He Got Hit!

The protective smokescreen made it very difficult for Ron to see clearly and aiming for the vessel was really difficult for him and his men. They had to take some actions otherwise it would be too late for anything. His men bombarded the battleship, but Ron wasn’t lucky enough. There was smoke coming out his plane which alarmed every sensor in the aircraft. According to witnesses, his plane was light seen drifting away in the clouds. The brave airman was lost forever never to seen again by anyone. Back in Esher, Sheila skipped a heartbeat when there was a letter which was sent to her informing her about the incident which stated that her loving husband was missing and presumed dead.

Life Ahead

“From what she has told me, my grandmother was devastated,” Phil said in the interview with Daily Mail. “She had lost her husband but was never sure what happened to him and lived her life with lots of unanswered questions. But she is an extremely stoic lady and she had a responsibility to bring up their son and get on with life.” 

The Footage

Years later, Phil stumbled upon a footage of the aircraft wreckage and he emailed the guy, “I emailed him and I said, ‘Would you be willing to share the coordinates of where you found this aircraft because I am the grandson and I would just like to try and find closure,” Phil told in the interview with the BBC.

Found It!

The person who discovered the wreckage happily shared the coordinates with Phil and he was there in the remote area with his father. After five-hour trek they reached the location where they found the wreck of the Hellcat. “We found an almost complete but disintegrated Hellcat aircraft that had hardly weathered or perished as it has spent most of every year since covered in snow,” Phil told the Daily Mail.

What Was Left?

“There was virtually no rust on it as if it had crashed last week. The rubber seals on the fuel pipes were as if they were still new. We saw parts of the fuselage still riddled with bullet holes. And the tail was very clearly still intact in one piece,” Phil told the BBC. “It’s clear that he only just clipped the very top of this mountaintop here, and he was very close to getting away with it and surviving,” Phil continued. So, what happened to Ron?

Did He Escape?

According to Phil, after talking to the locals of that area about the crash, they found out that some of them recalled the crash where people checked out the site and even removed the bodies from the plane. Ron’s body was treated with every respect it deserved and was buried by the Germans in the local burial ground. This information brought some peace in both Phil and his father’s heart who had no idea about their father.