Qualla: RAF Topcliffe https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:24 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/x/h/raf-topcliffe-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: RAF Topcliffe https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe RAF Topcliffe: Introduction https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe/ Photo credit P Glenwright, CC BY-SA 2.0. Walk into the old control tower at RAF Topcliffe today and you will find the Yorkshire Air Ambulance crew getting their helicopter ready for the next callout. The runway behind them once launched Halifax bombers heading for Germany. The buildings around them belong to the British Army now - this is Alanbrooke Barracks - and the only RAF unit left here teaches Air Cadets to fly gliders. It is the layered, half-forgotten kind of airfield that Britain is full of: a piece of flat Yorkshire farmland that became important in 1940, stayed important for thirty years, and quietly became something else.

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Image: P Glenwright | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/x/h/raf-topcliffe-wp/gcxh-raf-topcliffe-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full RAF Topcliffe: Whitleys and Halifaxes https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe/ Photo credit Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain. Topcliffe opened in September 1940 as a Bomber Command station, home to 77 Squadron and 102 (Ceylon) Squadron flying the Armstrong Whitworth Whitley - a slab-sided twin-engined heavy bomber that looked unimpressive and did the hard work anyway. A decoy site was built at Raskelf, ...

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Image: Royal Air Force official photographer | Public domain

]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/x/h/raf-topcliffe-wp/gcxh-raf-topcliffe-whitleys-and-halifaxes.mp3 0:06 2 full RAF Topcliffe: Cold War Classrooms in the Sky https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe/ Photo credit RuthAS, CC BY 3.0. After 1945 Topcliffe became a school. No. 1 Air Navigation School moved in from 1947 to 1954, then again from 1957 to 1961, training navigators on Wellingtons, Avro Ansons, and the chunky Vickers Varsity. The Air Electronics School arrived in 1962, growing into the Air Electronic...

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Image: RuthAS | CC BY 3.0

]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/x/h/raf-topcliffe-wp/gcxh-raf-topcliffe-cold-war-classrooms-in-the-sky.mp3 0:06 3 full RAF Topcliffe: Army Takes the Field https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe/ Photo credit RuthAS, CC BY 3.0. Between 1972 and 1973 most of the station passed to the British Army to become Alanbrooke Barracks, named for the wartime Chief of the Imperial General Staff. The runway and a small RAF enclave survived inside the Army's perimeter. Tucano training squadrons used it as a relief la...

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Image: RuthAS | CC BY 3.0

]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/x/h/raf-topcliffe-wp/gcxh-raf-topcliffe-army-takes-the-field.mp3 0:06 4 full RAF Topcliffe: An Ambulance in the Tower https://qualla.com/raf-topcliffe/ Photo credit Thomas Nugent, CC BY-SA 2.0. Since March 2012 the former control tower has been the base for G-YOAA, one of two Yorkshire Air Ambulance helicopters - now an Airbus H145 painted in the charity's distinctive yellow and red. In 2025 the charity broke ground on a purpose-built replacement facility three and a ha...

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Image: Thomas Nugent | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Fri, 29 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/x/h/raf-topcliffe-wp/gcxh-raf-topcliffe-an-ambulance-in-the-tower.mp3 0:06 5 full