AND HERE’S A FEW MORE OF HER IN HER ELEMENT – JUST TO WET YOUR APPETITES A LITTLE ( JUST IN CASE THE ‘RUMOUR’ HAS SOME TRUTH !!!););)

Richard

when did she last fly? Late 60’s, early 70’s?Good luck to them if this is true – there are folk on here with more knowledge than me in terms of what she needs.

NX611 (then christened “Guy Gibson”) last flew on 26th June 1970. She was flown from RAF Hullavington, Wiltshire to Blackpool’s ‘Squires Gate’ Airport by her then owners/operators Reflectaire Ltd where she was to become the centrepiece of their proposed aviation museum.

The story of her subsequent sad decline and eventual sale, following the public auction in 1972, has been widely publicised over the years so I won’t dwell on that rather unhappy period of her history.

Suffice to say, it is just over 38 years now since we were delighted by the sight and sound of her in the skies above us in the UK.

I was privileged to have been given the chance on 30th March 1969 to actually fly as one of the ‘passengers’ on board NX611 on her ferry flight from Biggin Hill to Lavenham airfield in Suffolk which was then to become her new home for almost a year. Suffice to say that was a totally unforgettable experience and one that many today would ‘die’ for.

I have chatted briefly with the Panton Brothers recently about the possibility of their considering returning ‘Just Jane’ to the skies and posed the question of the adequacy of the existing runway and wouldn’t she need to be based somewhere else other than at East Kirkby if they were ever to get her fully airworthy again. I was rather surprised when Fred actually said that that wouldn’t be a problem, but he wouldn’t elaborate at that point in time.

Having, as I’ve said, flown in NX611 I personally am quite torn between emotional and purely practical views as to whether I’d be happy to see ‘Just Jane’ back in the sky after such a long period of time.

Whilst NX611 was in the hands of her then (1965 to 1968) owners – H.A.P.S (Historic Aircraft Preservation Society) she was flown a total of eleven times, from her first airtest (since arriving at Biggin Hill from Australia in 1965) on 6th May 1967 to her return to Biggin Hill following her appearance at the ’50th Anniversary of the RAF’ airshow at Filton on 15th June 1968 (some 40 years ago !!!!).

NX611 was to fly on a further 3 occasions during the period 1969/70 :

30th March 1969 – Biggin Hill to Lavenham, Suffolk;
7th February 1970 – Lavenham to RAF Hullavington, Wiltshire, & finally
26th June 1970 – Hullavington to Blackpool ‘Squires Gate’.

As one of the members of HAPS and subsequently as one of the small band of aircraft preservationists who worked for the company who acquired the assets of HAPS Ltd in 1969, i.e. Reflectaire Limited, I know at first hand how difficult it was in those days to secure sufficient funding in order to keep NX611 in an airworthy condition. With sufficient determination, however, not to mention a great deal of personal commitment and sacrifice by the small band of people who gave of their time and money, we still achieved what was generally considered to be ‘the impossible’ and kept her flying. This would not have been possible if it hadn’t been for the invaluable help and support given to us by the then Hawker Siddeley company and their engineers, together with individual sponsorship from a wide group of firms and individuals. Inevitably, however, that sponsorship money almost completely dried up following her re-location to Blackpool, due to many factors, and as a consequence NX611 remained firmly grounded, having to resort solely to occasional engine run-ups to attract the public to visit.

That was then……… the Panton Brothers, and their family, have since succeeded where we ultimately failed – they have created and developed the type of museum facility that we had struggled to bring about in the late 60s / early 70s, to their everlasting credit.

As I’ve said – I’m really torn as to whether ‘Just Jane’ should continue to delight the public, young and old alike, with her regular taxy runs / tail-up runs etc, or if it would be a good thing to try to return her to the skies. I do know one thing though – if anything untoward were to befall her should she grace our skies once again, I for one would be totally devistated. Should they take that risk ? I just don’t know.

Richard

Is that the F104 that has now gone to Brunty…? There was talk that the Lightnings may be leaving as well….

Don’t know if you’ve seen the “JULY ’08” edition (out now!!) of ‘Flypast’ yet (Page 104 appropriately!!!) – Ken Ellis has just done an interesting piece on the ‘Brian McLain Collection’ and heavily features the F.104G Starfighter ’22+57′ – to complement his impressive collection of cockpits.

