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History :: Dummy and Decoy Airfields - the art of deception

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Updated: 16 Jan 05

In Sep 1939 the Air Ministry appointed a secret committee to the co-ordinated the task of airfield deception, that is to deceive enemy aircraft as to the locations of working military airfields in the UK and thereby preserve them from aerial attack.

Colonel Sir John Fisher Turner, Royal Engineers, masterminded the Day Decoys (K Sites) and Night Decoys (Q Sites), which were established throughout Britain early in the war to deceive enemy bombers and reconnaissance aircraft. Much of the design and building of these sites and the dummy aircraft was supported by technicians drawn from Sound City Films of Shepperton Studios, London. Simulating factories, railway yards, docks, urban layouts, airfields and the effect of incendiaries, the K sites, QF (Q Fire), QL (Q Lighting) and SF (Special Fire or "Starfish") sites were built in many parts of the British Isles.They were responsible for the design of not just decoy airfields but also decoy military bases and entire towns (see below).

Decoy airfields and dummy aircraft

There were two types of decoy airfields, ‘K’ sites and ‘Q’ sites.

K-sites for daytime deception

K-sites were daytime airfields equipped with dummy aircraft. K-sites in general had quite elaborate props.

Q-sites for night-time deception

Q-sites operated at night and tried to lure the enemy with sets of lights arranged to look like a real operational airfield. Q sites especially were very successful, drawing about 450 attacks and accounting for about 5 per cent of ordnance delivered by the Luftwaffe. There were around 250 of Q sites, initially built on a simple concept of a T shape of lights. By 1941 the decoys had lights which were set out over a mile and a half of countryside. In general Q sites had a night-time staff of two who would check lighting before dusk and await nightfall in a shelter. They would have lights on low but would also have a manoeuvrable light which looked like the light of an aircraft to attract the attention of the enemy pilot. The pilot would, it was hoped, attack, and the decoy men in their shelter would manipulate the lighting display.

RAF Donna Nook began life as a relief landing field and decoy airfield, populated with dummy Blenheims.

RAF Folkingham was a Q-site for Spitalgate. During the day there were dummy planes and lots of activity. During the night it was a Q site that successfully attracted the Luftwaffe.

RAF East Kirkby began as a decoy airfield; in later life it apparently had its own decoy at Sibsey.

RAF Elsham Wolds reportedly had a decoy airfield at nearby Great Limber.

RAF Faldingworth began life as Toft Grange decoy airfield.

RAF Hemswell probably had a Q site at Caenby.

Anwick acted as a decoy airfield for ???? until 1942.

Other decoy sites

There were additional decoy sites that protected cities and industrial sites. These were based on fire for deception. Starfish or SF sites were based on the idea of lighting huge fires outside cities and towns in quick response, i.e. once a bombing raid was under way. During a raid, German pathfinders woud drop marker incendiary bombs for the main force to follow. Starfish / SF sites were designed to draw the enemy by the fire set there and confuse bomb aimers, thus sparing the nearby centres of population. QF sites (possibly refering to quick-fire?) were a more active form of defence, conceived around the controlled burning of fires to suggest a burning target, again with the intention of seducing bombers.

In Lincolnshire there were Starfish sites at Risby, Twigmoor and Brumby to protect the industrial complex at Scunthorpe. Lincoln city was protected by QF sites on Branston Fen to the south-east.

Example decoys in Cumbria