How it was - 1980

[davebasing]

With almost all of us effectively locked down, reports and recent photos are likely to be in short supply for some time to come. I thought that I might therefore seek to bore you (and give me something to do) with some of my old photos and a few notes, starting for no particular reason with a selection from 40 years ago in 1980 by when I’d already been spotting and graphing for 20 years.
As affordable camera equipment was not what it is today (and no digital), coupled with the age of the now digitalised slides, my apologies for the quality of some of the shots.

That year began with a trip to the Icicle Meet at Marsh Benham , took in a few trips to Stansted, Mildenhall and other USAF bases, air shows at Brawdy, Greenham Common, Abingdon and Farnborough; the PFA Rallye at Leicester East; museums including Cardiff and Torbay; trips round Shawbury, Arborfield, Cosford and Bentwaters (either with BARG or organized through the CAA Flying Club of which I was then vice chair); and a few other places along the way. A stateside trip was made in October that year taking in the likes of MASDC, Marana, Mojave and a tour round the USAF maintenance facility at McClellan AFB in California and (while my wife was in the local launderette, for a crisp pound note for the young daughter of the guard who then took me round in his jeep) the Arizona National Guard at Tucson (then equipped with A7 Corsairs). 

I’ll do 1980 in bite size postings, at least until someone/everyone cries stop! Or alternatively, it might catch on for others to do something similar in their isolation? 

A crisp dawn start at Marsh Benham where 79 balloons hit the log (I still collected them then) –

Image1 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
Image2 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
Image7 by dave tompkins, on Flickr


Toy balloons (or inflatable bin bags as they should perhaps more accurately be called) were in evidence - the first and decidedly last time I ever recorded such abominations. Perhaps I should register all my large plastic duty free bags and charge people to come to log them? I wonder how many have logged G-ZZZZ (it’s a Pointmaker Mark 1 registered as a minimum lift device balloon in 1978 and actually a manhole cover at Lasham –“minimum lift” being the operative phrase -, registered as a protest at the bastardising of the UK register by my then CAA colleagues – but not by me!)
. Still, if these turn you on that's fine, just not for me.

Image4 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
Image7 by dave tompkins, on Flickr


Next outing was a week later in January taking in Stansted where CL44 PK-BAZ sat among the based TMAC fleet. I was seconded from the CAA to TMAC during 1979 including a week flogging CL44 G-AZML round Africa, where the swing tail hinges on the starboard side of the fuselage necessitated quite strong pressure on the controls to keep her in a straight line when manual flying in cruise and where the trim constantly worked overtime in auto mode. 
ac 001 by dave tompkins, on Flickr


And then on to Mildenhall where the KC135s were then all rotational (as this one from the New Jersey National Guard, amongst the 11 there that day) with no designated based aircraft, ensuring an ever-changing selection on almost every visit. Note that these were then still the basic A model with original J57 engines before retrofitting with the CFM56 to become KC135Rs or with PW102s to become KC135Es as did 80087 before being retired to AMARC. 96th Bomb Wing B52D 56-0659 was visiting Mildenhall that day (which I had seen at Upper Heyford the previous year and which was later preserved on the parade ground at Davis Monthan – photo of here there below which I took in 2011 - until broken up later in 2011), 2 C141s, a C5, an US Army C12 and civil DC8s from World and Airlift Int’l. Lakenheath just had a single F4G visiting from Spangdahlem. Sculthorpe was also visited for the French F100s & Mysteres and Belgian T33s being returned under the MDAP programme. No photos that day from outside but the USAF did hold a later photo day which I will get to later. Cambridge and Marham produced nothing I found worthy of note that day.


ac 002 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
IMG_0750 by dave tompkins, on Flickr


9 March saw a repeat of the Stansted/Mildenhall route, taking in Bentwaters and Woodbridge where the based A10s were still in the process of delivery. Stansted produced this former USAF Convair T29 which left AMARC supposedly for a proposed museum at Las Vegas but was seized by the Sheriff’s office. Released, it flew to Stansted then got as far as Ostend where it was sadly broken up in 1983. Also there were these two 707s plus 3 720s, an Aviogenex TU134, 737s from Maersk & Braathens, a DC9 from SAS and a Martinair DC10. 707 G-TJAA was one of 3 operated by Trans Asian on sub charters for carriers such as Air Malta, Egyptair and even BCAL. Air Anglia were in the process of becoming Air UK hence the hybrid scheme on this F27.

