As no one has posted a direct link to the British Pathe Footage, here it is.

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=52222

What a fascinating if fragile aircraft it looked. 😎

Both of the major aircraft manufacturers have suffered from over optimistic delivery, performance and cost projections for both civil and defence related projects in the last few years. It seem endemic in the industry.

While things are not good with the A400, I don’t think its yet nailed to the perch. To be honest I am more worried about the performance shortfalls than those related to cost.

A satellite image of the airport if you look at it I think will reveal how easy it might be to do this if the pilots were distracted or not paying attention or maybe in poor visibility. From what I remember from the one occasion I visted, there are multiple straight strips of tarmac aligned east-west

One of the Oil explorers, Desire Petroleum, announced a drilling campaign in the offshore North Falklands yesterday. ‘If ‘ they find oil early next year in any volumes then it will change the game for the RN to a significant extent, so I bet there are a few Admirals praying for oil :diablo:

So we can say that this was just a misunderstanding and move on…………

Has anyone come across any piccies yet of any of the parts of CVF being assembled no matter how minor ?

The BA609 is interesting. Its payload is 2.5 tonnes but the fuselage is only 5 feet across. The big issue might be that I don’t think it folds. Its 60 feet across so would fit on the CVF elevator which was designed to take two F35 side by side (about 70 feet) but it would occupy a lot of hanger space without a fold. Does anyone know it it has a cross shaft like the V-22 so that both rotors continue to turn if an engine fails ? Its range may not quite be high enough either for COD or AEW work at 750 miles. However, future versions might do the job.

I have watched all of these progammes over the years and this episode was definately one of the best. Really enjoyed it.

I can back up what folks say about not knowing what their family have done. My uncle had a bad war in the RAF because he spent all 7 years of it on Whitley’s, Hampdens, Wellingtons and other stuff that was outclassed and lost many friends. He won’t talk about it full stop and won’t even tell me his squadrons or even his service number. The only other thing I know is that his wife told me he was in the first RAF group who got to Nagasaki at the end, and he said that that single event changed his life. In 1945 he parked up his plane and has never stepped in one since. Some people just don’t want to talk about their past.