Apparently Brian discovered this aircraft for sale earlier this year on an internet auction site (? “the-bay”!!!). He successfully bidded and acquired the aircraft and had it transported by road from the site at Grainthorpe, Lincs. to its new home at Bruntingthorpe where he apparently intends to renovate to taxying status over the next few years. All he really lacks at this time to achieve this is a General Electric J79 turbojet – ANYONE KNOW OF ONE ?

Still don’t know the fate of the 2 Lightnings (& cockpits) and the SAAB J35 Draken (A-011) on the ‘LINCAIR’ (Lincolnshire Aircraft Preservation Trust) site. Does anyone have an update on these other aircraft?

Richard

It would appear so Dennis although the website refers to it as “Lincair”, Lincolnshire Aircraft Preservation Trust.
A neighbour spotted the aircraft whilst driving by and mentioned it to me this morning.
My neighbour did mention the place was up for sale.

Ted – here’s a couple of links to “Lincair” (sorry !!- no pun intended!!)

http://www.binbrook.demon.co.uk/html/collection.html
http://www.museum-explorer.org.uk/show.php?page=museum_content&c=25&q=&m=34&y=88

The first website seems to have last been updated in Jan. ’07 so I don’t know the current status of the collection I’m afraid. If it is being sold and the collection dispersed it will be a great shame.

Your first aerial shot would appear to be some time ago as the Google satellite shot shows a much more mature museum display area at the Grainthorpe site, with these aircraft clearly visible. I still can’t date this aerial shot either so things may have changed.

Have a look :
http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=53.43668&lon=0.067257&z=19.7&r=0&src=ggl

Regarding the F.104 Starfighter (22+57) – it does appear to have been moved to Brunty, and before late April 2008, as she is shown (without wings attached) in a photo on the ‘Lightning Preservation Group (LPG) Bruntingthorpe – Message and Forum Board’
http://lpgxs904xr728.proboards20.com/index.cgi?board=opendays07&action=display&thread=106
where ’22+57′ can be seen being towed round to the aircraft pans, ready for refitting the wings (26th April ’08).

By the way – is this you Ted ?
http://xs186.photos.gb.net/search.php?txt=TED&action=Go&t=p

If it is you Ted, I heard your name mentioned when I popped in for a visit to Metheringham Airfield Visitors Centre a few weeks ago and was impressed with the progress made with the restoration of the Jet Provost (XS186).

Cheers

Richard

Not very good I’m afraid, I didn’t have the best veiw and I was too scared to join all the peope on the hill 😀 they were all bigger than me and had bigger lenses lol 😀

This is for all those who weren’t as lucky as me to be present on Tuesday to witness the return of XH558 to RAF Coningsby.

Like you ‘Lincoln’ I was one of the lucky crowd gathered at Coningsby on Tuesday. I watched enviously as the ‘long lenses’ assembled on the ‘pile of loose chippings’ hill to the west of the active runway – me with only my lowly digi camera!!

Undaunted – I ‘clicked away’ anyhow as the Vulcan came into sight and made her high level flyover of the airfield at 16.28hrs. All eyes had been on the horizon scanning for the first sighting, but the shout went up and people were pointing excitedly straight up into the clear blue sky above us- sure enough there she was – her unmistakable delta shape distantly silhouetted against the blue as she headed north eastwards at some height over the airfield.

For what seemed ages, but was only about 10 minutes, there was no sign of ‘558, but then she appeared again from the east at a much lower altitude and did a graceful flypast along the main runway and banked right over the assembled crowd of onlookers to everyone’s delight.

She eventually turned onto finals, made a beautiful descent over the River Witham, and touched down onto Runway 07 at 16.49hrs.(NOT at 17.45hrs as reported in the next day’s edition of the Lincolnshire Echo !) to the spontaneous applause of the delighted crowd, a mix of well-wishers and ‘just curious’ alike.

‘558 was then taxied back the full extent of runway 25/07 and around the perimeter taxiway parallel with the main Dogdyke Road, giving the onlooking public a superb chance to view and photograph her as she made her way slowly to the western threshold of the shorter cross runway (roughly E/W). From there she was taxied some 500yards along that runway to her parking point just short of the northern taxiway and eventually her engines were silenced and she was surrounded by vehicles and personnel of all kinds.