2 German Navy Starfighters were visiting Lakenheath while Mildenhall again produced 11 tankers, none of which were there in January, the Air Guard was this time represented by 59-1499 from Pennsylvania.

ac 011 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 006 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 005 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 007 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Nice sighting in March was Indian Navy Sea King IN552 flying down the Thames to join IN551 which had been flown to Stansted 3 days earlier for delivery in Heavylift Belfasts.


A repeat trip was made on 23 March when Mildenhall produced 12 tankers, only 3 of which remained from the earlier visit (so 31 different tankers on 3 visits thus far that year – 12 of which I needed), with the National Guard this time providing 57-1482 from Kansas (now in AMARC). Stansted produced another Aviogenex TU134 and Gulfstream 2 N60CC. British Cargo Airlines (formed by the merger of IAS and TMAC) had failed the previous week and its fleet of DC8s and CL44s (including the famous Conroy Guppy) were stored/impounded at Stansted. TMAC also had the former African Safaris DC8 G-BETJ on the far side of Stansted solely as a source of spares. I had also photographed her in Basle back in 1975 in her flying days as 5Y-ASA. ATL was scrapping Eagle Air B720 TF-VLC due to some serious corrosion issues. It was the only 720 I ever flew in, having a jump seat ride in her from Luton to Basle & back in 1977 when she was on wet lease to Britannia (photo in full Eagle Air scheme at Basle on that trip).

ac 015 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 014 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 013 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 017 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 018 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 021 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
asa by dave tompkins, on Flickr
75-eo by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 022 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
77-iq by dave tompkins, on Flickr



Part 2 of 1980, starting with a trip to Heathrow, will follow for those still awake. Keep safe all of you.

[davebasing]

Fingwer trouible again, the other toy balloon should have been -

Image6 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

[alfred]

Hello Dave, very interesting.Hope it is not a silly question.How do you mean you mean you were seconded from the CAA to TMAC?

[lordevanelpuss]

Not a bad thread to start with. I'll agree with your sentiments regarding toy balloons. It was clearly a loophole being exploited by those (as someone put it back at that time) keen to see their name printed in Civil Aircraft Markings. My attitude softened a little bit with those that weren't just black plastic bags bought from the local shop and did look like mini hot air balloons. Was it really worth the hassle? I wonder how many 'bin bags' were cancelled as 'Used for the purpose for which it was designed for'! And, to be a bit more up to date, can you imagine chinese lanterns being registered, then cancelled after just one flight!!

[zz]

Lovely stuff Dave, keep it up!
1980 was the year before I started spotting at the age of 6!

I agree with the sentiments of the bin bags- but I’ve always logged them to fill the gaps! Ridiculous really!
The toy or model balloons these days are superb, often smaller replicas of a larger, “real” balloon. But unlike the bin bags, they don’t tend to be registered.

Looking forward to seeing the rest of 1980 and hoping eventually for 1981...

Cheers

[davebasing]

Mar 30, 2020 16:01:57 GMT alfred said:

Hello Dave, very interesting.Hope it is not a silly question.How do you mean you mean you were seconded from the CAA to TMAC?

Hi Alfred - We had a secondment programme in the CAA whereby we could be loaned to a UK airline for a period of time. Usually this was, at the time, to BA or BCAL but I found that as a regulator I knew the square root of not very much about cargo operations and the issues they faced, despite being responsible for regulating them as part of the industry. I therefore argued for a cargo secondment and though the request raised a few eyebrows in the CAA at the time, Trans Meridean Air Cargo (TMAC) were only too happy to oblige, feeling that a better understanding would lead to better regulation, so off I went to Stansted. Ironically perhaps, after early retirement from the CAA, I have found myself employed part time for the past 20 years as an adviser to the express air cargo industry, so perhaps I did learn something along the way! Either that or it shows that you can fool most of the people most of the time, as someone once famously said.

[davidallum]

Fantastic post Dave and of course more please,BTW the wife sends her regards and hopes you are well.

[davebasing]

Mar 30, 2020 17:34:12 GMT davidallum said:

Fantastic post Dave and of course more please,BTW the wife sends her regards and hopes you are well.

