Things were getting desperate then. As Ken went back to the radar set to see if we could pick up the Sumburgh beacon he discovered that ten minutes before he had tossed that particular piece of equipment through the front hatch. As we had about 5,000 pounds of fuel still in the tanks we decided as a last resort to jettison about three quarters of this amount. On opening the valve the gas burst out in great gushes from the wing outlets. We watched closely as the gauges showed that the tanks were gradually being drained. When the limit was reached for a possible return to base the valve was switched off, but lo and behold the gas kept trickling and then gradually the trickle built up to a gush. No matter what we tried we couldn't stop the flow and the boys just sat and watched the meters drop to zero. This left us with only 92 gallons in our reserve tanks, so a hurried conference was called. Neil pointed out that we couldn't hope to make England against the 50 knot head wind, and as the prospect of ditching in the middle of the night in a very rough North Sea didn't appeal to us, we turned around and headed for the Norwegian coast some 130 miles away.

We were a little cheered by the fact that now we were holding our own as far as height was concerned and the good engine was purring smoothly and not overheating. Grandy was asked to call base and tell them in code where we were headed. He advised us that that particular equipment had been ditched so we had to use fighter command frequency and tell them in plain language our destination. This action, of course, alerted the enemy as well.

In order to relieve the strain on Gord's legs due to the pull caused by the dead engine, Neil and I managed to tie the controls in place. Our ground speed had picked up considerably with the help of the strong tail wind. As our gas was just about all gone we knew it would be touch and go if we made a successful landing before the tanks ran dry. At 6:00 a.m., as dawn was breaking, we sighted the coast. It appeared to be all mountains with low cloud hanging well down over the tops of them. Gord and I spotted the entrance to a fjord and headed towards it. As we approached we saw two small ships escorting a submarine directly in our path. We didn't have much choice but to fly over the small convoy while taking some minor evasive action. They opened fire on us and we received several hits, one knocking out the intercom and another taking the top off the astrodome. Several others bounced harmlessly off the fuselage without exploding and these were probably manufactured in Norway by people friendly to the British. We fired off a couple of Very cartridges in the hopes of fooling the enemy with little favorable results.

After passing over the ships and sub safely we started searching for a place to put the plane down, finally settling on what appeared to be a nice green farmer's field. Gord swung the plane around into wind and down we came. The boys took up crash positions, with Ken and Harvey behind the main spar, Neil on his table, and George Grandy strapped in his wireless seat. Gord and I worked on getting him securely fastened and then the aircraft was slowed close to stalling speed by pumping down the flaps. About 30 seconds before impact and fifty feet above the scruffy trees we were coming in over, I opened the top hatch and took up a position behind the main door. Of course due to the rough terrain the wheels were left up for this crash landing.

Gord made a great landing, bringing the tail down first to slow us up, then the nose hit. Dust and dirt flew everywhere, Grandy and the radio both toppled down on me, Neil bounced off his table and cut his hand. Red (Harvey) and Ken were out the center hatch in a flash and the rest of us were not far behind, with Gord and I scrambling out the front hatch.