RAF Group Captain J. F. X. McKenna AFC, elected a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society in 1944, and appointed commandant of the Empire Test Pilots' School of the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment in March of that year, is killed this date during a familiarisation flight on a Mustang Mk IV, KH648, which crashes when the ammunition box cover detaches at high speed and the aircraft sheds a wing, crashing on the perimeter of Old Sarum Airfield , located 2 nautical miles north northeast of Salisbury, Wiltshire, England.