Took a chance tonight at the old Technical site at RAF Bicester as its on my door step and is close to my heart. You can really only look around the buildings once your inside the fence as there borded up like fort knox to help preserve them and i have way to much respect for this site to start forcing my way into the buildings. Only Place that was open up was the old motor pool which was pretty cool. There were afew cars up there think used to train sniffer dogs as they spend alot of time over there.
Brief History
The Technical site at RAF Bicester, Oxfordshire, the best preserved of the bomber base built in the Expansion Period of the 1920s.
The Royal Air Force was formed in April 1918 and work began on building RAF Bicester in the same year. It was planned as a training station for 120 officers and 60 NCOs, preparing pilots for service on the front in France - but it opened only six weeks before the war ended.
It closed in March 1920 and the entire camp was demolished.
In 1925, The RAF expanded under Sir Hugh Trenchard, who conceived a classic "trident" layout of early air stations, with the hangars and workshops in the technical site well away from barracks, institute and mess.
With the outbreak of war in 1939, the two resident squadrons departed for France - where two air crew who'd been based at Bicester won the first-ever RAF Victoria Crosses for an action in which they died.
In 1940, 104 and 108 Squadrons at Bicester became 13 Operational Training Unit, one of two principal medium bomber training units in Britain. But a growing emphasis on night flying worked against Bicester because it was too compact and surrounded by trees - making night landings dangerous.
From 1943, RAF Bicester was used to store equipment being built up for the invasion of north-west Europe - beginning a tradition of military supply that continues in the Bicester area into the 21st Century.
In April 2000, English Heritage completed a survey of 700 military aviation sites in Britain. Its report said: "RAF Bicester retains, better than any other military airbase in Britain, the layout and fabric relating to pre-1930s military aviation."
Heres some pictures
Matt
Brief History
The Technical site at RAF Bicester, Oxfordshire, the best preserved of the bomber base built in the Expansion Period of the 1920s.
The Royal Air Force was formed in April 1918 and work began on building RAF Bicester in the same year. It was planned as a training station for 120 officers and 60 NCOs, preparing pilots for service on the front in France - but it opened only six weeks before the war ended.
It closed in March 1920 and the entire camp was demolished.
In 1925, The RAF expanded under Sir Hugh Trenchard, who conceived a classic "trident" layout of early air stations, with the hangars and workshops in the technical site well away from barracks, institute and mess.
With the outbreak of war in 1939, the two resident squadrons departed for France - where two air crew who'd been based at Bicester won the first-ever RAF Victoria Crosses for an action in which they died.
In 1940, 104 and 108 Squadrons at Bicester became 13 Operational Training Unit, one of two principal medium bomber training units in Britain. But a growing emphasis on night flying worked against Bicester because it was too compact and surrounded by trees - making night landings dangerous.
From 1943, RAF Bicester was used to store equipment being built up for the invasion of north-west Europe - beginning a tradition of military supply that continues in the Bicester area into the 21st Century.
In April 2000, English Heritage completed a survey of 700 military aviation sites in Britain. Its report said: "RAF Bicester retains, better than any other military airbase in Britain, the layout and fabric relating to pre-1930s military aviation."
Heres some pictures
Matt
