For me its Gotta be the late Flt Lt Bill Reid V.C.-bless him,he took off on a raid on Dussledorf,his a/c was hit ,the windscreen shattered & Bill wounded(including a head wound) en-route,did not tell his crew of his injuries but carried on rather than risk colliding with another aircraft coming towards him.

Somewhere along the route he lost his navigator 😮 & sucessfully nav,ed himself to the target by using the stars as ref points,I beleive his Lanc was hit again but still carried on to make the only drop of the raid on target(as confirmed by the target photo).

On the way home, he was hit yet again:eek: 😮 😮 ,lost conciousness,came round and with the help of his engineer was able to get to Woodford,on landing the Lanc’s u/c collapsed.-Bill was only 21 at the time.His full story in his own words was broadcast on the “World at war” documentary. 😎

So modest was he, his wife only found out what had happened when she found his V.C. in a drawer-20 years later! 😎 😎

R.I.P. Flt Lt William Reid V.C. & God bless

p.s. in honesty all the receipents impress me:)

ONLY ONE CHAV ROCKETING SKYWARDS?????:rolleyes: :rolleyes:

Pleased to see your warbird population improving-don’t forget you still have more Lancs & farmers hiding aircraft in barns than we do over here-enjoy ’em & ask for more.;)

KB976 is not all abroard- 21′ of rear fuselage is on display wearing a Rose Bros rear turret at Doncaster Aeroventure.:)

That would be fantastic to see Peter,do you have any ideas when?

keep at it,looking forward to it,(keep ’em,flying,taxiing,or restored & looking etc,etc), 😀

Seeing this big white triangle fly over & being frightened silly by the ominous rumble a few moments later(I was 4or5 at the time!!),the 4 ship-scramble at the RAF Finningley Silver Jubilee reveiw in 1977, an impromptue flypast just after my passing-out parade at RAF Swinderby in ’89 & of course back at Finningley in ‘558’s last season with goodbye/fairwell on open bomb-bay doors.

Let’s hope my next memory is immenent!!!:)

For the time being I feel the PA474/NX611 status quo should be left as it is.

Admittedly part of me says put both in the air,but we very lucky to have a unique situation were we are the only country to have the both flyable and fully taxiable Lancasters.

To put both in the air would immediatly double the risk of losing one in an accident,whilst cost aside, because of the amount of work put into Just Jane’s retsoration and current state we have the potential for a future swap as airframe hours for PA474 inevitably run out.

Personally, I would whole-heartedly support a move to put NX611 back in the air if only the Lanc was still available in numbers prserved similar to that of types shuch as B17’s,Mustangs,Spitfires etc.

Lets “keep (one of) ’em flying”,as long as we can.:)