She looks in lovely condition, the nosewheel in the air shot looks very evocative, and there must be great temptation to get some daylight under the mains….

Heard some Merlins mid afternoon and the saw the 9 Tornados and Canberra pass to the south of us. Pointed out to my 3 year old that it was probably the last time he would see a Canberra in RAF service….. 🙁

Turning the engine off in flight is the best part – especially if you’re giving a ride to a helicopter pilot…… and you don’t tell him you’re going to do it

You’re talking two diametrically opposed methods of achieving flight there!

One of the most impressive things that I have seen is a CFS Gazelle Instructor chopping the power in a 100′ hover, landing, lifting off to 10′, doing a 360, landing, lifting off to 10′, doing a 180 and landing again all from the enrgy in the rotor-head, that’s Rotary gliding!

Nice selection, good alternative to Autotrader for those ‘when I win the Lottery…’ moments

I only ever managed the Powered things from Henlow (Venture T2?), it is rather odd to deliberately stop a perfectly good engine mid-flight 😮

Spikes and High voltage Elastic-Trickery are best.

In my youth I worked in a garage where we would cone off the entrances temporarily whilst the tanker unloaded, every time at least one person would drive up, move the cones out of the way and drive onto the forecourt….never under-estimate the stupidity of the public!

Can’t see why not? A helicopter is not subject to the same airframe stresses as a fixed-wing aircraft, so as long as you’ve got the spares, it should be able to go on indefinately! It just needs someone with the money and enthusiasm. There is already a lovely former Sabena Sikorsky H-34 flying in German Army colours in Germany(should really be in SABENA colours!) There have also been several Whirlwinds on the civil register( ex Rescue HAR.10, 32 Sqn. HAR.10 and the former Queens Flight HCC12), which makes me wonder why they don’t seem to last long in civil hands as I haven’t seen any of them for a few years now? :confused: Are they too expensive to operate, do the owners run out of spares or do they just get fed up with them?

Back in ’89 I was told that the Wessex cost the RAF £2,500/hr to run, could explain the lack of civvie ones…