In 1915, after his 18th birthday, Fairbairn sailed to England to enlist in the
Royal Flying Corps (RFC), the air arm of the
British Army. His older brother Osborne was already a member of the RFC, having been a student at
Jesus College, Cambridge, when the war broke out. He was admitted to officer training and sent to Scotland for instruction in June 1916, flying out of
Turnhouse and
Stirling. He completed his training in
Croydon and
Netheravon, practising on
Bristol Scouts. After being commissioned as a
flying officer, Fairbairn left for France in late December 1916 as a
fighter pilot with
No. 54 Squadron, the first RFC unit to fly
Sopwith Pups. The squadron began operations the following month. On 14 February 1917, Fairbairn and nine others were assigned to escort a reconnaissance mission over the German lines between
Cambrai and
Saint-Quentin. He broke off from the formation due to an engine failure and was pursued by German planes, eventually being forced into a crash landing. He had attempted an
Immelmann turn but was unable to regain lateral control, forcing the aircraft into a spiralling vertical descent. Upon landing, Fairbairn immediately set the plane on fire to avoid capture, but was unable to free himself and had to be rescued by German troops. He sustained severe facial burns from the fire, in addition to a bullet wound to the right elbow that was assessed as inoperable and left him permanently impaired. Taken as a
prisoner-of-war, Fairbairn spent time in France and the Netherlands before being sent to Switzerland to convalesce. He was
exchanged for a German prisoner in April 1918 and continued his recovery at a hospital in London. His injuries entitled him to a small
Royal Air Force pension. ==Post-war life and early political involvement==