Site Record

This slipway measures some 180m in length. Landward, it connects to one of the large hangars and its associated workshops (see NPRN 270847).

Event and Historical Information
Saunders-Roe were based on the Isle of Wight in the centre of air warfare over the English Channel, hence there was a need to find a base elsewhere for the essentially work on the Catalinas. A small estate called Friars was purchased adjacent to a sheltered deep water landing zone. Saunders Roe dismantled one of their spare T hangars at Cowes and re-erected on site in August 1941. The Ministry of Aircraft Production built a T2 hangar and workshops on the site in December 1941 and linked to the foreshore by a concrete slipway. Friar's House became part of the factory complex.

Sources include:
Defence of Britain Project
Jones, I, 2008, Airfields and Landing Grounds of Wales: North pg104-113
Phillips, Alan, 2006, Military Airfields Wales, pg25-27
Sloan, Roy, 1991, Wings of War over Gwynedd, pg142-55
Smith, David J, 1982 Action Stations 3: Military Airfields of Wales and the North West, pg43-4

Maritime Office, RCAHMW, June 2012.