RE: Hendon B-17

Many years ago, I was obviously taking so many photos of a certain black bomber that one of the ever-present security guards (There never seem to be so many around there these days) came up to me and asked if I’d like to ‘step onto the white areas’ to take my pictures! Of course I said a very grateful ‘yes’, and proceeded to enjoy myself for half an hour or so, ducking all around ‘Sugar’. The best bit was, I overheard someone else asking if they could do the same, and the same man-who was keeping an eye on me of course-said no!!! Ah, those were the days-I can’t imagine that happening there these days.

RE: 558 hopes dashed ?

What you mean is ‘bump’!

To be honest, I’m not sure what more can be said on this -the Lottery people have said a very reasonable no, and it was perhaps UNreasonable of the Vulcan people to even raise hopes and try. An appeal won’t get them anywhere, as they were aware that they’d be told ‘no’ before the first application, but the still went ahead, so why bother appealing, too?

What matters is that now we have a once ground-running able Vulcan now in pieces, with no sign of when, or how, it will be reassembled. ALL efforts at Bruntingthorpe now MUST concentrate on returning ‘558 to the condition in which they first received her. Because, short of someone like Richard Branson coughing and dropping a couple of million there out of his wallet by mistake, that plane is NOT going to fly again. (And that’s before we try and get CAA approval…) I’m sorry, but it’s just not. But equally, in my opinion, it must NOT be allowed to sit there in pieces, or be sold to anyone-especially abroad. Let’s be honest, we ALL want to see a Vulcan fly-but are we all going to go to California of Florida to witness it? No, we’re not.

Never mind ‘Vulcan to the skies’, we now muct campaign for ‘Vulcan off the jacks’!!!

RE: FW-190 584219

She certainly WAS run at St Athan, at at least one of the early/mid eighties ‘At Home’ days, maybe two, as I clearly remember both this and the Me410 being run early in the mornings on show day. I used to have photos of both running, but sadly I lost a lot of material in a move some years ago. But anyway yes, she once was a runner!

Now, she’s a Hendon dust collector.

It was always the done thing for St Athan- get there for gate opening time, leg it in, and have a good look around inside the Vulcan there before the crowds/queue built up and you didn’t get so much time inside! I remember on one year it was hooked up to ground power, so lots of little lights were twinkling and things were ‘humming’-magical!

RE: Hendon B-17

Y’know, I’m no photography expert-I used to go to all the shows with my fast film and long lenses, but these days I just go to watch-and likewise at Hendon, I used to try and use fast films, different exposures etc, and I nearly always ended up with a load of green-tinged rubbish. But just recently, I half-heartedly shot some pics at Hendon on supermarket 200ASA film, with my simple little Olympus compact, and they came out stunning!!!

Sometimes, you just can’t win.