One of the highlights of my visits to the airshows at Biggin Hill in the 1970’s was a Lightning roaring up the runway then pulling up into what looked like a vertical climb and the pilot calling out his height as he disappeared! Can’t recall the height though.

Pity I wasn’t around for the Javelin! That must have been impressive!

Peter

PNK …post 51

Acaster Malbis!!

Well done that man! South of York – prone to mist and fog – good location!

Northeagle – Post 12

Acklington – Before the big hole appeared?

Peter

There is a booklet published in Sussex about the Friston area and covers the airfield and includes a map – I don’t recall the author or publisher. Ken Delves recent book on Military Airfields of Southern England also covers Friston and shows a map of the airfiled.
It is/was shaped like a wishbone and this shape is still visible on current OS maps. Galyes farm is on the eastern side of the airfield. There was a larger grass runway wich runs in a NE/SW direction and a smaller fighter runway running roughly N/S. The larger was for emergencies.
You can get an early postwar aerial photo via this link

http://www.ukaerialphotos.com/

Just type the post code for Gayles farm or use the town choice and type Friston.

Part of a B-17 trolley, drinks for the use of.

Tony,

Would the Manchester be classed as a ‘Medium’, with or without Merlins?
Questions about bomb loads and range and tonnage per gallon etcto spring to mind. The Germans seemed to be hadicapped in some stages of the war by not having heavies, although the HE-177 had four engines in coupled pairs? Was this a heavy?

Ignoring the merits of one ‘heavy’ over another I would think a least two types would be a good idea if only to prevent having all of your eggs in one basket (is there a pun ther?). All categories of aircraft seemed to have more than one type for whatever reason.

Sorry I seemed to have asked as more questions than you. Interesting thoght though and may spark off other what ifs.

Let’s hope it doesn’t get into an arguement over the relative merits of the RAF’s bombing campaign.

Peter

Manston Fire Dump 1980

I know there was a fire dump thread in January but I thought they were related – scrap being the link.
Manston was a regular haunt in the school holidays of my youth but without a camera I had to wait. These are more recent (I must be getting old!) being 1980.

By the way anyone ever walked the width of Manston’s runway? It is wide and I got blown over by the blast of an HS125. Oh to be young and stupid again.

Peter

I have trouble logging in using Netscape 7 but not in AOL’s browser. IE6 doesn’t like me clicking on most things since SP2. Firefox I have but the icon is over an inch away from Netscapes!

Today some pics are placeholders only – is this the problem referred to?