How The RAF Lost 6 Fighter Jets In 45 Minutes

YouTube / The Fly Zone

Ended In Catastrophe

On February 8, 1956, eight Hawker Hunters took off from RAF West Raynham to carry out a routine 4×4 dogfight exercise at 45,000 ft.

The training itself went fine, but when the pilots were about to return to base, bad weather had already set in which forced them to reroute to RAF Marham, 20 miles South.

With only 10 minutes of fuel remaining, the 8 Hunters were met by a runway covered with thick fog that made it almost impossible to see.

Regardless, the 8 pilots attempted to land – with catastrophic results. The first pair somehow managed to land safely, but most of them weren’t so lucky.

Of the 6 remaining Hunter pilots, 4 were forced to eject last minute. Meanwhile, 1 of them belly-landed after overshooting the runway, and one of them was tragically killed after crashing into a nearby field.

The primary cause, according to the Board of Inquiry, was the sudden deterioration in the weather.