Sat 11 May. News. Author appeals for info on air crashes in Somerset (there have been 425 or them)

The BBC Somerset website has run an appeal by an author who is writing a book about air crashes in the county. Since the war apparently some 425 planes have crashed in Somerset – some in mysterious circumstances. It comes in the week of the Swiss Air Disaster 40^th anniversary commemorations – which is another crash the writer wishes to gather information on.

Part of the article reads:

He said Somerset has such a history as there are many airfields and they happened at a time when planes were new and untested.

Some had only 40 minutes’ flying time before they needed refuelling.

“Jet aircraft had just started to come in and there were a dozen airfields around Somerset in daily use,” he said.

“It was in its infancy – some of the planes didn’t have ejector seats and they were going at six miles a minute which was very, very, fast.

“When an aircraft took off, you didn’t know where it was going. It may have crashed in Wells, so you didn’t know anything about it.

“There wasn’t any local radio and the papers didn’t carry much. That information did not need to be published so even the Ministry Of Defence didn’t have any cause to publish it.”

To read the article visit http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-12749704