A Story of Selwyn Stanley Roach, Telegraphist Air Gunner (TAG) Fairey Swordfish Landing at Blacksod, Mayo, Ireland (June 1944) Friday, June 23rd, 1944 witnessed one of the many largely uneventful foreign aircraft landings of the war in Ireland. Many of the wartime incidents would see an Allied aircraft land in a field or on a beach with no damage. Following rest for the crew and most likely refuelling for the aircraft they would be allowed to depart under their own power under the determination by the Irish authorities that they were on a 'non warlike duty' at the time of the landing. That was pretty much the long and the short of what occurred in this instance. The Army authorities in their report recorded that the aircraft was found to have landed in a field on the Blacksod to Belmullet Road. The crew of three men on the aircraft, pilot S/Lt (A) William Gordon Coates, observer/navigator, S/Lt (A) James Geoffrey Banks, and LA Selwyn Stanley Roach, Telegraphist/Air Gunner (TAG) told the authorities that they were flying on a training exercise and had become lost, forcing them to make an emergency landing. Their landing took place around 13:30 on the 23rd and the crew were accommodated locally until the next day when they took off again at 15:00 hrs. Selwyn Roach (TAG), was aged 20 at the time of the above incident. He came from Swansea in Wales, the son of George and Laura Roach. Born in 1924, he was the third of three brothers. He married his wife Joan in 1952 in Surrey. England. Selwyn Roach passed away in 2002 in Swansea. This may have been taken at RNAS Maydown but could just as easily be at any other station he trained or served from. (This information obtained from research compiled by Dennis Burke, Dublin and Sligo, M Powell and the Roach family. Posted: Foreign Aircraft Landings - Ireland 1939-1945) http://www.skynet.ie/~dan/war/hs609.htm

This photo may have been taken at RNAS Maydown. (Selwyn Roach front left)