. Also, unlike, say a DC3, the glazing didn’t leak. The Welly was also praised for minimal vibration, unlike a four engine bomber which shook like a dog shitting razor blades. Queenslander.
My book on the Wellington confirms your comments about the comfort of the pilots seat.
Wimpey, rather than Welly? Love the simile of your final sentence, as Australian as a roo bouncing off a Toyota Land Cruiser
After a lecture given by Barnes Wallace in the 60's I had the honour of meeting him. He had shook hands with every apprentice, some 100+. He was a quiet unassuming gentleman, grey haired but still so full of vitality. We don't seem to breed men like him anymore or maybe they are stifled.
They are not corporate enough.
Still around and still valued even in big companies that realise value of creative ideas. But usually work as designer guns for hire now
Stifled. If they know what's good for them. If they keep quiet long enough for their minds to mummify, they get promoted to management. If they don't keep quiet, they get fired when the embalmed-brains need someone to blame.
H.R. and Economic Engineering weed those guys out.
tHe YouNg PeOplE tHesE dAyS
An Canadian friend told me a story about himself and his father and their visit to England to see his old base where he had flown out of during the war. His father had flown Wellingtons. He started his story by saying "my dad was king over there". They took a taxi to some museum and the driver was keen to hear about his father's recollections and expressed Britains thanks to Canada for their help and loyalty. When he dropped them off the driver said that it was a small museum and he would wait for them and he did. He returned them...no charge. When it was time to visit his old base (which was still an RAF base) they arrived out front and my friend asked security if his father could possibly get to see airfield he flew from and was told by the guard that he had no authority but would make enquiries. They waited a while and he then he saw an officer with an NCO marching towards them. The NCO opened the door and then to quote my fried "then that officer saluted my dad". They got the full treatment and his father was greeted enthusiastically by all. I will never forget that phrase "my dad was king over there".
Something to note: In this video you talk about an attack on the 'battlecruiser' Nürnberg. Nürnberg was about the furthest thing from a battlecruiser, being instead a light cruiser.
Yay one I requested! My maternal grandfather was a navigator in one of those. Thank you!
Did he happen to have a crazy bastard on the end of a rope by chance? Loved that story in the video. Epic
😁
A very good and in depth look at the Wellington medium bomber. I have a book on the Wellington and one of the things mentioned repeatedly in aircrew memories was of the reliability of the engines and I think that the radial Hercules engines played a significant role here because a radial engine didn't require the radiators and plumbing that an in-line engine did. Loss or damage to the cooling system of an in-line engine would result in the loss of the engine and this could result in the loss of the aircraft. So the geodetic structure and radial engines combined to make a legend of the Wellington's capacity to absorb considerable battle damage and still return home when others would have been lost. This is not to say that the Wellington was immune to losses, it wasn't but if you could survive the attack or the flak then you had a good chance of getting back home.
Another thing that pilots would rave about was just how comfortable the pilots seats were.
Mark from Melbourne Australia
Thank you for keeping your channel focused on educational values rather than financial ones.
Thank you ever so much.
Wow I am astonsihed!
I am German and always just heard something like this in historical accounts: after the first disastrous day-time attacks, the Welly got relegated to second-line duty. End of story.
There one can see the effect of gross simplification, didn't expect the Welly to have had such a distinct service career!
Can't wait to hear about the Humpback-Welly! :D
Rex, the Wimpy was the catalyst for the 60 series Merlins as fitted to the Spitfire Mk9 and the P51D Mustang. Vickers were developing a high altitude version of the Wellington and required an engine that could operate at 30000 ft. Rolls Royce rejected the use of a turbocharger and went for the two stage two speed route utilising the Vulture centrifugal supercharger as the second stage. The high altitude bomber went nowhere but Lord Hives suggested that they put the resultant engine into a Spitfire and the rest is history
My Grandad was employed making these aircraft during WW2 he never had a bad word for them and I can remember as a kid him trying to explain the geodesic frame to me. He also told me about fitting the Frazer Nash turrets. My only regret is that I didn't ask him more questions because this is a great often overlooked aircraft that was a credit to our Airforce.
