Part Completed Runways

Millisle in County Down had 2/3 of one runway, a third of another, plus a few buildings on the tech. site. That's as far as it got.

Source: Action Stations 7

Pocklington in Yorkshire had a runway abandoned after it was realised it's alignment was wrong(?) A fourth was constructed on a slightly different alignment and the abandoned one used as a parking area.

NJR

Does part completed include runways that had PSP/tin extensions?? At Tain the main runway had PSP at one end, and at Leuchars until the mid fifties the short runway (or what was at the time the main) had a 1500 feet tin extension.

NJR wrote:

Pocklington in Yorkshire had a runway abandoned after it was realised it's alignment was wrong(?)

NJR

Not quite, it was primarily due to the need to extend the 3 runways for heavier aircraft & payloads, but R/W 13/31 couldn't realistically be extended, hence the '4th runway' 14/32 came into being. Please see the blether on www.pocklingtonhistory.com/history/20thc...20Pocklington(2).pdf (pages 3 and 4).

HTH, Regards to all

John Nottingham

J wrote:

NJR wrote:

Pocklington in Yorkshire had a runway abandoned after it was realised it's alignment was wrong(?)

NJR

Not quite, it was primarily due to the need to extend the 3 runways for heavier aircraft & payloads, but R/W 13/31 couldn't realistically be extended, hence the '4th runway' 14/32 came into being. Please see the blether on www.pocklingtonhistory.com/history/20thc...20Pocklington(2).pdf (pages 3 and 4).

HTH, Regards to all

John Nottingham

Even then the 'main ' runway, 14/32 was shorter than the 'standard' Class A Bomber airfield main at 1646m/5398ft/1799yd instead of the normal 1829m/2000yd/6000ft and the two subsidiary runways were also over 200m shorter than standard which meant a heaviliy loaded Halifax was 'marginal' to say the least..

TerryClark wrote:

Even then the (Pocklington) 'main ' runway, 14/32 was shorter than the 'standard' Class A Bomber airfield main at 1799yd instead of the normal 2000yd and the two subsidiary runways were also over 200m shorter than standard which meant a heaviliy loaded Halifax was 'marginal' to say the least..

Surprisingly SD 310 (1944) states that all runways could be extended to the usual 2,000 / 1,400 / 1,400 yards. (as built the two subsids were 100 yds shorter.)

Carnaby wrote:

TerryClark wrote:

Even then the (Pocklington) 'main ' runway, 14/32 was shorter than the 'standard' Class A Bomber airfield main at 1799yd instead of the normal 2000yd and the two subsidiary runways were also over 200m shorter than standard which meant a heaviliy loaded Halifax was 'marginal' to say the least..

Surprisingly SD 310 (1944) states that all runways could be extended to the usual 2,000 / 1,400 / 1,400 yards. (as built the two subsids were 100 yds shorter.)

Aha! Well spotted. That might very well explain why the northern ends of runways 01/19 and 07/25 were extended by the 'curious loop arrangement' seen in the photo at the top-left corner on page 4 of www.pocklingtonhistory.com/history/20thc...20Pocklington(2).pdf

That extended both runways beyond the perimeter track by the additional 100 yards or so.to bring them to c. 1,400 yards in total. And that might imply that, if SD 310 was dated 1944, the extension was late-on during WW2 - and why the concrete base still looked pretty new in the 1946 photo. Pure conjecture...

Having talked to several 102 Sqn aircrew at their annual reunions, I get the impression that they were reasonably happy with the length of the 'replacement' main R/W 14/32 but that, with it having been realigned from the original 13/31, they always felt they were uncomfortably close to the original air traffic/watch tower, not helped by the lousy rudders on the Mk 2 Halifax. The accidents recounted on page 6 of the above link speak for themselves.

(Mind you, a Vulcan did something similar at Scampton in the mid-1960s, came off one side of the runway, did a 180, reversed through the air traffic car park still doing c. 80 knots, and finished up embedded in the ATC downstairs toilet, thankfully unoccupied. Big spike in the laundry bill that week however. Such fun.)

Further to my previous post, an oblique report has just been posted on the Pocklington History Group website (pocklingtonhistory.com/index.php) from a then evacuee from Hull to Pock in the early 1940s to the effect that, on the now Barmby Road in Pock, "After the level crossing the are some 1930s houses before the road is blocked off". That would seem to tie in with the notion that Runways 07/25 and 01/19 had both been extended at the N/NE end and across Barmby Road ("the curious loop arrangement" mentioned and illustrated above) which was then closed to traffic.