RAF Chipping Norton

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RAF Chipping Norton , perimeter track

If Cotswoldy, woody, rubbing-shoulders-at-the-village-pubby Southrop was a warm, comfortable good place to sit out the war, RAF Chipping Norton was not.

Set on the bleak, heathery top of the downs just south of Chipping Norton, it’s windswept and desolate even on a summer Sunday. It seemed the Luftwaffe thought so too. They raided the base once in October 1940 and twice in November.

Even the RAF seemed to agree. Starting out as a relief landing ground (RLG) for Little Rissington, it never progressed above the status of a satellite airfield. Although the perimeter track was concrete, Chippy’s two runways were grass, then upgraded to Sommerfield Track in 1941.

When I lived near Chipping Norton in the 1990s, the control tower still stood, along with many of the support buildings. Today, very little indeed remains to show that the hilltop ever played host to an airbase. I remember Bellman hangars, outbuildings and the control tower.

Today, only the concrete hangar foundations remain. The control tower has been knocked down and used for hardcore. Even from the air, only the remains of the concrete perimeter track, a few tracks and building bases at the south west show that this was an airfield. Hangar door track, RAF Chipping Norton

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