74 Miles M.38 Messenger 4 G-AKKG

Caption “Messanger KKG Shoreham 2nd August 1952”; first seen 28th June 1952 at Christchurch.

G-INFO and others have this as c/n 6700. http://daveg4otu.tripod.com/airfields/xchres.html records it as based at Christchurch to 1960 and from 1961. http://pascal.brugier.free.fr/registre/txt/hb-aaa.txt and http://members.aol.com/warwicaero/milesaircraft/aircraft/m38twoafhis.htm have it on the Swiss register as HB-EEC at some point. The latter notes it as crashed in the UK in 1968.

AJ Jackson squeezed off four shots of it (http://www.ajjcollection.co.uk/m6.htm)

73 Meteor 8 WK647 ‘Y’ again

An alternative view of the aircraft from posts 1 & 81 et al.

Caption “Meteor 8 WK647 Hullavington July 1952 54 Squadron (orange & blue squares)”

Taken at Hullavington ATC cadet camp (hence the pose of the chap left of the Meteor?)

Aircraft the the distance seem to me to be Wellingtons. Much better shot coming (No 82).

72 Fairchild Argus II G-AIYO

The next in an increasingly irregular series…

Caption “Argus IYO Shoreham 2nd August 1952”

According to G-INFO, a Fairchild 24W-41A serial number 850. No longer on the register.

Only a few hits on the web for this. It was owned or operated by a Walter Bowles in 1947 (http://www.beney.org.uk/personal/miles/wpb2.php but the captioned picture doesn’t display) who handed it to the Women’s Junior Air Corp. The RAF history pages mention the aircraft at http://www.raf.mod.uk/history/dianabw4.html in an article about the ATA pilot Diana Barnato-Walker:

“The W.J.A.C had their own aircraft, named “Grey Dove” it was a Fairchild, in which girls could fly for 7/6d. On some weekends over a 100 girls could fly depending on weather conditions.

The W.J.A.C Fairchild (G-AIYO) was due to be christened by HRH Princess Marina Duchess of Kent on the 17th July 1948, and was to be done in a unique ceremony, by pouring champagne over the engine housing! Diana arrived at White Waltham on the 11th July to collect the aircraft and enable her flying time to become familiar with it. She was climbing out of White Waltham on a test flight, having reached about 400 feet, when suddenly the aircraft burst into flames. Switching off the fuel Diana could have easily been in a fatal situation if the aircraft stalled, but where was there to land? She broke all rules that she had had drummed into her by instructors and experience over the years, and turned back to the airfield, ending the emergency by landing the aircraft diagonally across White Waltham airfield. The fire crew questioned Diana as to why she was starting to give them trouble after the war, being that she had a clean slate throughout it in far more dangerous circumstances! The aircraft was burnt and melted on the portside fuselage but in the three days that led up to its christening the damage was rectified to the best of the abilities of the ground crew and the ceremony took place as scheduled.”

Six photos of G-AIYO are listed in the AJ Jackson Collection (http://www.ajjcollection.co.uk/aiaa.htm).

ps what is the maximum attachment size now? It sure seems to be above 100kB.