I think I wrote about a podcast I once listened to, over in the ‘Haunted airfields’ thread. People spot ghost aircraft, typically cited as WW2 bombers according to the podcast, quite often!

An An-12 could be confused with a B-17 at an absolute push, in that both have a glass nose (hence the glint), and both have a tail gun turret. The latter is usually all but removed on the An-12s used for cargo duties. However the An-12 is high-wing, and the wings themselves are much thinner than a B-17. An-12s typically create a lot of smoke, so they look like they fell out of a different era. They also have a fairly unique timbre that makes you look up in the first place!

From my own experience I can see traffic approaching Edinburgh airport from the East, from the comfort of my office window. I was watching a C130 approaching, and my colleague asked “is that a bomber?”, which is fair enough! Olive drab, four props and a visible trail of smoke drifting behind the aircraft. This clearly wasn’t our usual 737 and Dash-8 traffic. In all fairness, there is 13 years between the first flights of the C130 and the Lancaster, and if you aren’t clued up then aircraft probably fall neatly into “bomber”, “jumbo jet”, “Spitfire” buckets. A C130 ticks enough ‘bomber’ boxes for most.

For all that I joke, another colleague watched the Pilatus PC-7 team’s practice run (from the same office window) a couple of years back, and commented on ‘all the Spitfires’ outside.

People also seem to generally under estimate the altitude of aircraft, quite often by a factor of ten! The Police helicopter circling their neighbourhood the night before at ‘a hundred feet’ was doing nothing of the sort. This gets even worse when they claim said helicopter was “hovering right over the house”. I also read (maybe on PPRUNE) of American airmen in the UK in the ’80s coming upon Shackletons and asking, incredulously, if we were still operating Liberators! All this makes a perfect storm of mis-identification.

I think most buses look largely the same; I leave it up to the bus spotting fraternity to dwell on the details. 😀

Apologies, but I can’t get too upset about the difference between ‘B25’ and ‘B-25’. I know what is being discussed in both instances. Maybe if it was a British type…. :applause:

In fact, maybe this is why it is languishing in a scrap yard! :rolleyes:

Me three! Far more interesting than non-existent Spitfires. 😀

Here is some footage from Aalborg:

Robbing crash sites of parts, either to bin them later, squander them away in private collections, or to flog on Ebay to boost the holiday fund, is all equally morally repugnant in my opinion. Plus, if your parts collection isn’t binned now your kids will almost certainly be binning it when you cark it.

On the one hand this community seems to complain every time somebody visits one of the high-ground wrecks in the UK and finds there is less of it than last time. Yet somehow it is always somebody else who is nicking parts from these wrecks! From an archaeological point of view, this undocumented looting of parts seems fairly heathen, and fairly commonplace here. Cherrypick the best bits you can fit in a rucksack or under one arm, and don’t tell anybody what you picked up. Then parade it on here for plaudits. :applause:

On the other hand, every other thread on here is either “identify this twisted scrap metal I stumbled upon” or “look at what I found in my garage”, so I guess wreck robbing keeps this forum ticking along. :highly_amused:

B36, is this odd shrine at least on public display or is it just something you look at on the way to your kitchen? Do you want a cookie for your efforts? Am I meant to be impressed?

I’m guessing the craters are visible here from LiDAR imagery? I’m impressed by the images above that seem to remove the tree cover and show the terrain below, in pretty vivid detail.

Daft question, but you’re sure all those craters were put there by allied bombers? It looks like the forested areas are planted out with monoculture stands of species like sitka spruce. From tramping around in various forestry stands as a student (taking measurements!) you do come across small circular ponds that have been dug into the ground for drainage or water retention, etc, usually laid out in an ad hoc manner.

Which work? Surely Just Jane is the next Lancaster preservation milestone if/when it returns to flight.

I noticed a couple of Shackleton prop blades on Ebay today, and it reminded me of the theft of blades reported earlier in this thread.

Both blades are clipped:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/WW-II-Propeller-From-Griffon-Powered-Shackleton-Plane/292527420176?_trkparms=aid%3D555018%26algo%3DPL.SIM%26ao%3D2%26asc%3D50546%26meid%3Dc17626fd16754269a46bceb2f56bc230%26pid%3D100012%26rk%3D2%26rkt%3D12%26sd%3D132621098521%26itm%3D292527420176&_trksid=p2047675.c100012.m1985

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/WW11-Griffon-Powered-Shackleton-Rear-Propeller-Cut-Off-For-Display/323102528379?_trkparms=aid%3D222007%26algo%3DSIM.MBE%26ao%3D2%26asc%3D50546%26meid%3D3383ba71e8f149a69b1714a9208d52f0%26pid%3D100005%26rk%3D6%26rkt%3D12%26sd%3D292527420176%26itm%3D323102528379&_trksid=p2047675.c100005.m1851