Blast Pen 11

Blast Pen 11 from an Aerial Photograph of the Airfield from May 1947
Historic England
Blast Pen 11 from an Aerial Photograph of the Airfield from April 2020
Google Maps
Blast Pen 11 Front from June 2020.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Rear from October 2018.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Left-Hand Doorway from January 2021.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Right-Hand Doorway from January 2021.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Rear Doorway from January 2021.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Shelter Interior from November 2013.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Right-Hand Arm End Brickwork from May 2020.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Centre Arm End Brickwork from May 2020. This reconstruction took place in 2017 and was rebuilt in 2021.
Neil Broughton
Blast Pen 11 Tribute from May 2020.
Neil Broughton
  • Pen 11 is the second most southerly of the pens on the western side of the airfield and faces north east.
  • It is known today as “The Tribute Pen”. The Tribute was unveiled in 2000 to honour all personnel who served at RAF Kenley from 1917 to 1959.
  • Today, the pen is the most complete representation of what a pen would have looked like during World War II. However, the brickwork on the outer arm end walls was rebuilt in the 1990s and is of an incorrect shape. The entire centre section was reconstructed in 2017 and, again, the end brickwork was of an incorrect shape. It was rebuilt again in 2021 and is now much more representative of how it would have originally looked.
  • The pen is of the smaller type found at Kenley, the original two bays would have been approximately 16.5m x 16.5m each.
  • The left front doorway has access to the rear doorway. Large steel doors secure both ends of the shelter.
  • All three doorways have single-element lintels.
  • The rear retaining wall is of brick construction, approximately 50.7m longĀ  and 0.5m tall at it’s highest point. It is 0.2m thick with twelve piers of 0.45m thickness for strength.
  • The interior shelter is of pre-cast concrete construction.
  • The centre arm end wall had a buttress fitted for additional strength, as now appears on the reconstructed arm.

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