My grandad was a foreman at Sywell repair station, that specialised in Wellingtons, I have his hand written note book correcting the errors in factory electrics manual, plus various wiring diagrams, (bomb doors etc)
I'm from America and all I got to say is simple: You brits were ahead of your time with the Vickers Wellington and it's a damn shame that you only have 2 left remaining. One being preserved thank god. I mean, the Vickers Wellington from what I'm hearing was basically the RAF's version of the B-17 but better due to it having more flexibility to fit more roles.
These are really good videos! No music, no nonsense, but very thorough and complete!
OMG you are covering something a bit more mainstream... I could but dream! Your attention to detail on the better known aircraft of this era = colour me pleased :) Looking forward to part 2 - excellent work!
I can't imagine how much time you spent on research for this. I've learned more about WW2 in the last six months than the previous 40 years, a large part of that because of your channel. Thank you for another look into the history of aviation.
You can learn literally all of this from ordering one or two decently in depth books on the Wellington. What is there to "research",? He is basically summarized what the books say. They are the ones who dug through the primary sources and archives, etc. You think some dude with a RUclips channel did all the primary research himself?
@@justforever96 So you stroke your ego by insulting random commenters? That's pretty sad, I almost feel sorry for you.
In Oct 1971, I was posted from training, to RAF Little Rissington. A local pub, The Duke of Wellington became my local. It was run by an ex-Sqn Ldr called Jack ‘Baggy’ Sach, DFC, Wellington (amongst others) pilot. Fascinating bloke, look him up, he had an amazing career.
Did they change the name of the pub indirectly in honour of the plane and pilot?
I recently discover this channel a like it because you go beyond the usual subjects like that P-51, Spitfires, Lancaster and B-17. Keep on doing it.
Fine comment yes and I too am attracted to this channel for similar reasons and despite the dreadful quantity of #ADVERTS if one perseveres it's rewarded with some of the finest factual research and presentation I've yet seen.
Great doc so far...the humourous story of moving from the biplane to Wellington illustrates the massive technical advancements made in those war years.
My father was RCAF but as an early arrival in Europe was posted to RAF squadrons as a navigator thus he served with RAF 150 and 196 squadrons for most of the war before heading to RCAF Lancasters in late 1944 through 1945. He loved the Wellingtons he flew in and often spoke of them so just no operational details.
Fantastic in depth video, thank you. The Wellington is perhaps a little overlooked. Your video makes it clear that it was in fact a true workhorse. The design was brilliant as it allowed efficient mass production and plenty of scope for development and modification.
Really enjoyed this longer format. I would love to see similar videos on the B26 Marauder and B25 Mitchell, especially the models fitted with the 75mm cannons. I have seen numerous videos on them but none in such detail and of such good presentation quality.
One hour is perfect for this type of video, looking forward to part 2.
At 44:00 minutes I was stoked to see my father Frederick J "Popeye" Lucas (third from right) and my Godfather Air Commodore Maurice Buckley (seventh from right) who was CO of 75 Sqn at that time. Dad finished the war as a Wing Commander DFC & Bar having completed 57 ops with 75 (NZ) Sqn RAF and 25 ops with 487 Sqn RNZAF (Mosquitos). His 36th op (and the end of his first tour) was the first 1000 bomber raid over Berlin.
My family are very proud of him.
I did not expect such a long, in-depth video going over so much fascinating history. This was quite a treat, thank you!
The Wellington would save Barnes Wallis's life. He was a passenger in one which was flying along the south shore of the River Humber one night when one of the wings hit the cable from a barrage balloon. The pilot tried all he could to break lose but to no avail. While at the same time the cable was cutting through the wing. Now the wings were held on by a spar and once it cut through the spar the wing would come off and the aircraft would crash. But as it turned out the spar was rather substantial than the cable and it was the cable which was cut through not the wing. The managed to make and emergency landing and once it was repaired the aircraft flew home.
