We hope that you find the Control Towers website to be a repository of amazing stories. You can read tales of bravery and sacrifice that occurred through the history of aviation. These include accounts of pilots who trusted unproven machines, aircrew who flew through flak and night skies over occupied Europe, controllers and ground staff who kept aircraft moving during the Battle of Britain, and even civilians on the ground who were caught up in conflict.
Our aim is simple: we write these articles to honour their courage but above all, make sure these people are not forgotten about. By researching these stories, airfields, units and aircraft, Control Towers hopes to give a clearer sense of what they faced in the air and on the ground.
Wulfe Hound: The USAAF B-17 Captured and Flown by the Luftwaffe
If you want a single aircraft that shows how fast the air war hardened in…
RAF Molesworth: History (Pre-War, WW2, to Modern Usage)
If you drive through west Cambridgeshire today, the site of RAF Molesworth does not announce…
Eugene Moran: WW2 Tail Gunner Who Fell to Earth & Survived
There are wartime survival stories that sound tidy when you boil them down to a…
James Raley: The Man Who Fell to Earth in a B-17 Flying Fortress Tail
James A. Raley’s WW2 story has been boiled down to a neat line: “the man…
Ivan Chisov’s Fall From 23,000 Feet & How He Survived
Ivan Mikhailovich Chisov was a Soviet Air Force lieutenant who survived a fall of approximately…
Alan Eugene Magee: The WW2 Ball Turret Gunner Who Fell 20,000 Feet and Survived
The first people to see Alan Eugene Magee arrive did not see an airman. They…