Hi David - Thanks for that, still all well here thanks in no small way to your good lady and her colleagues at the hospital. They fully deserve all the thanks and appreciation that they are getting. Hope that she is staying safe.

[davidallum]

Thanks Dave and she is staying as safe as can be possible.

[Jeff]

Thanks Dave, looks like this could be a runner for the duration, have you thought of writing a book? .... Some of the story's you tell are fantastic, this ILS?? Beacon that went home every night was a classic 😊

[billsamuels]

Morning Dave.

As ever mate, superb idea and a fantastic delivery and start... I agree with Jeff, you should really write a book, it may note reach the ‘best sellers, list but it would certainly make a great read and your experiences, adventures and attention to detail would certainly be appreciated by the wider enthusiast and spotter community.

You’re a treasure mate and I love hearing about your life stories... 

Please keep them coming.

Bill

[davebasing]

Thanks Bill, but the last time anyone called me a treasure was a long ago girlfriend who then dug a hole and tried to bury me. Another (from Cornwall with a delightful accent) said that she could read me like a book, but sadly it wasn't braille!

[christoff]

Mar 31, 2020 9:22:02 GMT davebasing said:

Thanks Bill, but the last time anyone called me a treasure was a long ago girlfriend who then dug a hole and tried to bury me. Another (from Cornwall with a delightful accent) said that she could read me like a book, but sadly it wasn't braille!

Was it a popup book   

[graham]

Fantastic stuff Dave, great narrative as ever and superb photos. It prompted me to go back over my logs and whilst I was nowhere busy as you were, I did attend several shows in 1980 including Rhein-Main, IAT, Duxford, Bentwaters, Mildenhall, Farnborough and Coltishall. Unfortunately, I wasn't a photographer back then which is a pity.

[davebasing]

So, Part 2. Moving into April 1980, the 4th saw me at Heathrow by the 27L approach.
ac 032 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 028 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

That appears from my logs to have been my only April outing (my wife must, as usual, have found me other/better things to do) but star of the month was Convair 990 N4339D noted over my house (I was then in Upminster) on the 12th. New to me but it was however a not uncommon sight at the time being operated by General Dynamics and a frequent visitor to Europe in connection with the F16 production lines. In 1967 I arranged my return flight from the Paris air show to be on Convair 990 N5605 which Air France had on lease from Modern Air Transport. Bit basic inside but went like a rocket.
In the 60s and early 70s Wethersfield was always on the itinerary, frequently attracting significant numbers of visitors at weekends, usually USAF (F100s, F102s etc) but on one day I was there in 1968 the Dutch Air Force joined in with half a dozen F84Fs. After the based 20 TFW left for Upper Heyford given Wethersfield’s proximity to Stansted which was then scheduled to become London’s 3rd airport, only occasional exercises were held there, usually with either U2s or MC130 Combat Talon Hercules. A visit on 8 May produced 5 Hercs of which only 64-0566 was needed, but which went on to be UK based later in its life, ending up as a structural test frame in Georgia.
A long day on 11 May began at Thorpe Water Park beside the M3 in Chertsey to see needed Sea Hawk WV798 which was part of the attraction there (and went on to the museum at Lasham) together with various other aircraft including an ex Danish AF Hunter, Sea Vixen etc. Going on to Blackbushe a few aircraft were still left over from the filming of Hanover Street some 2 years before, plus Doug Arnold’s ex Peruvian Thunderbolt N47DE which I graphed again a mere 34 years later in a better scheme in the museum at Palm Springs California, now registered as N47RP.
ac 038 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 039 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 040 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
IMG_7659 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Fair Oaks that day produced the Goodyear airship N2A, which was a fairly common sight in the skies around London in those days, and Merlin G-IIIB. Onward to Salisbury where Vampire XD453 had been preserved with the local 1010 ATC squadron since 1965. It left there for Old Sarum in 1984 then to Yorkshire but was sadly neglected having suffered some 20 years outside in Salisbury and was finally broken up at Millom in 1997.
ac 037 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 041 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

We then carried on to Popham (probably my first visit there but where my - then un-born - son now keeps his part share Cessna 150 which we take up when he is not doing his day job as a B737 captain) and Thruxton where the only thing of any real note was former Confederate Air Force Beech Mentor N16JL (though this had been at the July 1977 show at Blackbushe). While looking a bit tatty it did eventually return to the US becoming N234KC and finally coming to grief at McCall, Idaho in September 2003. Boscombe that day was hosting a deployment of F111s from Canon, New Mexico where I made all 16 of them. We also went to the Defence establishment at Winterborne Gunner which housed Meteor VT260 (now preserved in California), two Whirlwinds and an Argosy. Middle Wallop probably had a fly-in as we logged 24 UK light aircraft there, while Farnborough produced a Gannet, a pair of Gnats, 2 Buccaneers, 5 Whirlwinds a Wessex, Scout, Hastings, Comet and Sea Vixen.

