5 Million RAF reconnaissance photographs taken over Western Europe during World War 2 will be available from 19 January 2004 via the website, www.evidenceincamera.co.uk.

These RAF records are the ones now stored at Keele University( ex the Allied Central Interpretation at RAF Medmenham) an extension of the National Archives ,Kew.
Keele also stores the RAF reconnaissance records from the Great War.Whether there will be records pre 1918 I am am not sure but it is a good start.I think I have already seen Great War reconnaisance photographs from Keele on this forum.

Apparently it is planned to show 2.5 million Luftwaffe aerial reconnaissance photographs taken over the Eastern Front.These records were considered to be hot intelligence on the Soviet satellites in Eastern Europe by NATO and were only declassified 10 years ago.

Eventually it is planned to include aerial recconnaisance photographs from all Britain's military campaigns including Suez,Korea,the Falklands and the two Gulf Wars.Some project.

Interestingly the records have been used from time to time in the search and location of unexploded bombs across Europe.Until now,this was a painstaking manual task which involved looking through thousands of boxes for a particular image.

Steven Spielburg was given special access to these aerial photographs while researching for his film "Band of Brothers"

It would be appropriate to remember F/L Tony Hill who took the excellent reconnaissance photographs of the Bruneval Wurzburg Radar site for the preparation and planning of the "smash and grab" operation in Febuary 1942. A successful operation carried out by the Paratroop Regiment with a sole RAF Flight Sgt Cox (Radar) in tow which gave the RAF valuble information on the German air defence radar systems.

Chiefy Cox went on to say after the operation "When I first saw the Wurzburg,I found to my surprise that it was just like the photograph". A tribute to the reconnaisance aircrews that brought these valuable pieces of intelligence back to enhance our knowledge of the enemy camp.Tony Hill was sadly lost over Le Creusot when carrying out another unarmed reconnaisance sortie over the Schneider works to evaluate the RAF raid of October 17 1942.

Per Ardua ad Astra

Regards

Frank East

..This probably explains, when I was trying to login and register (having followed the link from the BBC News page) that the registration page wouldn't work!!

Am I the only one to find this a slow site to use, or maybe it was swamped after being on R4?

I used this archive some years ago to get some 1944 photos of Beaumont Hamel area. They show quite amazing detail, and many wartime (WW1) features that are no longer there. One also showed a cammo net strung across the Hawthorn Crater!!

Has this gotten undwerway yet? I've not been able to access it.

Thaanks

We had a lengthy thread on TARA earlier this year. Bottom line =its still not running; only the 30something pics

Thought I'd just pop in 4 years later. I tried this site today and it seems to be offline. Does anyone have updated information? Is it gone?

Paul

I have written to TARA about three times and have never had a reply. The website never works and should be taken down. I hope someone will be sacked. Complete waste of people's time and expectations.

Gunner Bailey (frustrated of Kent)

Thanks for the information.

Paul

The last I heard about this is that the photo archives were being transferred from Keel to a Uni in Scotland who were going to make them properly available. I sincerely hope this happens sometime soon!

Anyone got the definitive gen on this?

Kind Regards,
SMJ

Why is this a classic thread?

Just nine posts and relating to WW2 to boot



cheers Martin B

Quite right Martin, so here it is in its new home. The WW2 photos are relevant though, as I'm sure you know. I have found WW2 aerial photos quite useful for WW1 research.

TR

The TARA collection, formerly at Keele, is moving to the RCAHMS (Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historic Mouments of Scotland): see http://www.rcahms.gov.uk/news.html for the latest (brief) details.

Obvious, I would have thought! For example, when was Red Dragon Crater filled? If a 1944 photo shows it filled, the filling predates then. If not, it post-dates it.