I’d never seen “live” shots of Stirlings towing gliders to Arnhem before and by contrast there is an Auster doing joyflights at Clacton. Wonderful stuff.

What did you search for to find the Stirlings? “My” airfield isn’t represented by name, but anything that might be relevant to Riff Raff and Varsity would be right up my street…

Adrian

Hawker Restorations Limited, responsible for around half the Hurricanes currently flying, have several restorations in their shop at the moment including two Mk 1 Battle of Britain veterans, both at an advanced state.

Including one in the Spitfire tradition of being rebuilt from a data plate and a carrier bag of bits.

I’d scan the pic I have of the recovered remains, but the copyright holder wouldn’t be impressed. Suffice to say that it hit rock from 30,000 feet.

Adrian
(wonder if I can sell my fragment of Form 700 as a rebuild project?)

Whatever happened, it looks as though both Tiger and occupants won’t need too much fettling to have them in full working order again.

Maybe the mysterious “third person” was actually the passenger’s underwear? Or the chap whose bank account the insurance comes out? Either could have come to serious harm.

Or perhaps someone fell off trying to extricate the crew… Could have been worse, could have been stuck up a Ferris wheel!

Adrian

I think “WOW!” is a fair response!

I wonder when the last time a Ju88 flew was?

Adrian

This month’s Aeroplane has an article on the Macchi M.C.72, and a photo of the survivor MM181 at Vigna di Valle which also houses the M.39 MM76, the Fiat C.29 and maybe some more…..

Indeed – written by some bloke named Kightly who seems terribly familiar…

There’s a link on his blog (http://www.vintageaerowriter.com/) to a sound recording of the thing. I will say little, except that it sounds hotter than Satan’s posing pouch. It howls!

Adrian

I’m with Andy – I think the odds are that this was a “Sweetheart brooch”, rather than anything official. It looks very bright, though – possibly made a lot more recently than the aircraft suggests? Or just well looked after?

It’s rather fun, though, isn’t it?

Adrian

Thanks Andy, I thought that might be the case. I think it was a case of making a horrible mess in a spot that you weren’t meant to get to meaning that no-one got there with a camera. Not forgetting, of course, that you probably weren’t allowed to photograph such things most of the time, photography was restricted by wartime anyway, and despite Kodak’s best efforts photography was far, far far from as ubiquitous as it is today…

Adrian

I don’t suppose you’ve ever come across a photo of the smouldering crater on Whitstable beach, have you, Andy?

I know of at least two, possibly three, photos of the Do17 at nearby Seasalter (and there’s even film… somewhere… because I recognised it during “Spitfire Ace”, but I’ve never found a photo of the Whitstable wreck.

Adrian