A CAA flying club visit around Bentwaters to see the new A10s took place later in May where 31 based Hogs were noted plus a Torrejon F4D and a pair of Zweibricken RF4Cs. The early A10 deliveries were in the grey scheme while later ones arrived in camo. We often got pre-notification of the delivery flights and, if the days were long enough, would scuttle off after work to Bentwaters to catch their evening arrivals, as per this example with long range tanks in the gathering gloom in late April 1979 when 6 arrived from the States. Woodbridge down the road produced a further 19 A10s (thus 50 of them seen for the day), and the then based Rescue Hercs and H53s.
80-a10 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
79-bw by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 044 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
80-H53 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

26 May saw the start of a road trip with my wife to Wales and the show at Brawdy. First stop was the museum at Cardiff-Rhoose. The museum opened in 1976 (entry was 15p!) and closed in 1998. Among the exhibits were an F100, Mystere and T33 which had been returned to the USAF at Sculthorpe under MDAP and all 3 were sadly cut up in February 1998. As officially on loan from the USAF a US representative had to be on site to witness the scrapping. Viscount G-AOJC was painted by the museum in local Cambrian Airways scheme despite never flying with that airline. The fuselage then went to Enstone in 96 and was broken up there in 97 with the cockpit going to a diving centre in Oxfordshire.
Image14 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
Image16 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Then on to the ATC squadron at Kenfig Hill who had (and still have) a rather rare Mark 1 Hunter from the first ever Hunter production batch.
Swansea the next day produced Aerostar D-IMHS.
ac 046 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
Image17 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Visits to Brawdy on the show day and the day before accounted for over 50 Hawks as I was lucky enough to be invited into the hangars (plus the Arrows who flew as an 8 ship having lost XX262 9 days earlier, hitting the mast of a boat during a display off Brighton sea front) and 27 Hunters. Foreign participation in the show were Germany (Transall, F4F and a G91T) and Belgium (3 x SF260), plus 2 A10s and an F111E from the USAF. The two based Meteors below (which were the last 2 in RAF operational service) had very different subsequent fates. WA669 was destroyed in the fatal vintage pair collision with Vampire XH304 at the 1986 show at Mildenhall. I caught up with VZ467 again in Australia in 2006 where she is now preserved in the Temora museum in New South Wales masquerading as Australian Air Force “A77-851”. Also not often did one see a camo Jet Provost. Spitfire PS915 was the gate guard (with the Hunter now preserved in Basingstoke) but is now flying again with the BBMF.
ac 051 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 052 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 053 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 057 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
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ac 062 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 054 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

2 days later it was the IAT (not yet Royal) show at Greenham Common in the rain, which will be the start of part 3 (and soon for young ZZ, 1981)

[davebasing]

As usual old age made me miss out the Meteor in Temora

oz 470 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

[graham]

Stunning stuff Dave.

[davebasing]

Part 3 and more blowing the dust and cobwebs off the old logs -

31 May 1980 it was the IAT (not yet Royal) show at Greenham Common in the rain where 2 of the Canon F111s on detachment at Boscombe Down were in the static.

ac 066 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 072 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 067 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Alconbury on 9 June produced 8 RF4C Phantoms from The Alabama National Guard routing back from a deployment in Germany supported by an Ohio Guard C130B 61-0952. Sitting forlornly was the wreck of Phantom XV589 which had crashed on finals 6 days earlier when the nose cone suddenly swung open (crew ejected OK).

