Veteran to fly Donegal corridor for first time in 60 years
A Second World War veteran is to retrace his flight-path from Northern Ireland along the top-secret Donegal corridor for the first time in more than 60 years.
Ted Jones, 86, who met his wife in Co Fermanagh within weeks of being sent there by the Royal Air Force (RAF) in 1944, trained captains and crews of military flying boats.
Although the Irish Republic was officially neutral at the time, British forces were allowed to fly along a narrow strip of airspace over Co Donegal linking Lough Erne with the Atlantic Ocean.
Before the confidential agreement between then Taoiseach Eamon de Valera and Sir John Maffey, Britain's representative in Ireland, RAF aircraft based near Enniskillen had to fly north to Derry before heading westwards over the mid-Atlantic to protect shipping convoys coming from the US.
Later this month, Mr Jones will board a Catalina flying boat for the first time in 64 years at his former base at St Angelo airport, near Enniskillen, and set out once more on the route as part of the Fermanagh Seaplane Festival.
The great-grandfather, from Nailsworth, Gloucester, but who has lived for most of his life in Clontarf, north Dublin, said he was looking forward to the trip down memory lane.
"It'll be fun, won't it?" he said, consulting his flying log book to check the date of his final flight.
"The last time I took off from St Angelo in a Catalina was May 26 1945."
Mr Jones, who became Ireland's oldest skydiver three years ago when he did a charity parachute jump, used to train captains and crew on the 17-tonne Catalina flying boats during six-hour flights along the Donegal corridor.
His fondest memories are the night-time missions from Killadeas in Co Fermanagh towards the St John's Point lighthouse in Donegal Bay.
"We used to hone in on the lighthouse with radar and shine a really strong light on them, scaring the hell out of the lighthouse keepers," he laughed.
Continued on Page 2
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Monday 21 May 2012
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