The pilot hit me I am the victim
@@barrageballoon4845 lmfao
@@barrageballoon4845 Blue on blue so we say nothing and pretend it never happened
@@twddersharkmarine7774 lmfao. Does that counts as collateral damage?
@@bigblue6917 well it is a british Barrage Balloon vs a british Wellington, it could definitely count as a blue on blue probably
A longer video that describes the history of the bomber Wellington very well. I look forward to Part 2, when its versatility in other roles, already mentioned, will get the same treatment. Excellent work.
My uncle flew two tours over Europe for the RCAF in Wellingtons. He was a tail gunner.
Very brave man. You didn't get much chance of surviving almost any incident in that position.
🇨🇦 🍁 🇨🇦
My great uncle flew half an operation in a Wellington over Tripoli. He is buried in the Tripoli cemetery along with the rest of his crew…
Wow. My great uncle was a tank TC in Normandy and he lived.
@@bradyelich2745 my father-in-law (1st marriage) was a tank driver and drove across France after D Day. He lost two tanks, but survived. Both were destroyed while the crew were sleeping. Apparently, some crew would sleep under their tanks to keep dry (and warm?), but, luckily, my father-in-law never did, so lived to tell the tale. One funny consequence of all this was that he drove all his adult life, without ever taking a driving test, as in those days you could get a driving licence purely on the strength of having been a driver in the forces - any sort of driver! You can imagine the jokes every time he had an accident or even had trouble parking!
The story of 'Jimmy' Ward is almost too much to comprehend. What those kids had to go through...what they took on...just incredible and frightfully humbling.
young goats in aeroplanes?
The only known surviving Brooklands-built Vickers Wellington is N2980, known as "R for Robert". Built in late 1939, this Mk.1A ditched in Loch Ness in a blizzard on the last day of 1940. Sinking to the bottom of the deep Loch, the aircraft was found by "Nessie" hunters in the 1970s and salvaged in 1985. It has been restored to show the geodetic structure and is on permanent static display at Brooklands Museum in Surrey.
I bet Nessie wasn't happy that that Wellington is removed out of her fish bowl.
I'm constantly amazed at the incompetence and arrogance of those who made decisions whether writing totally impractical specifications or tactical decisions. It speaks volumes about the men who rose above this and got on with the job of winning the war, even with those handicaps....A friend of my family won a VC flying Wellingtons, Sgt Pilot James Ward. His exploits are well documented. Sadly he was killed a couple of months later over Germany. My parents were obviously very proud of him....(Should have written this AFTER watching to the end). Thank you for acknowledging James.
Ancestors of the dumbos we have 'running' the country now; ah, the proceeds of our glorious class system.
I think you need to go and do some more reading. Here's few things for you to muse over:
1. The Air Ministry was looking at 6 and 8 gun machine gun fighters before the first 4 machine gun fighters in service.
2. The Air Ministry didn't limit the wing span of the Stirling and Halifax so that it could fit into the hangars as the Type C hangar had doors that open to 120', that 20' more than the Halifax size was limited to. The reason for the wingspan limit was concerns that an aircraft with a larger span would be difficult for one pilot to control.
3. The Air Ministry had doubts about the RR Vulture engines not being as good as expected so they asked Handley Page to resign their proposal for P13/36 to take RR Merlins as an insurance policy leading to the 4 engined HP57 or Halifax.
Hardly ignorant or arrogant. They also put in place the structures that saved this country during the Battle of Britain.
That was extremely interesting! As I had two uncles in WWII! One a pilot, the other a navigator! Sadly, the navigator died in his first 1000 bombing raid! the other, survived the same raid! I do not know which Wellington they flew! So thank you, for the extremely detailed account of that make! I certainly appreciated it! I will add this! The uncle that survived, flew Torpedo bombing raids down in the med and he told me what that was like! it made my blood run cold at what he had to do! R.I.P to the both of them! Sigh!! The uncle that survived WWII died of cancer! Thank you to all those that flew this aircraft otherwise I would not be here today talking to you all!!
