REAL drama entered the life of a young actor as a RAF Hawker Hunter jet smashed into a residential area of Ipswich close to where he was standing.

David Kindred

REAL drama entered the life of a young actor as a RAF Hawker Hunter jet smashed into a residential area of Ipswich close to where he was standing.

It was August 2, 1957, when an RAF Hawker Hunter jet crashed into open land in Tuddenham Road, Ipswich, amazingly not injuring anybody.

This day of drama was recalled in Kindred Spirits recently by Keith Donovan who now lives in Oxford Road, Ipswich.

At the time Keith was one of a group of young boys playing very close to where the pilotless aircraft smashed into the ground and exploded.

The pilot had baled out of the doomed jet. Anthony Tuckey, of Cauldwell Hall Road, Ipswich, who had a long association with theatre in Ipswich, has vivid memories of that day.

Anthony said: “In August 1957 I was working as an actor at the Arts Theatre in Tower Street, Ipswich and living in digs on Tuddenham Road.

“That morning we were all standing chatting and smoking outside the back door when the crash happened. The sequence was extraordinary. We saw the plane flash over the rooftops, felt the earth shake from the impact then we heard the plane and the sound of the crash. All in about three seconds maximum”