RAF Thornaby was a former RAF Station located at the Teesside town of Thornaby-on-Tees, North Yorkshire. The station was created in the mid 1920s and came under the control of No. 18 Group, RAF Coastal Command in 1939. Being used mostly for reconnaissance work, anti shipping strikes, and attacks on enemy airfields etc. Lockheed Hudson aircraft of No. 220 Squadron from this base located the German prison ship Altmark in Norwegian waters on 16 February 1940—an action which led to the subsequent liberation of 299 prisoners by HMS Cossack of the Royal Navy.
The station was engaged in air-sea rescue work from 1943 using Vickers Warwick aircraft with Nos. 279, 280 and 281 Squadrons. These aircrew had developed a means of dropping emergency supplies to their ditched colleagues, using a receptacle which was later to be widely known as the "Thornaby Bag".
Although the airfield was expanded in 1942 in order to facilitate heavy bombers, it never actually operated such aircraft (although number 1 OTU used Halifaxes and 6 OTU used Wellingtons) and remained as a Training and Coastal Command base. Thornaby's last action of the war came on 3 May 1945 when Beaufighters of No. 455 Squadron Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) attacked Kiel leaving two mine-sweepers destroyed. From 1945, Supermarine Spitfires and de Havilland Mosquitos along with Harvard and Oxford aircraft flew from Thornaby (although Spitfies had been based here in 1943). In the late 1940's and 1950s, these gave way to Vampires, Meteor's, Meteor T7's and Hunters which also operated from the nearby RAF Middleton St. George (aka Goosepool).
Also in the 1950s No. 275 Search and Rescue Squadron based at Linton-on-Ouse equipped with Sycamore HR13 and HR14 Helicopters relocated to Thornaby on the 18th November 1954 and played a major part in the development of air sea rescue as we know it today. The squadron remained until 9 October 1957 when it moved to RAF Leconfield. Thus history repeated with again the station being involved in Air Sea Rescue work as during the late part of the war.
The base closed to flying in October of 1958 when the Hawker Hunters of 92 squadron left for Middleton St George and the station was put on a care and maintenance basis until being sold to Thornaby-on-Tees Borough Council for redevelopment in 1963. Most of it now lies beneath houses and light industrial units as the town of Thornaby expanded southwards in the 1960s and 70s. Traces can be picked out via Google Maps however and a ground visit will reveal a number of surviving structures within the contemporary buildings.
In 1997 a RAF memorial was erected at Thornaby, and to this day the people of Thornaby take great pride in their history and celebrate the lives of those who served there.
In 2007 a full-size replica Spitfire aircraft was erected on the roundabout at the junction of Thornaby Road, Bader Avenue and Trenchard Avenue.
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