Knew a little about Barnes Wallace and the Wellingtons' geodesic structure via some architectural projects I wrote-up, as a journalist, long ago.
But this, wonderfully detailed and authoritative insight is something else, altogether.
Congratulations, well done!
Since my childhood airplane picture collecting days a favorite photo is one of a Wellington. I noticed you have in Part 1 a half dozen photos of anti-submarine radar equipped Wellingtons. Those of course were part of the major campaign to protect the convoys from the wolf packs. I hope you cover those in detail in Part 2. Thanks for a great story.
Around 1970, one of the characters around the Flying Club I frequented was a former Wimpey pilot. I think he visited Kiel at least once.
Wow! That was 53 mins, and it was great.... I don't know if all planes deserve the longer format, but the Wellington certainly does..... and I can't wait for part two....
My uncle was a Squadron Leader and flew Wellingtons on missions in Egypt, Crete and Italy. He's no longer with us but spoke with affection about the aircraft and especially how tough it was under fire.
One of my favourite aircraft of all time.
I have had the pleasure of visiting the Wellington Aviation Museum in Moreton-in-Marsh on more than one occasion. A small but extremely interesting attraction to any fan of the bomber. It's highly recommended. As are your videos Rex. I await part two, thanks a lot.
A friend of my mothers flew Wellingtons in Egypt , Noel Toms joined the RAF after travelling from New Zealand after working on a farm in his youth. After the war he came back and flew DC3s with Air New Zealand into the 50s but did not want to transition to jets so left.
Geez. Never realised that the Wellingtons were produced in even greater numbers than the Lancaster. Quite a robust aircraft to be able to receive so many hits from whatever ammunition.
That is the point of smaller, cheaper bombers, kind of.
Fantastic video. The Wimpy is one of my favourite bombers of WWII and this video really did it justice. Looking forward to part 2!
Rex, thanks so much for mentioning Sgt Ward’s heroics.
My father trained as a navigator on the Wimpy in the war. Luckily for him / me, the war ended before he had to fly in action. He loved this plane. God bless his soul.
Jimmy Ward, what an absolute mad bastard hero!
Thank you Rex. My father was a second World War USAAF pilot and I enjoy your work a great deal.
Thanks for the video Rex.
Nearly 20 years years ago I met a guy who was a sergeant pilot on Wellingtons.
He wrote an hilarious book about his life too.
The actual unsung hero plane of Bomber Command , tough as all buggery .
One of the few aircraft to be built throughout the war, on any side. The Bf-109, and Spitfire were two others.
Really enjoyable, love the long format, can't imagine the work that went into this! Good stuff!
Thank you Rex! I was always curious about the seemingly undersung Wellington and this documentary was fascinating . . . looking forward to Part 2!
Excellent presentation Rex. I honestly didn’t notice that nearly an hour had trotted by. You successfully filled in a couple of areas I was missing on very early variants & am certainly looking forward to your ‘one-offs’ video.
I do hope you include the Mk.VII, the one with almost certainly the most powerful automatic weapon to ever be fitted in a dorsal turret on a bomber.
Keep up the good work!
This is one of the best videos you put out so far, very enjoyable and - most probably - well researched. Nevermind the complaints regarding the long format, (if there are any) if the ample source material demands it, so it be. Great job. 👏
My Father delivered the first Wellington to the RAF (he being a serving RAF Officer). Somewhere, I have a Photograph of the Aircraft in Question which was White in colour. I also have a Photo of my Father debriefing Guy Gibson with a Wellesley in the Background.
Thank you, a very interesting and comprehensive Film.
My stepfather Charlie Stewart was an Australian pilot flying for the RAF as was the Kiwis mentioned in the video. He liked the Wimpies but was bitterly angry about their lack of initial defensive armament. He flew for the entire war out of England, the Western Desert at the end of which he transited onto Liberators which he adored and flew in Italy. His Wellingtons were often hit by fighters and flak, the later Italian fighters he disliked the most due to their speed and the suddenness of the cannon attack.
