17 replies to this topic

[Cooperman]

I saw the famous Vulcan bomber XH558 fly over my home toady. What a fantastic sight she made. The last time I saw a Vulcan flying was this same aircraft at the Cranfield Dreamflight Air-show on 20th Sept 1992.
It is just such an impressive sight. No wonder the Yanks called it 'The Aluminum Overcast'.
Anyone else seen it and been impressed?

[OllieTheWelder]

I've seen it at Waddington RAF base, It was pretty amazing. It looked as if it flew so slow and the noise was deafening.

[stretters]

She was at Clacton airshow a couple of weeks back, but unfortunately I was chained to the desk at work and missed her!

[mininuts]

Saw Vulcans a couple of times at Woodford, (BAE), air show way back in '74/'75. My uncle worked there so we used to get complimentary tickets every year and I remember sitting on the edge of the roof on his Vauxhall Viva HC watching the show.
I was only 7 or 8 but, I still remember the sheer size and sound of the Vulcan.

[sonikk4]

When i joined Betty's bombers in 1980 one of the lads on my FLM course Pete Cron was posted onto the Vulcan mainly because he was a shortie and would fit nicely into the fuel tanks. He was told that by the instructors as well. Big beastie along with the Victors as well.

[Cooperman]

The H.P. Victor was arguably the better aeroplane. It was faster, higher and carried a bigger bomb load than Vulcan if I remember correctly. It was also in RAF service for longer and was flying as a tanker as late as 1990 in the Gulf War
The most impressive take off I ever saw was a test Victor with 4 Scorpion rocket motors fitted by de Havilland Engines doing a measured take-off and climb test at Hatfield when I was an apprentice there. It was, quite simply, incredible.

[sonikk4]

The scary thing about the Victors was bailing out of the side chute. Pilot and Co got bang seats whereas the rest of the crew had to bail out the l/h side via a chute type device.

[Bagpuss127]

I saw the Vulcan at Waddington Airshow last year, got to agree what an awesome sight and sound !
If any one wants to have a look round a Vulcan including a cockpit tour get down to Newark air museum, their static exibit is amazing.

[Alex_B]

Seen XH558 twice now, once at the goodwood Revival last year and once this year at Airbourne, Eastbournes yearly airshow. Its an amazing aircraft and has such a dominance over everything, at airbourne I was sitting on a beach best part of 4 miles away from beachy head and you could see it doing figures of 8 waiting for its slot and even from that far away it was breathtaking.

This was shot from beachy head by someone, amazing view from up there!

[sonikk4]

Seen XH558 twice now, once at the goodwood Revival last year and once this year at Airbourne, Eastbournes yearly airshow. Its an amazing aircraft and has such a dominance over everything, at airbourne I was sitting on a beach best part of 4 miles away from beachy head and you could see it doing figures of 8 waiting for its slot and even from that far away it was breathtaking.

This was shot from beachy head by someone, amazing view from up there!

We were waiting for the big V to fly over my mates house in East Dean that day (Barbie time) and never even heard it so gutted. Having seen the vids that must have looked awesome flying that low especially as it looked level with the lighthouse as well.

[86mayfair]

I saw it at CarFest a couple of weeks ago - It struck me how huge it was.

It looked so slow and was really very quiet until the pilot throttled up and went into a climb. It was so loud!

[silver_toes]

My dad worked on both the victor and the vulcan during his time in the RAF. I've seen XH558 a couple of times, once flying and once parked up. If anyone's interested there's a 'Vulcan to the sky' group made up primarily of old RAF mechanics and pilots who keep this beautiful A/C flying.

See this website for more info http://www.vulcantothesky.org/

when my Dad retired a few months ago he got a picture of the Vulcan signed by all the aircrew and support staff as a retirement present. I'll see if I can dig out some of his original photos taken when he worked on them if anyone's interested

[davej]

I`ve seen the Vulcan a few times at airshows and I love it, such an amazing aircraft. Its home is at Doncaster airport and they do tours around it, one day I will get up there to see it. If you like the Victor as well then definitely read Vulcan 607 by Rowland White, its all about getting the Vulcan down to the Falklands, amazing read.

[Udo]

For the first 21 years of my life I lived in a village which was under RAF waddingtons take off/landing corridors, a very common sight in my youth but still nice to see

[Cooperman]

Don't forget the Vickers Valiant, the 3rd of the RAF's 'V-Bomber Force'. Only one left now in the RAF Museum at Hendon.
Did anyone see the video of the Victor at Bruntingthorpe which inadvertantly got well-airborn when doing a fast taxi-run at a show there in 2009. It was b****y dangerous and it was lucky the outcome wasn't more serious! www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3HaeYVlBw8

We do seem to have some other aviation enthusiasts on here.