A BARG trip to Arborfield & Odiham on 18 June found 6 Sioux, 2 Scouts an AOP9 and 2 Beavers in use for Army Air Corps training at Arborfield, plus a Meteor TT20 and parts of 2 Jet Provosts. Beaver XP806 was rebuilt with parts of crashed XP815 after 806 had itself crashed in Oman in 1970. Amazingly it left Arborfield for the gate at Middle Wallop and later was sold to an outfit in Alaska as N450LA.
ac 075 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 077 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Odiham had based 8 Wessex and 19 Pumas (the first Chinook delivery was still a few months away), plus preserved Sycamore WV781 (now preserved at Caernarfon) and fire trainers Wessex XS871 (which went to a scrappy in Chippenham) and Whirlwind XP333 (or half of it) which moved on to a final end at the fire school at Manston.
ac 078 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 079 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

5 July saw a trip to take in the 5 B52Gs for the annual bombing competition at Marham with 58-0189 displaying the unit’s WW2 tail marks – notice the based Canberras in the background. Then on to the PFA Rally at Leicester East. Stansted was the first stop producing this ex Pan Am B707 which went on to the Government of Benin (saw it active as such at Gatwick in 1988, then graphed it again in store at Ostend in 95) before being dismantled at Ostend in 1997 going on to become a restaurant in Wetteren, Belgium in 1997 where it could be seen (together with a T33) from the air during the descent on my regular flights to Brussels. Also at Stansted was this Kuwait Air Force DC9. Together with sister ship serial 320 they were not uncommon visitors to the UK until 320 was destroyed during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.
ac 082 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 085 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
95-da by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 084 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Logged 372 at the PFA Rallye (154 needed - still collected light aircraft then) which as always produced some “WTF is that” aircraft, like the Szep HFC125 below which is now preserved in the transport museum in a park in Budapest. Percival Gull G-AERD can now be found displayed in the foyer of the National Museum of Australia in Canberra. This is because Edgar Percival was actually Australian where he was both a pilot and an engineer. He came to the UK to serve with the Royal Flying Corps in WW1, returned to Australia then back again to the UK as an Air Ministry test pilot before founding his own aircraft manufacturing company. The Dewotaine in Swiss marks was G-BBMI and is still in the US as N282DW with the Kermit Weeks collection at Polk City. And a Beagle Airedale, a rather disastrous and ill-considered attempt to compete with the likes of the infinitely better performing PA28 and Cessna 172. Heavy and grossly under powered, Beagle managed somehow eventually to produce 43 when the break-even level was supposedly about 675! The Beagle Terrier fared no better, as it took more man hours to convert from the original Army Air Corps Austers than it had taken to build the original aircraft. Had the chance to handle one Terrier which was a saga deserving of a whole page in itself if it didn’t still give me nightmares, involving Wells Cathedral, a PAN call and Staverton’s finest fire trucks.
PFA1 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
PFA2 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
PFA3 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
PFA4 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
PFA5 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

16 July and a visit to the RAF technical training school at Cosford, then using the likes of Javelins, Shackletons, ex Red Arrows Gnats etc, while Vampire XE993 was slowly rotting on the dump after it had arrived from an ATC unit in Huddersfield. It did leave for the Tong paintball park in Staffordshire before being returned to the RAF at Stafford in 2010 for a possible re-build but was considered beyond human help and was finally scrapped in 2013.
ac 091 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 098 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 095 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 101 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 107 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

A trip round RAF Shawbury the following week and the based Wessex, Whirlwind, Jet Provosts, Gazelles and Chipmunks. It was the time of the local fete for which Shawbury had built this cute ‘Gazelle’ float for the river race.
ac 115 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 122 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 129 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 126 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Part 4 will cover the Mildenhall, Farnborough & Abingdon shows before going Stateside.

[zz]

Great stuff, keep it coming!!

[davebasing]

Part 4

2nd August and another trip to Stansted & Mildenhall. Stansted produced this Canadian Gulfstream (the 9th production aircraft) and an Air Guinea 727, while Mildenhall had 18 tankers including from the Air Guards of Ohio and Arizona plus no less than 5 from the Air Force Reserve. World DC8 N805WA also arrived. 4 August saw a fly past of 12 CFS Jet Provosts over London. Next trip was to the Alconbury show on 16 August via to Stapleford, Stansted, Mildenhall and Duxford. The Hall produced the (then) infamous C141 40612 and overshoots by 4 Ramstein Phantoms. Alconbury was fairly low key though I did manage to need 11 including this Phantom from Hahn.

