Such a shame the B25 was wasted like that and came to the state it's in now. Imagine if it had gone (at this point and state when with Aces High) to Elvington or Newark as they are now. They would have really done something with it and kept it in good order. It was a real looker when it was at Southend Historic Aircraft Museum, especially after it had the nose changed and got repainted again. It all went downhill after it's B17G top turret was loaned to the TV company that made "We'll meet again" for use either on Sally B or making the mould for a fresh blown turret ( I can't remember which it was) and they never gave it back to HAM to be refitted, so a sheet of alloy had to be pop riveted over that gaping turret hole After being "sold" at the museum auction and the sale falling through it passed to Aces High who moved it to their then base at DX, where after re-assembly it got damaged in the storm of '87. Moving on to North Weald it had a cosmetic blow-over into a pseudo USAAF scheme but when sold at a DX auction to a new DX based owner (who allegedly mistook it and thought he was buying the Aces High airworthy camera ship "Dolly") it fell into advanced disrepair and inaction whilst a wrangle played out. During this time it was pushed onto the grass by the M11 and exfoliation corrosion dealt it a death blow far beyond the salvation by any museum. I imagine it might one day appear at a cockpit-fest type event, though the interior was gutted and vandalised when I last saw her.
The b25 is now in the very safe hands of wings museum and them are slowly restoring back to former glory and will go display when completed, they have made good progress on the nose when I saw it in January!
With the Duxford scene all quiet at the moment a look back to 1974 with a couple of pictures of Nord 1002 G-ATBG then owned by Lindsey Walton. This aircraft is still of course based at Duxford.
With Duxford's current closure, to help keep the thread going, here's a few images scanned from my slides of Ormond Haydon-Baillie's CF-100 and T-33s at Duxford in the 1970's:
Avro Canada CF-100 Canuck 18393/G-BCYK Duxford 1975 SCAN00121 by Fred Taylor, on Flickr
Canadair T-33AN Silver Star G-WGHB Duxford 1974 SCAN00395 by Fred Taylor, on Flickr
Canadair T-33AN Silver Star G-OAHB Duxford 1974 SCAN00394 by Fred Taylor, on Flickr
Just to keep the thread alive !! A couple of pics from the late Pete Loveday Collection of B17 N17TE arriving at Duxford on the 16/3/75. Now of course the well loved Sally B.
I’d concur that it’s what is now the Armoury cafe, now with the visitors centre behind and the Airspace building behind that.
As an aside the other cafe, The Workshop, was the old dopeshop hence the chimneys at either end to improve airflow through the building.
(Mark Twain: There are lies, there are damn lies and then there are statistics)
Good news for a change, with Spitfire PR.XI PL983 / G-PRXI back in the air today (first flight since being damaged at Midden Zeeland on August 22nd last year );
No pics, of course, but an idea of what a practice display looks like:
Good news for a change, with Spitfire PR.XI PL983 / G-PRXI back in the air today (first flight since being damaged at Midden Zeeland on August 22nd last year );
No pics, of course, but an idea of what a practice display looks like:
Unlikely to be a practice display, flying that pattern. More likely a ‘not beyond 10 miles from home base’ flight allowed under the current regulations.
Duxford is coming back to life!
Today saw plenty of activity including a late evening photoshoot for the Mustang formerly known as 'The Shark', with Harvard G-BGPB, which is now carrying a 4th Fighter Group paint scheme. The attachment pictures it landing last Friday.
