A very early morning trip to Wales to visit the crash site of Thunderbolt P-47c 41-6246 ' Sweet Pea' from the 495 FTG RAF Atcham Shropshire .
41-6246 took off on a training flight over Wales on the 16th of September 1944 and headed into the cloudy and cold mountains piloted by F/o Peter Quinci , 41-6246 never returned home its remains and those of the pilot were not to be discovered for 6 days .
High
on Aran Fawddwy by Bala, North Wales on the 22nd of September a local
Trapper found the remains just below the ridge line the plane had
impacted a cliff face and was totally destroyed with wreckage falling
down 2 gullies to the valley floor ,RAF mountain rescue attended the
scene but were driven off by very bad weather returning next day they
found a P-47 checklist at the foot of one of the gullies confirming the
planes identity after recovery of the pilots remains the site was left
to recovery crews to deal with.
At
the site today little remains near the impact point that could be seen
under the ice covering the mountain moving lower bits started to show in
the scree until at the bottom of the slope I found many parts scattered
about over a wide area the biggest remains were of the tail and the
supercharger nearby other bits were showing through the bog, the most
interesting part I found which was one of the fighters wheel rims was
quite a distance away and this was by pure luck as it wasn't in the
wreckage field
Crew =
F/o Peter Quinci USAA,F
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