ac 131 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 373 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 132 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 139 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

The Mildenhall show on the 24th was more fruitful with the Canadians sending a Buffalo, two T33s and 7 Starfighters. Austria sent 6 Saab105s and the French, Dutch, Norwegians, Germans and Spanish also participated. Always nice to see a Mohawk even if not needed that day. Lakenheath had 2 visiting Phantoms from the 57FIS in Iceland plus a Marines KC130R

ac 141 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

The Army recruiting office in the Strand, London had Gazelle ZA732 on display during Farnborough week. Northolt and Odiham still hosted visiting aircraft for the Farnborough show though not in the numbers that once prevailed. Odiham on 3 September had 3 French Air Force Nord 262s and a Falcon 20, a German AF Hansa and a Dutch F27M while there were just 6 RAF visitors which I noted. Gone were the days when Odiham opened its gates for access to the flight line each day after the final arrival of the morning. The Farnborough show included this Finnish Valmet V70 and the F27 destined for the Angolan Air Force. 13 September and the Battle of Britain show at Abingdon which was then the RAF overhaul centre for the Jaguar, 20 of the type being noted. Also then based were the Bulldogs of both the London and Oxford University Air Squadrons and the Chipmunks of 6 Air Experience Flight. Carried on to Brize Norton for 3 B52Ds and Fairford for 3 KC135s.

ac 159 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 160 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 168 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

ac 173 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 177 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Only 1 other visit of note before going to the States, being to the USS Nimitz anchored in Stokes Bay whose C1 Trader was at Lee-on-Solent where a number of the engineering school helicopters were also noted outside including 9 Whirlwinds and 3 Wessex.

Off Stateside on 4 October on Pan Am 747-100 N747PA, the second to be built and which ended her days as a restaurant in South Korea before finally being scrapped after the restaurant had closed . Due to taking on some last-minute cargo and hence extra fuel (while we were sitting on the aircraft for well over an hour with the curt cabin announcement being that the alternative to the need to take on extra fuel at LHR was to reduce weight by off-loading some passengers “and you wouldn’t want that would you”. Typical Pan Am in my experience – dreadful airline!). Even so we still had to make a landing in Winnipeg for fuel before carrying on to Los Angeles. Our return flight from SFO in 747 N652PA while supposedly non-stop (and 3 hours late) but also made an en-route stop this time at Seattle for some unknown reason but, like Winnipeg, at least allowed a few more to go into the book.
It was primarily a 3 week family holiday but with a fair number of stops along the way for aeronautical activity. Thus the first outing was to Universal Studios where the back lot (co-incidentally) had various aircraft that had been used as film props, including this T33 which had been written off USAF charge after an accident on Boxing Day 1962 at Norton AFB and a sectioned B29 the cockpit of which was saved and is now preserved in Stockton, Ca. Never did discover what the fuselage in front of the B29 nose was (DC3?).
ac 178 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 179 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Quick stop at Van Nuys produced another T33 which to this day is still there (having arrived there in 1974), albeit now kept inside the North Valley Occupational Centre at the airfield. Also there was this interestingly registered Lockheed C60 Lodestar XA-SEX. Another survivor (originally delivered to the Free French Air Force in 1944) it is now preserved in the superb USAF Museum in Dayton Ohio with its original serial 43-16445.
Though I didn’t collect such things, the commuter terminal at LAX produced these Air Bahia Navajos just two months before the airline folded.
ac 180 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 181 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 190 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Travelling east towards Tucson we were given ramp access at Marana. The former US Navy S58 N46916 was subsequently sold in Mexico as XB-DZX; the Vampire (supposedly ex Australian AF) defied identification; while Neptunes abounded for fire fighting together with a B17 now preserved in Oregon; the Mexican Air Force King Air was on maintenance while a few aircraft were in store (nowhere near the numbers to be seen there now). The APSA Convair 990 (OB-R728) was broken up there but its forward fuselage ended up in the ARM yard next to AMARC. The test bed B26 had been modified with the addition of a turboprop engine on the nose. With that now removed, she stands outside these days in good condition as an instructional airframe at the South Mountain High School in Phoenix as N25GT.
ac 200 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 196 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 198 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 199 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 208 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
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ac 204 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

Part 5 will start in Tucson and include a full day tour of AMARC (then MASC) where we were allowed to wander off the Air Force bus at the end of each area and collected at the other end to go on to the next (those were the days!).

