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RAF Newmarket was a Royal Air Force station located near Newmarket, Suffolk, England, near the border with Cambridgeshire. In the 1950s - 1960s a new camp appeared under the name RAF Newmarket on the Dullingham Road.This was a Communications Unit under Signals Command and contained Eastern Communications Centre (Commcen Eastern) and North Eastern Communications Centre (Commcen North East) and staffed mainly by National Service and h Regular Personnel.The administration of this camp was from RAF Waterbeach. This was a relay station handling signals traffic between all RAF bases in the Eastern and North Eastern areas
Contents
History
The RAF station was actually a grass-strip on Newmarket's Rowley Mile Racecourse. The grass strip is still used by light aircraft today.
Squadrons
Units
The following units were also here at some point:
Early Jet Aircraft
In July and August 1942, ground running and taxiing tests were carried out at RAF Newmarket with a prototype of the new Gloster Meteor jet fighter.
2000 aircraft crash
In June 2000, a Piper Seneca plane crashed on take off, killing the pilot and injuring jockeys Ray Cochrane and Frankie Dettori. The plane was headed for Goodwood in Sussex. Cochrane received the Queen's Commendation for Bravery in 2002 for saving Dettori's life.