Donna Nook

53°27'41"N 000°09'07"E


Station crest of RAF Donna Nook

runway: 00/00 - 1500x..yds - grass?
runway: 00/00 - 1500x..yds - grass?

Donna Nook air field (RAF Donna Nook) was an airfield 220 kilometers north of London.
The airfield was built in 1936 as a relief landing ground, on what was until then only an air to ground weapons range. Firm plans existed from 1938 to expand it as a bomber airfield with three hardened runways, but lack of funding kept these plans shelved.
At the start of World War II, RAF Donna Nook was initially used as a decoy site after the fall of France. Between August 1941 AND July 1942, it was used as a small airfield under RAF North Coates control, with 206 Sqn as the only user. Aircraft types included Blenheim, Beaufort, and Hudson from Coastal Command. It featured one T2 and two blister hangars.
Tragedy struck on 22 January 1942 when 5 Hudsons from 407 Sqn returned from a shipping strike mission. One crashed on landing, hitting the Air Traffic Control Tower. All bombs on board exploded resulting in 16 personnel killed and many more injured. As a result of the crash, the base was non-operational for a week.
The site was also home to one of the Chain Home radar sites of the RAF. It has been suggested that Sir Arthur C. Clarke was posted at this radar site in 1943.
After 206 Sqn had left, the airfield continued to serve as a relief landing ground for RAF North Coates. When concrete runways were installed at RAF North Coates, all aircraft (2 squadrons of Beaufighter from 16 Group Strike Command) deployed to Donna Nook.
From late 1944, the airfield began to see use as No 292 German POW Camp. About 3,000 POWs were held, mostly Poles and Ukrainians from the Polish 1st and 2nd Divisions of the Germany Army, captured in France. Having served the German military and with their countries under the influence of the Soviet Union, many POWs opted to remain in England after 1945 as displaced persons.

1938 plans for the proposed bomb store site and runways of a Bomber Command airfield overlaid on what is  known to have existed in 1943 (dotted lines) at RAF Donna Nook (PNK, at AirfieldInformationeXchange).
 
Donna Nook airfield closed in 1945 but remained an RAF unit with 61 MU taking residence from Oct 1945 to Dec 1947. The POW camp closed in 1948. The site was destroyed in the great floods of 1953. The target range continued however. It had reopened as a NATO bombing range in 1949 and is now known as the Donna Nook/East Coast bombing range. The targets were re-sited to the original Donna Nook in 1975 and now occupies the original 1926 site. RAF Donna Nook was also a secondary Bloodhound Firing Unit site.
In July 2002, RAF Donna Nook became the first National Nature Reserve on Ministry of Defence land in the UK.
 
A few buildings and a section of perimeter track/runway are all that survive of the former RAF Donna Nook. Most lie on private land however. The name lives on in the "new" RAF Donna Nook, which runs the NATO air weapons range on the adjacent sandflats. Only helicopters occasionally land there.


RAF Donna Nook airfield in relation to the weapons range. The location of where  the T2 hangar used to be is clearly visible in the soil. Compare also with the map above (Google Earth).