A World War II Lancaster bomber in the skies of Belgium on Wednesday
(Belga) A British Avro Lancaster heavy bomber from the Second World War will fly over Belgium and the Netherlands on Wednesday on the occasion of the anniversaries of the Liberation and the end of this conflict, with passages planned above three places steeped in history in Flanders, we learned on Sunday.
This four-engined aircraft belongs to a historic unit of the British Royal Air Force (RAF), the “Battle of Britain Memorial Flight” (BBMF), created to pay tribute to the airmen of the Battle of Britain in the fall of 1940. Registered PA474, it is one of only two aircraft of this type still in flying condition in the world. It is due to leave its home base, Coningsby (west of England), on Wednesday morning to fly over a series of sites linked to WWII Lancasters in Belgium – in Lierde (East Flanders) at 12:06 p.m., Alken (Limburg) at 12.27 p.m., Hechtel-Eksel (Limburg) at 12.35 p.m. and Gierle (province of Antwerp) at 1 p.m. – and in the Netherlands. A technical stopover is planned in Gilze-Rijen (south) before returning across the Channel, according to the published schedule. “It is in the context of the Liberation of the (Limburg) region that the Lancaster comes to Sanicole (the flying club installed on the Hechtel-Eksel aerodrome). It is a tribute to the Limburg municipalities and their We also commemorate the Lancaster which crashed on May 12, 1944 in Beverlo”, a nearby town, a spokesman for Sanicole, Joeri Mombers, told the Belga agency. The flying club opens its doors for the occasion. This will be the first visit of the BBMF Lancaster to Belgium since 2011 – and possibly the last due to the limited number of flight hours allowed for this ancestor. (Belgian)