No VAT payable if sold ‘offshore’

Have no knowledge of the auction market but you say No VAT if the item is sold overseas, well that would be bad news if a UK resident wanted to buy it, or indeed anything else, if a foreign buyer can save a whopping 20% on the sale price. In any case VAT is chargable across the EU so surely the NoVAT rule could only apply to non EU residents.

There are other museums that might have wanted it. (Liverpool airport, EMA airpark, NEAM etc). They could have posted on here, for a start. .

That was my first thought on hearing the report of the scrapping, it seemed to come out of the blue, but these things do not happen over night, YAM must have been considering this for several months. Whilst I understand the aircraft is their’s to do with as they please, I would have thought they should have an obligation to obtain the best price for its disposal. What options were considered in this case ? Alternatives could have included sponsorship for restoration, sale as a whole to another preservation group, donation of parts to private collectors or Herald projects, and finally best tendered price for removal as scrap.

Last year’s event had a much better WWI programme booked and didn’t come close to selling out, so your comment would seem to be way off the mark Sopwith.7f1

Totally agree with you Mike J. It seems unfortunate that the Snipe and Albatros have not yet arrived for this WW1 event, two items I would not wanted to miss, also the the return of the Triplane and first showing of the Camel would have made this show a must see for Shuttleworth fans, it would not have been a sell out event. Whilst I understand the need to generate money for the Collection by booking the Vulcan that has happened, but at what cost ? I am SVAS member and due to family holiday comitments have been away all week and would have been making a late start to Shuttleworth. Advanced tickets or not the access to Old Warden can be bad at busy times during a normal show, Sunday will be a nightmare and I am currently seriously thinking of missing the event.

Strange to not approach the wider preservation community to see if anything could be of use ?

Surely where not enough material is available for an “Icon” bookzine then the place to publish is the Database section of Aeroplane. If you feel there is too much information to fit the monthly page limit then spread over two issues. If you (publishers) keep pushing the single type mag then there will be no material left for the Monthlies.

RE #212
The limitations of Bruntingthorpe are already well covered in this thread. If it ended up at Brunty (who have already said no thanks) then, to echo your sentiments, just how accessible will XH558 be to the public on most days?

Access at Bruntingthorpe is OK, is not the Cold War Collection is open every weekend ?
Sure the current big hangar and most other parts of the airfield are off limits, that is because it is an aircraft parts reclaim operation, and car storage and testing company’s pay good money to use the site.
If the existing Bruntingthorpe teams have already said they do not want, or can not commit to caring for XH558 then that is sad, but understandable.

Lots of talk about the RAF recovering the Maryland. If it is so interesting would not an American team want to recover and restore it ?

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Vampire T55 ZU-DFH / 277 is active with the South African Air Force Historic Flight at Swartkop