Seasons Greetings all!
I was flicking through some old museum guides this weekend and came across an old Fleet Air Arm Museum one. I forgot that Hall 1 used to contain the fantastic WW1 Aircraft Dioramas!
I know the Spad went to Duxford and the Pup and Sopwith Baby are still there but what happened to the others?
Is the Albatross in their storage facility still? What happened to the Camel? I also recall years ago a red triplane but i believe that was only on loan and left the Hall before the exhibits were disbanded?
By: Jur - 19th December 2017 at 08:27
FAAM 1990: The Albatros
By: Seaking93 - 18th December 2017 at 20:29
The reason the Flycatcher was offered to the museum was the fact that John Fairey had found a cracked spar and decided that he did not want to repair it but preserve the airframe and sell the engine, this he did. The Flycatcher was on show in the museum for several years, as were the WWI replicas, but with over 100 airframes in the collection and space for 50 on show as mentioned above the policy is to rotate the collection at least once a year so that as far as possible there is something new each year for the visitor to see.
By: SADSACK - 18th December 2017 at 14:21
Its a shame that the Flycatcher didn’t go to the historic flight. But the policy is “if its the only one, on the ground it stays”… pity she isn’t on show after all that work put into her.
By: TEXANTOMCAT - 17th December 2017 at 21:32
The Flycatcher was an airworthy machine built for John Fairey IIRC. It’s bloody lovely. To be fair to the FAAM they regularly change their displays. Also they saved a WW1 seaplane lighter and I think the plan is eventually to display the Pup or Camel on it.
Also from a historic perspective they do have the Shorts 184 that spotted at Jutland (sadly damaged in a Luftwaffe air raid)
I think we forget we are spoilt that all the Uk air arms have their own museums whereas many nations struggle with one!
By: Wondy - 17th December 2017 at 21:10
Cheers All very informative! Was a great display back in the day!
By: Wyvernfan - 17th December 2017 at 21:03
Last I saw the superb Flycatcher replica was over in Cobham hall.
Rob
By: CADman - 17th December 2017 at 20:51
Did the Museum have the airworthy Fairey Flycatcher replica ? Where did that go ?
By: The Blue Max - 17th December 2017 at 19:55
Albatros was sold to Jerry Yagen, Camel is still there in storage which is a shame as it should be flying, it was built for the film “Biggles Sweeps The Skies” by Slingsbys.
The Red Fokker Triplane was Robin Bowes’s which used to Winter at The FAAM, this was sadly lost in a fatal accident in 1996.
I visited the FAAM last year and found their WW1 exhibits very poor, not sure if things have improved.
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December 17, 2017 at 7:44 pm