Canadian war stories: escape from Norway

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The spectacular escape of Canadian airmen from German occupied Norway

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On September 26th 1944, a crew of six Canadians crash-landed in Norway. This is the dramatic story of how the crew evaded 4000 German soldiers and made their escape to safety. Exactly 70 years ago today, a Wellington bomber plane carrying a crew of six Canadian airmen took off from Scotland to undertake what was meant to be a routine anti-sub patrol mission along the German-occupied Norwegian coast. Despite rough weather conditions, the operation was greenlit and the patrol reached the patrol area at 3:30 am. After a few hours, their starboard engine caught fire due to an engine malfunction. The crew decided to turn toward the Shetland Islands, the closest allied land.
Trouble over the North Sea
Before long, it became clear that the weather conditions would make it hard to traverse the North Sea on one engine. The crew desperately dumped equipment, ammunition and some fuel to decrease weight. This resulted in a defunct valve and a permanently leaking fuel tank. Without fuel, the crew had no choice but to turn the plane toward hostile territory to perform an emergency landing. Sometime around 6 am, the plane landed in rugged terrain on a field in Os, Hordaland. [url=http://www.deeth.ca/_Media/norway_places.jpeg]Map[/url]

Nice stuff there.  Thanks to Norwegian resistance, they were able to escape to the UK after a few weeks.