Because the Wellington was so robust he survived the war but unfortunately many of his crew did not. The plane was so tough that half the crew could be killed and their crew stations smashed yet it still got home and this took a heavy toll on him and he developed what we now understand to be a bad case PTSD. One of the things about the geodesic frame was that in an attack from the rear the cannon shells striking the fuselage were encountering essentially a solid wall of struts giving them plenty of opportunity to detonate among the crew, something German fighters soon realised.
The worst situation he encountered he told me of was when a heavy flak shell detonated right behind the ship sweeping it with massive fragments. Only the crew forward of the wing remained uninjured and the whole structure was swaying and parts were falling off the aircraft the whole way home. The forward crewman went aft and found that some of the crew were severely injured yet still living. They nursed the Wellington back to the base but it broke up on landing and all the gravely injured crew died in the ensuing fire.
Very interesting and well done. Thanks for sharing this with us.
My Dad flew in Wimpy's through thWW2 in Coastal Command as W/Op AG. One of his more memorable missions was over the Bay of Biscay on Anti U-boat patrol. They lost an engine and spent 3 1/2 hours getting back to St Eval and were diverted due to heavy fog. The field they were diverted to (Portreath) was fogbound but on long finals the runway lit up with tall flames but they landed safely. Seems they were an impromptu test of FIDO
Glad to see good ol Squadron/Signal books getting so much love in your videos. I recognize the artwork and font. They're a far cry today from their glory days of the 70s-90s when Lou Drendel was a key contributor.
A great documentary! Very informative, entertaining & humorous! Look forward to watch more of your work!
Excellent video and presentation, Rex. You have clearly done a great deal of research and dug out a range and variety of films and photos that I don't think I've seen before, so well done. I'd also like to praise your style and pace of delivery; you speak clearly with a good variation of pitch and pace, with the odd sprinkling of humour to maintain the listener's interest. Great content, I sincerely hope that your channel continues to grow.
I'm looking forward to Part 2 of the Wellington story.
Very good documentary about the Wimpey. Can't wait for part 2.
Great effort! Vickers is often forgotten when wartime bombers are talked about. My only personal experience was a passenger on the one of the last Air Canada flights of the Viscount. (my ears are still ringing)
And yet they were much quieter than piston-engine alternatives.
I flew on a few Viscounts and they never seemed that noisy to me, especially compared to flying in a DC3!
I travelled all across Australia in a Vickers Viscount from Perth to Adelaide and on to Sydney. It was a great experience as a window-seat passenger, allowing easy viewing and clear panoramic photo opportunities, especially of the southern coastlines of WA and SA.
My first flight ever was in a Vickers Varsity, which had Bristol Hercules engines. I was a 15 year old ATC cadet. They werer pretty noisy!
@@clive373 Now that I think about it, the distinctive Viscount howl/whistle was as much the props as it was engines.
Thanks for a new video Rex
Love the longer format. Keep 'em coming.
Wow a so detailed presentation !
Great job !
I discovered the Wellington when as a boy I was looking for my first "Big" aircraft kit. I found the Matchbox model with the dramatic boxart and immediately became a fan of this machine
11:30 the wellesley is such a cool plane for the 1930's I just love the mix of older and newer design features same for the wellington but to a lesser degree for me.
Thank you! The Wellington is closely connected with Czechoslovak 311.sqn. There are several photos of 311's planes in your video and above all, at 41:31 one of czechoslovak crews can be spotted, from left: Sgt Karol Valach (KIA 23.6.1941), Sgt Josef Filler, F/Sgt Josef Bernát, P/O Vilém Konštacký (KIA 23.6.1941), P/O Josef Horák and Sgt Jan Plzák.
Czechoslovak machines carried KX code. Later PP after reassignment to the Coast Command.
The reason for the transfer from BC to CC were losses during 1941 in excess of 40% which led to a loss of operational capability at the beginning of 1942. For this reason, the squadron was transferred under CC to carry out anti-submarine patrols. Wellington remained with the sqn. until the second half of 1943, when they started serving on Liberator GR.