[davidallum]

I lost count of the number of times we were sat outside our house in Tilehurst,Reading with the box on listening to "London,MAC 40612",ah happy days.

[alfred]

Very interesting.Have to agree about Pan Am, awful with arrogant staff.Used them a couple of times to New York.
Six months later flew with Wardair to Vancouver, what a difference.

[christoff]

Apr 10, 2020 16:42:13 GMT davidallum said:

I lost count of the number of times we were sat outside our house in Tilehurst,Reading with the box on listening to "London,MAC 40612",ah happy days.

Ahhh 40612 It's on the back of a toilet door at work, although I know not how it got there 

[davebasing]

Just realised that 3 shots that were meant to be included in Part 4 somehow got away - including our friend 40612 which was retired in AMARC and transferred to the HVF yard for scrapping on 10 June 2004!

ac 214 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 209 by dave tompkins, on Flickr
ac 137 by dave tompkins, on Flickr

[graham]

Great stuff Dave and many thanks for managing to shed light on an old query. Back around 98/99 I worked for a chemical and PPE distributor in Wiltshire and Flowers Scrap Yard in Chippenham was one of my regular accounts. It was run by a father and his three sons, all of them were strapping blokes that you would definitely want on your side in a punch up but they were the most decent blokes you could hope to meet - "salt of the earth" I believe would be apt.

I remember calling in one day and seeing bits of a Wessex on the heap there, I had a look but couldn't find a reg and the guys there didn't know either.

On checking my logs I did see XS871 at Culdrose Show on 27/7/77 but at least now, 20 years on from her arriving at Flowers, I finally have her reg.

[davebasing]

Hi Graham - Glad it was of use. Its the time for going through old logs. Back in 1963 I went by underground, train and bus from Chiswick to the open house at Bentwaters (no family car then, it wouldn't have fitted in the shoe box we called home, right next to the freshly licked gravel- with fond memories of Tim Brooke-Taylor RIP who co-wrote that famous sketch). There were two dumped C47s there, one of which I read and the other which I noted as 'on its belly' and could only read part of the serial. In those days there was of course no internet and few magazines which were anyway mostly civil oriented. Many years later BARG did run an article on USAF C47s in Europe but only those noted from 1964 onwards. This week I came across that gap in the log and began a bit of a lateral thinking search which eventually led me to a USAF accident report on a C47 which had swung during a test run with only engineering staff on board and with the rudder gust lock still engaged thus preventing them from correcting the swing, causing it to go off the paved surface and the gear to collapse. The location - Bentwaters; the date - just before the 1963 show; the serial - including exactly the digits I was able to read that day. Only took me 57 years to solve it. Still remember the kindness that day of two older spotters behind me in the very long queue for the local bus back to the station who decided to give up and hail a taxy, inviting me to share it but who wouldn't let me pay my share as they decided (rightly) that I was still a schoolboy and therefore not exactly flush with money. Whoever you were I thank you.

[graham]

Just out of interest Dave, would you know if Flowers scrapped any other aircraft?. I believe the business closed quite a few years ago now and there's a housing estate on the extensive area that the yard covered in Wood Lane.

[davebasing]

Hi Graham - Yes, Flowers yard dealt with quite a significant number of aircraft over many years including those which were struck off at nearby RAF Colerne from post WW2 onwards. Don't have my older Wrecks & Relics any more but I know it used to feature regularly in those. Canberras, Sea Hawks, Swifts etc of the more modern types but some much older and more long lived aircraft were actually found there and saved from the yard including Spitfire MH367 (which had been there since 1948!) which was rescued from the yard in around 1988 and is now flying again in New Zealand, large parts of a Hawker Typhoon which are I think now at Staverton and some Hurricane parts. The Wessex from Odiham was I think however the only one of that type to have been there. Perhaps someone with access to older issues of Wrecks & Relics might be able to add more details.

[davebasing]

Just remembered that in around 1975 Flowers yard also dealt with at least a couple of the numerous Varistys that were withdrawn at 5MU Kemble, WF377 & 389.

[rugbyref]

I got so close to a flight in a Varsity from RAF Oakington. All strapped in (with parachutes stowed!) when the pilot discovered an oil leak and aborted the flight.