There should not be any pop-ups present on the site.
I would also be interested to hear about anything that may appear.

M

In the UK there are four airworthy

– The Red Gnat red Gnat (!) “XR993”
– Kennet’s Red Arrows painted jet “XS111”
– Delta Jets’ ex-4FTS XR538
– Delta Jets’ XR991 in yellowjacks colours.

The former G-GNAT owned by Arnold Glass has just been exported to Australia, so that’s 5 airworthy.

There is another Gnat awaiting restoration to flying condition at Weald – all blue G-FRCE. It has recently been sold to new owners so restoration may begin shortly.
Rumours are that G-NATY down at Hurn could be made airworthy again, but it’s doubtful whether it will ever take to the air again.

BTW out of topic but Hurn-related. Work has restarted on the MiG 17. Fingers crossed for 2004.

M

Thunder City looked into getting a refuelling probe for one of their Buccaneers to enable it to feed the Lightning on any possible return to the UK.
They were having immense trouble locating one a couple of years ago, and it’s possibly still the same now.

M

Unfortunately XF516 was Craig’s second serious ejection from a fast jet. He was written off the first time so I’m sure we’ll see him flying the Typhoon again, even if he is a couple of inches smaller in height. 🙂

M

Was in Yeovil town centre and at 1101 a BT van drove past with music blaring.
He did eventually stop and cut his engine about ten seconds later.

M

Re: Re: I hope RAF and Navy…

Originally posted by Mike J
Very unlikely that the RNHF will operate a Sea Harrier. Firstly, the cost would be prohibitive (especially as they are now set up as a self-funding trust)

Agreed there. Some people don’t realise that they are now self-supporting and do not get anything from the Navy apart from hangarage.

Yeovilton will cease to be an operational Fast Jet base after the SHars go, whirly things only from then on (plus a couple of FRADU Hawks, posssibly), so will lose much of the infrastructure to operate one.

There are all sorts of rumours doing the rounds about Yeovilton’s future when the SHARs go, from Chinooks to Hawks.

Look at how much trouble they have had to keep a relatively-simple Sea Hawk airworthy.

They’ve not really had much experience of keeping one airworthy to be fair. They only had WV908 airworthy for a few months before it had to be grounded. Fingers crossed for 2004 that we’ll see it again. The Fury will be back next year unless any major probs occur.

Meant to mention this with my Sea Prince/Pembroke post above: WW453/G-TMKI is kept at a private location in Portishead.

M