Sanders Draper School

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Sanders Draper School
Motto	Positive achievement for all
Established	1937 (actual) 1938 (official)
Type	Comprehensive school
Founder	Lady Simon
Location	Hornchurch Greater London England
LEA	London Borough of Havering
Ofsted number	102341
Students	954^[1]
Gender	Co-educational
Ages	11 to 16
Website	http://www.sandersdraper.org.uk

The Sanders Draper School is a mixed-gender secondary school for students aged between 11 and 16 located in Hornchurch, London Borough of Havering, UK. It is a specialist science school and it shares its grounds with Sutton's Junior & Infant school, just off Suttons Lane. It consists of four main buildings and a large sports and playground.

[edit] History

The school was opened in 1937, but was only officially founded on June 2nd, 1938 by Lady Simon, as "Suttons Modern Secondary School". It was built to provide educational facilities for between 950 and 1,100 students. It originally housed boys and girls in different departments with the boys on the southern edge, eventually running as two separate school establishments (one for boys and the other for girls) in 1945. The two "establishments" were amalgamated as one mixed school in 1953.^[2]

On March 24th, 1943, American-born Flying Officer Raimond Sanders-Draper (voluntarily flying for the RAF), took off from Sutton's Aerodrome. The aerodrome perimeter was only 530 yard (485m) from the school grounds. Shortly after take off, Sanders-Draper developed engine trouble and was forced to take emergency action. It is believed he chose to put his Spitfire nose-down into the playing fields, rather than make an attempt at landing on larger open grounds, as he was not sure he could avoid hitting the school with his now much-reduced engine power.

the aircraft crashed and debries scared the side of the building which can still be seen today, also damaging 9 windows and injuring 11 students and 2 teachers in a classroom, as well as debris the fuel in the aircraft set fire to the playing field and suttons primary school burning half of the wooden structure and injuring another 13 students and 6 teachers. the aircraft was found over a 250 meters radious and not all components were found including the left wing flaps, propeller, control column and some of the empennage all are most likely deep under the suttons playing field.

Only one student, 13 year old Richard (Dick) Burton (sometimes Barten,^[3]) was killed by debris and the igniting fuel, with 5 other students treated for minor burns and cuts. Tragically, this heroic action was also responsible for the death of Raimond Sanders-Draper. In honour and recognition of his bravery, Suttons School officially changed it's name to "The Sanders-Draper School" in 1973.^[4]

This is a log from one of the students who witnessed the accident^[5]:

At 10.45am an aircraft crashed on the playing field a big ball of fire could be seen blasting into the sky. Splinters from the 'plane scored the wall and injured people on the playing field and shrubbery. Richard Burton could be seen heading towards the plane before it finally exploded frowing him into the wall and stabbing him with twisted steel and glass he receved medical attention but had already died from the injurys. other students and staff were treated for injurys. mostly everyone was screeming and running around, glass, metal and other debris shatterd the windows and ripped through the walls, cutting some meembers of my class and the teachers. soon the fire service and police arrived and the disarster was over, we went back to lessons but the day never got back on track. the next day the plane was picked up and taken away.