Type: Hawker Tempest Mk. V
Part: 274 Squadron RAF
Crash date: 5th October 1944
Crash location: Along the Tielsestraat, Opheusden
Commander: F/O G.T. Kinnell
Occupants: 1
This Hawker Tempest Mk. V, number EJ709 (JJ-Q) took off at 11:00 hours with seven other aircraft from the Keent Airstrip B82 in Grave. The only occupant was pilot F/O George Taylor Kinnell from the RNZAF. The flight was intended to be an armed exploration of the Enschede-Lingen-Münster-Deventer area. But the aircraft was hit by Flak anti-aircraft guns around 11:35 hours. Kinnell managed to make a safe belly landing along the Tielsestraat in Opheusden. He was subsequently taken as a prisoner of war.
The Tempest, which had suffered 15% damage, would later be repaired by the Germans, using parts from a Hawker Tempest, which had been taken down near the German Thiene.
You can find more information about this Tempest here.
A Hawker Tempest Mk. V.
F/O George Taylor Kinnell from the RNZAF, pilot of the Hawker Tempest Mk. V.
The crash site of the Hawker Tempest, south of the junction Tielsestraat-Rijnbandijk in Opheusden.
An excerpt from the logbook of George Taylor Kinnell with on October 5, 1944 the telling words: "BROUGHT DOWN FLAK - FINIS."