BBMF Dakota

I haven’t seen a Gooney Bird for years..nice shot

I am still around…….!!

I haven’t seen a Gooney Bird for years..nice shot

Then you do have the good fortune. It is a very “nostalgic” picture.:)

Thanks 🙂
I downloaded the BBMF time table and noted down all the Bletchley Park flypast dates and times. As I live close to Bletchley Park and have the times I just go outside about 5mins before the flypast and wait with the camera 🙂

That’s a real beauty, well done. I never seem to have the camera handy when things like that happen to me.

Forgot to put the choke in?

No display im afraid. The Lancs hours are allocated and no request was made for a flypast. Its not on the 2003 display lsit anyway

🙁

As it’s the 60th anniversary of the dams raid, it’s quite possible there may be a display at Ladybower reservoir in North Derbyshire this year. The dam there is very similar to one of the Ruhr ones with twin towers and was used in training.
I went to the 50th anniversary do which was great and out of the ordinary.

Haha, i think you may be right Lancman!

Roll on the display season thats what i think! Anybody in West Yorkshire on the 10th May should get down to Haworth, Its a great place to see the Lanc display…..flies over the moors and then swoops down into the valley 🙂

Marvellous!!!

……and if the Lanc goes U/S as well you could have the Dak and two Chipmunks and call it the North American Memorial Flight!!!

Hmmm…you think too much, you know that?!!! 😉

Cheers to y’all! 😀

🙂 Lancman, i was thinking..if the spit and hurricane were unserviceable, maybe we could use the Chipmunks 😉 they’d look great on each side of the Lanc 🙂

Hallelujah!!!

Amen

…………..the end

😉

For Pete’s sake, I’m NOT ‘degrading other aircraft’!!!:mad:

Originally posted by Lancman
Nice pics-the Dak, if the BBMF must have the damn thing, at least looks a lot more appealing now.

“the damn thing”

If that’s not a criticism of the aircraft, what is?

I’ve not entered this topic yet because I’ve been away. As a result, many if not all of the comments I would have made have already been put forward by a lot of people. Let me just add one thing though.

Last summer, I visited the Airborne Forces cemetary at Oosterbeek near Arnhem. Flight Lieutenant David Lord VC is buried there. As I’m sure you know, he earned that VC by flying a slow, unarmed C47 over Arnhem in September 1944 in an attempt to resupply the beleagured troops on the ground. His aircraft was hit and set ablaze on the first run, yet he carried on to the DZ.

When he learned that there were still supplies aboard, despite the considerable damage already sustained by his aircraft, he came around again to drop the remainder of his cargo. The aircraft continued to draw heavy anti aircraft fire during this time.

Flt Lt Lord then ordered his crew to abandon the aircraft while he held her on course, doubtless knowing he had no chance of survival. One man made it out, before the wing collapsed and the aircraft came down.

The BBMF’s C47 wears the colours of Flt Lt Lord’s aircraft.

Last year I visited Little Gransden for their annual display, with a friend who knows very little about aviation. In previous years, this display has been graced by the Lancaster, an especially stirring event given the small size of the venue and the significance of the Lancaster to this little part of Cambridgeshire. I expected the Lancaster would be there again last year, but found that the C47 was on the programme instead.

Far from being disappointed, my friend and I listened to the short remembrance service which also forms a part of each annual display, and then watched spellbound as the C47 appeared, displayed and departed. I had told my friend Flt Lt Lord’s story some weeks before; seeing this large, slow aircraft displaying in front of us, in broad daylight, and at speeds and heights which would be about the same as Flt Lt Lord all those years ago, brought it home to both of us just how great an achievement it must have been to make those drops, and how great a sacrifice he and his crew had made.

What am I trying to say here?

The topic seems to have strayed down the ‘should they / shouldn’t they be called BBMF’ route. Fine. That’s an old argument, we’ve all got our views.

But Mike, you called the Dakota ‘the damn thing’. I’ve got a lot of respect for the enthusiasm that you have for the Lancaster – I wish more people cared about it as much as you do. But DON’T go degrading other aircraft which have just as much history, significance and right to be operated as memorials to their crews.

Rant over.

Ah, but I HAVEN’T criticised the Dak itself- just, in my opinion, it’s place in the BBMF!

Lancman hearby states for the record and to appease his online aviation friends that as an aircraft in general, he thinks the Dakota rocks, and he’d happily have it’s babies!!!

LOL about the Mustang!!! 😀

Lancman – god forbid they flight ever get a P-51 Mustang then. Designed for the British-used by the British and later fitted with
the British designed Merlin !
I cannot see there is any mileage in the arguement for British
born and bred only !
Anyway what were you expecting in critising the Dak amongst
enthusiasts !!!

Given the stated length of BBMF service, one can only assume that ‘Fluffy’ is either Chief Tech Keith Brenchley, or Chief Tech Paul Blackah? Anyone?

Everyone sems to be having a go at me as if I don’t of course realise what a historically significant aircraft the Dak is-of COURSE I know this, okay?! I personally just don’t think that a primarily American aircraft fits in that well with a Royal Air Force, WW2 Memorial Flight, okay?!

Wish I’d never bloody mentioned it now!!! 😡