Lee – what is your position within the RNHF?

Webmaster.

Regular readers of the ONLY official RNHF website will be aware that it was not the cartridge starting system as a whole that was the problem, but the ageing cartridges themselves. Needless to say, the aircraft is (or will be when it returns to Yeovilton in March) fully serviceable, as is the engine.

Tests are currently underway on the remaining stock of cartridges, and RNHF remain hopeful that a small batch may be released again in time for the 2007 season. Keep checking back on the site for updates……like last night’s one.

The Comet will follow after Christmas. I was told that she will probably be repainted in situ in hangar 1 (in Air France colours) as the “shop” is full. Fella on the desk said that she never wore RAF colours??

Oh yes she did – XM823, see hereXM823 Piccie Linky

Orginally F-BGNZ. As a teenager I spent a whole winter painting out the fuselage of her sister, F-BGNX, at Salisbury Hall (Bruce will recall).

The MB.5. Ah, now there was an aeroplane that really ought to have had a happier ending. How can anyone possibly say this was ugly? It was a beasty!! I always liked that particular shot with the canopy open on take off and the pilot with his cloth helmet and oxygen mask on.

I don’t think the final fate of the aircraft has ever been nailed down. Wasn’t it last seen at Bircham Newton? I believe the running joke for anyone who visits Chalgrove is to walk along the hedge line, stop and suddenly exclaim “Oh look, here it is!!”, and see how many people will look up. 😀

As for that abomination in the States – sheesh! It looks AWFUL! I fully agree with the comments about the Prototype “P”, but what about the colour too?! I sense this project has “Tragedy” written all over it at some point in the future. 🙁

The photos came from Graham cooper.

Now why doesn’t that surprise me? The man who was selling off the Fleetlands archive wholesale, and without permission! Thankfully I managed to get whatever was left transferred to the safe custody of the Fleet Air Arm Museum before anything else could go missing and any more money could line his pockets! I’m sure there is one other person on here who could vouch for this! 😡

…see the ‘Thunder and Lightnings’ website for a good rundown.

Or buy the Air-Britain book instead! 😉 Packed with photos (many never before seen in print), histories and pilot anecdotes of what it really was like to fly.

Plug over… 😎

Was it one of the pile of canopies (at least a dozen) of very similar looking ones which was at the Flowers scrap yard in Chippenham?

I remember one had the word “Scimitar” written on it in faint chinagraph.

You beat me to it! A friend of mine was spitting feathers (quite rightly) when he sent a friend of his along in his absence to the auction of items from Flowers’ scrapyard in Chippenham having been tipped off about Scimitar canopies. When I was editing (sorry, completely re-writing!!) The Scimitar File for Air-Britain I put this anecdote in. By all accounts there were a handful of them all still in their waxed paper and they were all bought by some numpty of a “designer” who wanted to turn them into chairs!! 😮
This guy wouldn’t even part with one of them for cash.

So maybe one of them has come to light after all?