What vehicle is this?

Non-existant user wrote:

Must be a common theme as the WRENS used to set up their dive screens outside instead of inside the dive screen shelter, which, in some quadrant shelters, were almost greenhouses in summer.

Meanwhile at Treligga the WRENS were wearing duffle coats and wellies!

Ossington_2008 wrote:

Came across this photo in an old book on the ATA. Can someone identify the vehicle type please? I assume the colours are black and white? Anyone have a photo of the rear? I guess the van body is standard, with just the addition of an Anson turret. Should be a doable model project.

imgur.com/IbKiqpY

Obviously a runway control vehicle produced locally.
Unusual for a newspaper article to actually name the airfield; in wartime it would normally say something like 'somewhere in England.'
If the Hudson was being used for training, I wonder why it appears to be in Coastal Command colours rather than overall camouflage like the aircraft in the background.

If it is White Waltham (I'm not sure, as the hangars don't seem right to me? I can't place the shot on the limited resources I have available) then it constantly had a stream of every type of aircraft, belonging to every Command, continuously.

Maybe Coastal Command used the aircraft for training and it was landing at White Waltham prior to a ferry flight to somewhere else? Perhaps it was en-route for maintenance or repair? "Used for training" doesn't have to mean it was used locally for training. AM686 is nice and clearly visible - I'm sure someone will have access to the record card for the aircraft, as things re-open a bit for the summer,. The other thought I had was do we know that the caption is period? It could just as easily be from a post-war publication.

Absolutely agree on the van body. They were pretty much universally locally produced and there seems to have been no standard to making them whatsoever - but there were some utterly brilliant local solutions created!

Cheers,

Ian P.

Non-existant user wrote:

If it is White Waltham (I'm not sure, as the hangars don't seem right to me? I can't place the shot on the limited resources I have available) then it constantly had a stream of every type of aircraft, belonging to every Command, continuously.

Cheers,

Ian P.

Agree about the hangars; those on the left side of the photo and the building at far left don't look like Waltham to me although I admit my first vist there was in '62 and a lot could have been demolished.
Correction: it probably IS Waltham.
Googling the airfield comes up with an aerial photo showing a similar hangar complex on the north side next to the railway line where the Fairey Aviation works were latterly (now demolished) whereas I always thought the ATA HQ was southside near what was the UAS and AEF until the RAF moved out.

I've tried researching AM686 but the results are confusing; how can an aircraft serving with 320 Sqdn which ditched off the Dutch coast in 1942 be then 'handed over' by 320 to the ATA and fly with them?

TerryClark wrote:

I've tried researching AM686 but the results are confusing; how can an aircraft serving with 320 Sqdn which ditched off the Dutch coast in 1942 be then 'handed over' by 320 to the ATA and fly with them?

The 320 Sqn Hudson V described HERE as being AM686 "Cheribon" and ditching off the Dutch coast in May 1942 appears to have actually been Hudson III AM939.

AM686 seems to have served with 48 and 53 Sqns prior to being assigned to 320 (Netherlands) Sqn on 11 Feb 1943, and was returned to the RAF and assigned to 279 Sqn on 9 March 1943. It was 279 Sqn who later handed her over to the ATA.

The vehicle image came from "I couldn't care less" by A Phelps, published by Harborough circa 1946. It appears to be a personal account of ATA life (I have yet to start it). Most illustrations in it are of the standard Flight magazine aircraft we see everywhere. Here is another.

I'll just watch everyone discuss the model of Anson and the Dragon Rapide on that one, while I go "Ooh, they've got a Fordson N pulling their fuel trailer... What's that next to it?"

Ian P.