6 Group Unavailable
On 1944-11-04, Squadron Leader A. Ross Dawson, the Chief Technical Officer with 424/433 Sqns at Skipton on Swale, wrote in his diary:
"After postponing the op twice we finally got them all away tonight at 5:00 o'clock â€" 15 from 424 & 16 from 433. No non-starters nor early returns which was a good thing. The target was Bochen & we had 11,150 lbs of bombs up. It was very successful too. These targets are getting bad since we lost two again tonight. Another for 424 "Q"' Queenie (Flying Officer Loving) &"F" Freddie (433) Flying Officer Mountford so that's 5 we have lost in 3 ops so far this month. Flight Lieutenant Wood, the F/Eng leader for 424 was lucky in that this morning he found he had and infection on his arm which had come up overnight & the M.O wouldn't let him fly tonight. They exchanged him at the last minute for a spare in "Q" which of course went missing. He feels pretty bad about it too since Loving only had 4 more trips to do in his second tour & was a pretty good guy"
Diary of A Ross Dawson, courtesy CWM