Last week’s meeting of the Wings and Wheels Society Dursley was well attended when speakers Rich Kelsey and Pilot Dave Lamb gave an illustrated show entitled Kemble to Elvington a Flying visit to the North Yorkshire Air Museum.
The illustrated show was a look back to August 14th 2009 when Rich, Dave and Bill Westall charted a PA28 Aircraft from Kemble to Elvington airfield and visited the adjacent museum. The show started with Rich showing a five-minute video of the flight to Elvington’s take-offs and landings. After this he showed pictures of the exhibited aircraft and other items on show in this fascinating museum, with interesting facts about the exhibits.
Now named The Yorkshire Air Museum and Allied Air Forces Memorial, Elvington is situated near to York. The outward flight from Kemble to Elvington took one hour 20 minutes (with a good tail wind). The runway at Elvington is one of the longest in the UK at 3,094 meters in length. Elvington was a former Royal Air Force station which operated from the beginning of the Second World War in 1940 until 1992.
By October 1942 No 77 Squadron had 20 aircraft based at Elvington initially using the Armstrong Whitworth Whitley medium bomber although this was quickly replaced by the Handley Page Halifax four engine heavy bomber. No 77 Squadron Halifax suffered heavy losses during its time at Elvington with over 500 aircrew killed, missing or taken prisoner and almost 80 Halifax lost as it played a major part in the Battle of the Ruhr and the bombing of Berlin. The Museum to this day serves as a memorial to Bomber Command.
From the 2009 visit – the museum had many exhibits with a few that are no longer located there anymore, one of them is Tony Agar’s De-Havilland Mosquito HJ711 – this is now located at The Lincolnshire Aviation Heritage Centre, at East Kirkby Airfield where it does special taxing days for the public.
Rich also noted such exhibits at Elvington as Handley Page Victor ‘Lusty Lindy’ and Halifax Friday the 13th that completed 128 operations. The speaker also noted the history of Sir George Cayley (1773 – 1854) who was a Yorkshire engineer, inventor, and aviator. Caley is one of the most important people in the history of aeronautics, in fact he is the pioneer of aerial navigation and aeronautical engineering and designer of the first successful glider to carry a human being airborne in 1853.
A replica of this George Cayle glider hangs from the museum roof today. Other Exhibits that were discussed (to name a few): Messerschmitt BF109 G-6, Waco Hadrian CG-4A Glider that is like a Horsa Glider, and an English Electric Lightning F6. Rich ended of the evenings show with some aerial photos, taken on the flight home to Kemble that included images of Yorkshire and East Midland coal fired power stations, most of which have been decommissioned since the photos were taken in 2009! At the end of the evening there was a brief question-and-answer session, then Dave Lamb gave a vote of thanks to the Speaker.
The Next Wings and Wheels show will be held at Dursley Community Centre GL11 4BX on Thursday 14th November at 8pm with a show titled: Military Aviation procurement since 1945 – Success or Failure. The talk will be by retired Group Captain Jock Heron who was a widely experienced RAF fast jet pilot, having flown also on exchange duties with the United States and French Air Forces.
For further info email wingsteam@debsillusatration.co.uk or visit our web site at: www.wingsandwheelssociety.org.uk. Or Contact Rich 01453 544489 or Dave 01453 544348.