Tannington is a village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in the

Mid Suffolk Mid Suffolk is a local government district in Suffolk, England. The district is primarily a rural area, containing just three towns, being Stowmarket, Needham Market and Eye. Its council was based in Needham Market until 2017 when it moved to sha ...

district of

Suffolk Suffolk ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Norfolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Essex to the south, and Cambridgeshire to the west. Ipswich is the largest settlement and the county ...

in eastern

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. Located around ten miles south-east of Diss, in 2005 its population was 110. At the 2011 Census the population had fallen below 100, and not therefore being maintained on this site was included in the civil parish of

Brundish Brundish is a village and civil parish in the English county of Suffolk. The village is south-east of Stradbroke and north of Dennington in the Mid Suffolk Mid Suffolk is a local government district in Suffolk, England. The district is pr ...

History

World War II bomber incident

Late in the afternoon of 10 October 1943, an American

B-17 Flying Fortress The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress is an American four-engined heavy bomber aircraft developed in the 1930s for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). A fast and high-flying bomber, the B-17 dropped more bombs than any other aircraft during ...

, serial number 42-3506 nicknamed ''

Sir Baboon McGoon ''Sir Baboon McGoon'' was an American Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress last assigned to the 324th Bombardment Squadron, 91st Bombardment Group, 91st Bomb Group, Eighth Air Force, 8th Air Force, operating out of RAF Bassingbourn (AAF Station 121), Camb ...

'', ran out of fuel and made a

belly landing A belly landing or gear-up landing occurs when an aircraft lands without its landing gear fully extended and uses its underside, or belly, as its primary landing device. Normally the term ''gear-up landing'' refers to incidents in which the pilo ...

in a soft and muddy sugar beet field in the village of Tannington. Efforts of a mobile recovery crew to repair the aircraft, and the aircraft's return to service, were documented in ''

Popular Science Popular science (also called pop-science or popsci) is an interpretation of science intended for a general audience. While science journalism focuses on recent scientific developments, popular science is more broad ranging. It may be written ...

'' magazine.Popular Science magazine, archive viewer, June 1944 issue, retrieved 8 June 2012 fro
this link
The aircraft was lost for good when it

ditched In aviation, a water landing is, in the broadest sense, an aircraft landing on a body of water. Seaplanes, such as floatplanes and flying boats, land on water as a normal operation. Ditching is a controlled emergency landing on the water surf ...

into the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...

on 29 March 1944, while returning from a bombardment mission over

Brunswick, Germany Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( ; from Low German , local dialect: ) is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the North Sea via the rivers Aller and ...

. The ''Popular Science'' article about the belly landing in Tannington appeared two months later, in the June 1944 issue.

References

External links

Villages in Suffolk Civil parishes in Suffolk Mid Suffolk District {{Suffolk-geo-stub