Qualla: RAF Dundonald https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:16 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_res/siteimages/rsslogo.png Qualla: RAF Dundonald https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald RAF Dundonald: Introduction https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald/ If you fly low over the fields three miles northeast of Troon today, you might catch what look like faint scars in the grass: long, suggestive lines that do not quite match the field boundaries. They are the ghosts of RAF Dundonald's runways. From the ground there is almost nothing left, but seen from the air the airfield refuses to disappear entirely. For just over five years during the Second World War, this patch of South Ayrshire was where Allied commandos learned to expect strafing runs, simulated dive-bombing, and the chaos of an army-air assault in motion.

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/u/s/raf-dundonald-wp/gcus-raf-dundonald-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full RAF Dundonald: A Relief Field for Novices https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald/ RAF Dundonald opened in March 1940, not as a frontline station but as a relief landing ground for nearby RAF Prestwick. Prestwick was home to No. 12 Elementary Flying Training School, and Dundonald gave its student pilots somewhere quieter to practise circuits and bumps in de Hav...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/u/s/raf-dundonald-wp/gcus-raf-dundonald-a-relief-field-for-novices.mp3 0:06 2 full RAF Dundonald: The Hess Footnote https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald/ Then came one of the war's strangest episodes. On the night of 10 May 1941, Rudolf Hess, Hitler's deputy, parachuted into Scotland. Author John Harris has argued there is evidence Dundonald may have been Hess's intended destination, with high-ranking officials waiting to negotiat...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/u/s/raf-dundonald-wp/gcus-raf-dundonald-the-hess-footnote.mp3 0:06 3 full RAF Dundonald: Training the Men Who Would Land at Normandy https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald/ Dundonald's real wartime purpose arrived in April 1943, when 516 (Combined Operations) Squadron formed at the airfield. Its job was to make commando training feel real. Pilots flew a mixed inventory of aircraft: North American Mustangs and Hawker Hurricanes as fighter-bombers, wi...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/u/s/raf-dundonald-wp/gcus-raf-dundonald-training-the-men-who-would-land-at-normandy.mp3 0:06 4 full RAF Dundonald: What Replaced the Runways https://qualla.com/raf-dundonald/ In the 1960s a Monsanto nylon plant rose on part of the site, prosperous enough at first but closed by 1979. The land was redeveloped as Olympic Business Park, and the rest of the airfield reverted to farmland. None of the temporary wartime buildings survive. There is no preserve...

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]]> Thu, 28 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/u/s/raf-dundonald-wp/gcus-raf-dundonald-what-replaced-the-runways.mp3 0:06 5 full