I know this photo too.
Excellent video! Many thanks for that. Stepfather flew as navigator in a Wellington toward the end of the war. A search here on utube for "Hercules start up and run" yields a few videos with the engines on trailers at various shows. There is at least one video (about 4minutes 20 secs long) that has it run up to cruise power. If you can find that one turn the sound right up - stepfather was sitting between two of these with nothing but a bit of fabric between him and them. Really gives a feel for what it was like.
Wimpy! Such a great aircraft. I wish there was a restored version flying the airshow circuit with interior tours.
Loved this longer format deep dive into the Wellington.
Great info, very well presented.
Hows about a summary of the Hercules? Not remembered like the Merlin but a great workhorse engine all the same.
Thank you for making this happen
Great episode thanks! I had no idea that so many were produced, I've seen the two surviving examples, at Hendon and Brooklands. My old neighbour was a Wellington navigator!
Don't pander to the goldfish! Very good video - and there are so few well produced and researched videos up to this standard. Top job.
It’s amazing that with so many produced only two surviving examples remain, and one of those was dredged up from Loch Ness and is being left as it was found, the other is slowly being restored for static display.
The only surviving R.A.F. "Halifax" is the one fished up from a lake and left rusted but stablised: the Canadians fished up another from a Norwegian lake and did a more-thorough restoration job than the R.A.F. chose to do to theirs.
@@None-zc5vg There’s also the restored “Halifax” at Elvington, although that does use the wings from a Hastings.
There are lots of ‘bits’ of Wellingtons about. A fuselage at Brooklands, a tail at Meoeton on the Marsh - a centre section somewhere in Norfolk and wings elsewhere - If seemed there ought to have been some initiative to assemble another complete airframe from these, but there seems to have been no interest in doing so…. Maybe if there were none left someone might have wanted to.
That was very interesting nice to see the old girl get some limelight often overlooked in favour of the Lancaster .would like to see some more of the aircraft involved in coastal command. Really well put together contents cheers mate.
I wouldn't have ecpected to really follow this up to the end but in fact I did in one session from beginning to end. I have to say I learned a lot about wartime airplane production and beeing able to put that into context with other wartime events and their timelines was helpfull too. Very entertaining!
Thank you. Very enjoyable! I haven't known about the geodaetic construction used in such numbers. That's amazing.
As a historical aircraft lover, it is amazing that you take your time to make these amazing videos.
We recently visited Brooklands Museum in Surrey, a wellington is on dispaly with the skinnremoved in various locations to show the geodetic structure. Museum is well worth a visit for aircraft, (includinng a Concorde) plus race cars, motor bikes and even a bus museum. Great for children also, with a lot of interactive activities. My son was allowed to sit in cockpits of a Harrier and a VC 10. Experienced volunteers explain things in detail.
Just recently watched a video from 'who do you think you are' minni driver's father ronny was in a Wellington in the battle of heligoland bight where he was awarded a DFM . Great video Rex. Looking forward to a halifax video. The Unsung hero of bomber command imo.
Climbs out on the wing to put out a fire. At 100mph.
Well done Kiwi. Kia Kaha.
I'd never heard that story before. I doubt many Kiwis have. Great doco.
Well they had to scrap the R100 when the airship scheme failed, so they shrank it down and put wings on it. And Bob's your uncle we had us a very versatile aeroplane. Talking of, I know Rex's schtick is heavier-than-air-craft, but it might be fun to see a video about R100, and maybe some of the other lesser known airships. I.e, the Detroit ZMC-2, Shutte-Lanz airships, the French efforts in semi-rigids.
The Luftwaffe used the hula hoop on the Ju52. It was a mineclearing device against magnetic mines. The germans called it " Mausi-Schleife" ( mouse-loop).
Brilliant work. That was an absolute pleasure to watch.
