90th Anniversary of the flight flight at Boscombe Down

At 09:20hrs on 25th November 1917, Lt ‘Bill’ Heaton got airborne in Royal Aircraft Factory BE2b, serial No 2783, from Number Six training Depot, and flew around the locale for 20 minutes before returning to the grass strip. 2783 was to be christened ‘Virgo Intacta’ by Bill Heaton and his colleagues.

This is the first recorded operational movement for what was to become RAF Boscombe Down. Thats 90 years ago and this miltary airfield is still active !!!!. 90 years old and still going strong !. Boscombe Down is where the Empire Test Pilots School operate from.

To commemorate this act, the Boscombe Down Aviation Collection (BDAC) http://www.boscombedownaviationcollection.org/ decided to build a full scale model of this aircraft (to compliment the other types in the collection). Not a light undertaking as spookily enough, you can’t just order up a set of plans !…involving lots of measurements from the surviving airframes, this is now the 6th…yes, I repeat, the 6th …airframe in existence.

These few pics show the result of four and a half years hard work by volunteers at the BDAC. A truly fantastic feat. All the construction team have worked at Boscombe Down at one time or another, but most are now retired.

You will note something if you study the wings…no ailerons !. This one turned corners courtesy of wing warping, that’s how early a model it is. Later versions did include that new idea of moveable control surfaces, but as I’ve said that happened later on.

This isn’t ‘Fly by Wire’ ….it’s more ‘Heave by Cable’ !