_{TUCKS LUCK ?}

_{56 Sqn were the first outfit to receive the Hawker Typhoon, the first arriving at Duxford in September 1941, to replace their Hurricanes. 56 was led by Sqn/Ldr Hanks, who had seen action with 1 Sqn during the 'Phoney War' and Battle of France, as part of the Duxford wing led by Wing Commander Bob Stanford-Tuck. According to Larry Foresters' book 'Fly for your life', an account of Tucks war, he was due take a Typhoon up for a test flight on 1st November 1941. The book relates how he was called back to the telephone as the engine was started,  another pilot  nearby was told 'Dacky, you take her, you know the drill'. It continues to tell how he watched a 'Tiffie' dive out of the blue haze and disappear behind some trees to be replaced with smoke and flames, riding out with the crash trucks they found a 'big smoking crater and a field littered with scraps of metal. Twelve feet down in the brown earth; the remains of the big engine'.  Given that the distance between Duxford and site of the crash is over 35 miles it is unlikely that even Tuck could have seen the demise of the Typhoon.}

_{What ever the accuracy of the account, what is known is that the first Typhoon to be lost was R7592, coded US-L, a still new aircraft with only 7:35hrs flying logged. P/O James Frederick Deck was killed in the crash at Roudham, near Thetford. A post mortem was to reveal that Deck had been overcome by carbon monoxide fumes from the exhaust. An eye-witness remembered coming home to lunch, to see a shallow crater surrounded by thousands of pieces of debris, the largest being the Napier Sabre engine which 'laid steaming on the bank at the side of the lane'.}

_{Excavation revealed little of the aircraft, one propeller blade and a few items from the cockpit were all that remained of the first Typhoon loss.}

_{James Deck was the first of three brothers to die whilst serving with the RAF during the war; Harold was killed with 226 Sqn on 26th July 1942 and is buried in Sage Cemetery, in Germany, Charles is remembered on the Runnymede Memorial, he has no grave, he was lost flying a Tempest, the successor of the Typhoon, with 222 Sqn on 19th January 1945. James is buried in Honington All Saints churchyard.}