Seahawk Plane Crash at Kingston Gorse - 1955

The Queen's Commendation was awarded posthumously to Lieutenant Martin Warren Winfield, R.N. of No. 806 Sqn., F.A.A., who lost his life at Kingston Gorse, Sussex, after his Sea Hawk suffered engine failure. Lt. Winfield, realizing that he would be unable to make an emergency landing at Ford, headed towards the coast. He remained with his aircraft until it had cleared a built-up area and people on the beach, and then ejected at 100ft. He subsequently died from his injuries.

Operating from the R.N. Air Station at Ford, near Arundel, 24-years-old Lieutenant Winfield was piloting a Seahawk aircraft in a test flight when his engine failed at 8,600 feet. Realising that he would be unable to make an emergency landing at Ford, he directed his aircraft to the coast with the intention of baling out over the sea. He lost height rapidly, passed over a built-up area on the coast and crashed into the sea five hundred yards from shore at Kingston Gorse, Rustington.

He operated his ejector seat at one hundred feet when he had cleared the built-up area and holiday makers on the beach, and subsequently died from his injuries. It is considered that Lieutenant Winfield, whose home was at Beckington, near Bath, remained in his aircraft and delayed his ejection until he was certain that heavy loss of life and damage to property had been avoided and in so doing sacrificed his life. It is relevant to recall the statement of the Coroner at the inquest on Lieutenant Winfield: " I am certain that had he chosen to operate the ejector seat earlier, he could have saved himself. That might have meant a calamity in the Kingston Gorse neighbourhood. To avoid the possibility of it, he sacrificed himself for those people and died gallantly and in the best and highest traditions of the Service to which he belonged."