Does Gary Numan still fly.

He made a brilliant song called ‘My Centurion Dies’ referring to his Cessna 210 going down after an engine failure. Rather morbid but as a pilot I’ve always thought it catches the feelings you would be going through in such a situation perfectly.

“There already is a book!’ Praying to the Aliens’ it has a lot about his flying and is a great read”

That’s true, and I have that book and very good it is too! What I had in mind is a book, hopefully illustrated, that just covers his flying career and interest. There was a lot that wasn’t in “Praying to the Aliens” and I can’t help but think that an aviation book from Gary would sell well for him.

Best regards;
Steve

If you don’t see anything even slightly dubious about flogging this wreckage for money then so be it. I suppose there is an area of the historic aviation sphere that is perfectly happy to desecrate crash sites for personal gain (either the exclusivity factor or from flogging parts at Aerojumbles). This is dark history within living memory of a lot of aviation enthusiasts. I’ve seen a good number of eyewitness accounts from people who were unfortunate enough to watch the P-38 go in. Flogging one of the more readily identifiable pieces of the wreckage for £5k seems a bit ghoulish. I doubt it will help return another P-38 to the skies, if nothing else. I also wonder how Proudfoot’s family feel about the whole thing, unless of course they have sanctioned the sale.

Where do you personally draw the line with this sort of thing? If I went to Lockerbie next weekend with a metal detector and then tried to sell 747 relics on Ebay, purely for personal gain, for example?

Personally? Well that’s subjective, but I suppose if you’re flogging bits with the deceased pilots blood on it soon after the accident, well I’d see that as ghoulish, and distasteful. A wingtip, of a crash 20 years ago, no, not at all. Rather than making assumptions, why not contact the owners of the aircraft at the time of the crash (TFC) and ask them?
Also, I can think of several Spitfires in the last 2 decades that have claimed the lives of their pilots (and passenger) that have been restored to flight. Scrap material has been sold on, and companies have charged the owners for rebuild. Where do you stand then?
You’d need to come here to Lincolnshire to find parts of the Lockerbie Jumbo, they’re all stored here, or were, when I saw them in 2009.

I did wonder which is why I wrote “aero jumbles and elsewhere”.

For the record, there’s very little crash recovered stuff sold at aerojumbles.

The last time I was aware of it would probably be the Shoreham event, where it was limited to one or two individuals.

War and Peace would probably attract those kind of sellers as there’s all manner of grisly stuff to be found there anyway.

They certainly will be, which is why I would much rather see them exhibited in museums (where they can tell the story of the crew, the aircraft, the state of the War when the aircraft crashed) rather than squirreled away in the loft and then subject to “what is it worth?” threads on here.

Anyway, I’m leading this thread off course. I’m troubled in particular with a relic from Proudfoot’s P-38 being sold so casually, especially if it has been liberated from wreckage stored at Duxford.

Won’t a fair percentage of relics traded at aero jumbles and elsewhere have come from crashed aircraft in which aircrew may well have perished?

If you don’t see anything even slightly dubious about flogging this wreckage for money then so be it. I suppose there is an area of the historic aviation sphere that is perfectly happy to desecrate crash sites for personal gain (either the exclusivity factor or from flogging parts at Aerojumbles). This is dark history within living memory of a lot of aviation enthusiasts. I’ve seen a good number of eyewitness accounts from people who were unfortunate enough to watch the P-38 go in. Flogging one of the more readily identifiable pieces of the wreckage for £5k seems a bit ghoulish. I doubt it will help return another P-38 to the skies, if nothing else. I also wonder how Proudfoot’s family feel about the whole thing, unless of course they have sanctioned the sale.

Where do you personally draw the line with this sort of thing? If I went to Lockerbie next weekend with a metal detector and then tried to sell 747 relics on Ebay, purely for personal gain, for example?

It was TFC’s P-38, and it was discussed here fairly recently.
I’m not sure why it’s distasteful, many aircraft in the warbird world have had some dark history.

Largely off topic, but I was a bit surprised this morning to see a photograph of what was apparently the battered wing tip of Hoof Proudfoot’s P-38 for sale recently at ‘The War and Peace Show’ (Revival?). Whatever this relic might have actually been, it is was marked “P38 Lightning, Duxford (indecipherable), £4,800”.

Apparently the wreckage was stored at Duxford, so selling pieces of it seems astonishingly distasteful if true.

Things must be bad if he considers the USA safer than the UK

There already is a book!’ Praying to the Aliens’ it has a lot about his flying and is a great read

There was a news snippet in FlyPast in the eighties where Gary was quoted that the Harvard was a stepping stone to his ultimate goal to acquire a Spitfire.

My dad was the first manager of the Squadron from 88 to late 90 and we had some great times as the site was being built and once it had opened so I think a book by Gary would be outstanding

Gary was on BBC Radio 4’s “Loose Ends” Saturday night, and briefly mentioned his flying.

RAFRochford,

I certainly will suggest it to him!

Tester04;

When you do see him, pitch the idea of him writing a book about his display days. It would be a cracking read and he writes with a very engaging style!

It was always nice to see him fly Eddie’s Yak 11 at Earls Colne…I still think he should have had a go at TD248.

I saw him at Rendcombe in the early 90’s with his Harvard and his then girlfriend who is now his wife I presume. He seemed a very unassuming sort of chap by what I saw of him and his display was fine. As much as I remember it was not the best of days for display flying either, a fair old wind and low cloud base.

I flew with Gary in the Harvard Formation Team in 1989 and 1990. We used to do the pairs aeros parts which led to the Radial Pair that he flew with Norman. He was an excellent formation aerobatic lead pilot and it was with Gary that I learned formation aeros. I don’t think that any of the other pilots from the team at that time are still display flying.

We are still in touch and he has a UK tour this autumn and are hoping to meet up again. He may not be flying currently but he still has a great interest in aviation. His Harvard, G-AZSC, is now operated at Goodwood and I managed to fly it again a couple of years ago.

Very many happy memories of flying with Gary.

DS

For Gary the loss rate was hard and fast ( Peter – Norman- Hoof – Euin) to name a few but these four were key