My Grandfather had some amazing history with his Welly - as nav/rad/tail gunner - he survived amongst other things a fully loaded crash after take off into a field of poles (designed to prevent German landings) the Welly survived without fire or explosion but a prop came away, cut through the side and embedded itself in his desk right next to his arm - almost slicing his airman's beret in two - we still have the beret in the family to this day but sadly not Taid as he passed away some thirty years ago now. After his European theatre and Burma tours he used to train pilots for the special roles - particularly the intel flights, night training navigation through North Wales - on one occasion what I believe to have been a Polish pilot under instruction ignored his instructor (Taid) and flew his plane UNDER the Conwy Suspension bridge . There is barely enough space to do this at low tide so I've no idea how they did it but all hands survived including the airplane!
Good show Rex! It's been a treat watching your channel mature. Keep up the good work!
This has to be one of the best videos yet, Rex. Nicely done. 👍
I remember them recovering one of these from Loch Ness.It’s in the museum at Brooklands now.
My father was a navigator/bombardier on Wellingtons in the Desert Air Force during 1942-1943. His first two missions were dropping bombs on the first night of El Alamein. He told me some interesting facts about the Wellington:
1) in flight the tail would corkscrew, and you could observe this phenomenon looking aft to the tail gunner's position from the navigator station,
2) the geodetic structure also meant that the aircraft would stretch several inches in flight,
3) parts of the geodetic structure were marked so that they could be chopped out with the fire axe, removed and tossed out of the plane to reduce weight if the aircraft was losing altitude.
He also told me a rather amusing story about flying in Wellingtons. On every mission the crews were supposed to take a photo of the target, and since they were flying at night they had to drop a magnesium flare. This was done by attaching a wire to the cotterpin that acted as the safety for the flare, then rapidly shoving the flare down a tube. The weight of the flare would pull the pin, thereby activating the fuse, and it would drop free of the aircraft, going off and illuminating the target.
On one mission, the crew were a bit tired and being a bit stupid. There were three guys at the flare station (I cannot now recall which positions they were, probably engineer, radio operator and one other), and they started goofing around. Anyway, they attached the wire, and placed the flare at the mouth of the tube. Then they started chanting, "A onesy, a twosie, a threesie, flare ... OH @*&#!" as the person dropping flare didn't hit it hard enough and the flare stuck partway down the tube with the pin half-pulled. As my father described it, one man, with great aplomb, ran screaming towards the cockpit. The second man, showing great presences of mind, pulled out his pocket knife and began trying to cut the steel wire. The third man, thinking quickly, grabbed the fire axe and, with a hefty swing, cut both the top of the tube and the wire holding the pin on the magnesium flare. The flare dropped free of the plane and exploded close enough to the aircraft to shred all the fabric on the underside of the fuselage.
Jimmy Ward VC Now that is a story!
My father was an Airborne Radar Mechanic in Bomber Command (he serviced G & H2S sets but was also trained on Loran & Oboe etc.) and spent most of his war service at RAF Chipping Norton where Bomber Command formed up air crews, taking individually trained men and getting crewing Wellingtons. To show how strong the aircraft was he on more than one occasion entered an aircraft that had a hole in its fuselage bigger than a door but it had still returned!
The only problem he had, as did all radar mechanics, was there were responsible for a cable that fed off the generator off one of the engines that powered the radar equipment. As this cable was at the rear of the engine it would eventually rot due to oil seeping from the engine and changing it was an issue - the space to do it was half the size of the issued screwdrivers! Luckily for dad one time he went on leave to London to see my mum (they didn’t marry until after the war), he went into an ironmongers shop in Streatham and found 6 stubby screwdrivers ideal for working on the back of the engine. With a bit of persuasion he purchased four and three of his friends received these gifts when he returned to his station!
Thank You for yet another Great video.
One of my favourite planes, along with the short Sunderland.
Definetely looking forward to part two.
Cheers
Another excellent quality video! My favourite aviation channel for certain. 👍
I knew nothing about this plane. Well done video. Bring on no. 2.
Excellent, thanks for this, looking forward to part2.