Not long afterwards a number of Typhoon aircraft returned to the airfield from a sortie and it made a rather poignant site to see the ‘old’ and the new generation of RAF types in such close proximity – superbly complementing each other, yet outwardly so very different.

Hope this rather sentimental description serves to try to put into words the up-beat atmosphere that was undoubtedly generated on the day – I felt it would provide a nice relief from the rather too often expressed views surrounding funding issues for the restoration project.

I hope to be back at Coningsby today (Friday) to witness the anticipated ‘local’ test flight of ‘558, delayed from Thursday because of the reported (by ‘Dis Gruntled’) compass swing difficulties experienced on Wednesday.

Meantime – Here’s a few of my own shots from Tuesday. Hope you enjoy.

Richard,

A dilema indeed.

N248 was given a thorough structural check before they decided to allow her up the pylon and she turned out to be in fine shape, with only slight corosion in the floats. Quite remarkable for an aircraft designed for just a few hours of flight. In addition to all the visits to Horse Guards, Heathrow and so in the ’40s and ’50s she also spent several years on a pier in Southampton, Royal Pier I think. That’s where I first saw her and fell in love as a school kid, 1964 I think…………………………….etc.
SM

I agree with you Ralph, it’s a dilema that will continue for quite some foreseeable future I’m quite sure.

It’s interesting to hear of ‘S1596’ (N248) having been on public display (?) on a pier in Southampton in the mid ’60s – do you know of any photos of her at that location? Was she actually ‘on’ the deck of the pier or (heaven forbid!) was she moored up ? Who were the owners at that time ?

As she was still ‘painted up’ as S1596 at the time of her static display on Horseguards Parade in September 1968 – who owned her then – ? on loan to the RAF or what ?

Your shots of the float on ‘S1595’ and the current cockpit on ‘N248’ are quite revealing. If the bright blue paint still visible around the rivets on the Science Museum example is not original then, as you say, when was it applied ! What actually is ‘Supermarine Blue’ – do you know of a current example of an aircraft sporting that ‘true’ blue ?

I don’t think I need to make further observations about the current application of unauthentic ‘dayglo green’ to the cockpit of the ‘Solent Sky’ machine, suffice to simply say “I suppose it’s doing the job it was intended to do – helping to deter any potential ravages of the weather whenever she is exposed to it.

Being a bit of a ‘purist’ myself, when it comes to authenticity issues surrounding preserved examples of our aviation heritage, I must say I rather tend to cringe when I see such practices – but, as I’ve said before, I will always refrain from direct or implied criticism for the reasons I’ve given already. There is usually a very sound reason behind most decisions made by owners / operators and only they are fully aware of the circumstances that drove that decision forward.

Again, I willingly throw this open to discussion and constructive observations.

Cheers

Richard

and also yanked up the pylon in undignified fashion at the Goodwood Festival of Speed a couple of years back.

Cheers

SM

Like this!

Septic.
[/QUOTE]

YES I REMEMBER IT WELL GARY !!!

I remember it caused a bit of controversy back in 2004 on this Forum as per previously posted link http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=27993&highlight=Supermarine+S6

As Ralph (‘Schneiderman’) has already remarked – “She’s certainly been around” – let’s pray nothing nasty befalls this aircraft if any future attempt is ever made to display her in an ‘unusual’ manner. She’s too valuable a piece of British Aviation history to take any undue risks, such as (“in my own humble opinion”) she has been subjected to on certain occasions in the post WW2 years.

Richard

I think I have a shot somewhere, not taken by me but acquired in the 1960’s, of one of the Racers suspended inside at the ‘Festival of Britain’ in 1951.

Is it my imagination?

Mark

I don’t think your memory’s playing tricks ‘Mark’ –

I believe this is ‘S1596’ in 1951 being “lowered into position during the development of the Transport Pavilion in the South Bank Exhibition, part of the Festival of Britain”
http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/archive/exhibits/festival/list_details.asp?key=546983&rtn=ob%3Dphotograph%26ob_s%3Dany%26pr%3D%26pr_s%3Dany%26de%3D%26de_s%3Dany%26num%3D10%26firstob%3D41%26sortby%3D1

Richard