By: WJ244 - 14th June 2011 at 19:19
Done a bit more digging in the museum newsletters which report that during the Summer of 1971 G-AVVO received the outer wings, rudder, tailplane and port engine from G-AVHU. I remember that VHU had no tailplane when I cut the fabric piece from it. I helped dismantle VVO for the trip to Newark probably during the 1972 school Summer holidays.
GPG was donated to the museum around April 1972 shortly before the museum opened in May 1972 and VHU had been gone for some time by then. I suspect the fuselage and inner wings which were still stood on the undercarriage were removed from the end of 33/15 at the same time as the remains of Viking G-AIKN and most of the Bristol Freighter sections from the main dump area. I am sure these were all gone by the time the museum opened as I spent part of the open day display guarding the dump which at that time consisted of little except some Air Canada Vanguard sections.
I don’t know what happened to the original outer wings and tailplane for VVO but it is likely they were dumped with the remains of VHU and were swapped because those from VHU were in better condition.
It would appear any report of the survival of VHU is greatly exaggerated!
By: Old Fart - 14th June 2011 at 18:34
Cheers,
By: WJ244 - 14th June 2011 at 18:28
Anson G-AVHU was owned by Historic Aircraft Museum(Southend) Ltd who at one point had three Ansons. Following the donation of G-AGPG by Ekco the museum decided to retain GPG which potentially could be kept airworthy but unfortunately this didn’t happen. G-AVVO/VL348 was sent to Newark Air Museum where it still survives.
The last I saw of G-AVHU/TX211 it was sitting with other scrap aircraft at the far end of Runway 33/15 near the compass circle with quite a lot of the fabric stripped off the rear fuselage by the weather. I have a small piece of fabric which I cut from the fuselage around the tailplane area a while before it left the museum compound but as far as I am aware my fabric piece is all that survives of G_AVHU.
Bearing in mind that G-AGPG has had a rather nomadic existence since leaving Southend it is possible that somone has got confused or didn’t realise that the Southend museum had more than one Anson.
By: Orion - 14th June 2011 at 15:54
PWFU 30/5/84
By: Newforest - 14th June 2011 at 15:36
Post 4 would indicate that it was scrapped at Southend. 🙂
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June 14, 2011 at 3:21 pm