ozzy72 wrote on Apr 14^th, 2012 at 6:57pm:


I doubt anything further than what's already been released in the public domain by Peter Arnold can be ventured...

As for how many are currently airworthy, or in the process of being restored to flight (such as formerly airworthy - crashed - PL983) or undergoing major overhaul (Shuttleworth's AR501), his list makes 76. The figure's been around the 45-50 capable of flight at any one time for about the last 5-10 years, and around 25 airworthy in the UK at any one time for about the last 10-15 years (as new ones have appeared, others have gone Stateside [generally], crashed, or undergoing major maintenance).

jetprop wrote on Apr 14^th, 2012 at 6:31pm:


EXACTLY!!! This is why I was and still am floored by it every day!!!! I can go on and on and on about aircraft they do not know about. At least HALF could not identify a U-2 Dragon Lady, F-14 (once you say Top Gun they got it), A-7, F-4, F-86, ANY Mig, ANY Su, ANY Tu, ANY Yak, and on and on and on..I am not joking nor exaggerating. Those of us that are fluent in aviation history are apparently a rare breed. All throughout grade school I was the only kid I (as far as I knew) that was an aviation nut. At GRCC I still was, I thought that would change getting into an aeronautical engineering program but nope. Problem is aeronautical engineering today is done because it is a job. I hear all the time from freshman that they picked it because "planes are cool", but they refuse to learn anything about aviation unless they will be graded on it. This is especially true of foreign students, they don't care much at all about aviation.
Aviation is not 'cool' nor is it widely accepted in schools. Thankfully EAA has been on a crusade against this trend, they have started a program that raises funds to buy aircraft kits for highschool student groups to build and eventually fly. The students are helped along by EAA members and anyone with the right experience EAA can get their hands on...simply put, we need to SHARE aviation as much as possible!! If you have a plane, please offer to take others flying, get them hooked on it! If all you have is flight sims, share it! Show it off!! Nearly every person deep down has a an eye for flying in one way or another.

I am curious how any person can purchase even one of these aircraft.

Do they not still belong to the Royal Air Force and should the taxpayer not be reinbursed somehow in todays figures?

C wrote on Apr 15^th, 2012 at 8:09pm:


Looks like I need to grab a shovel and head over there..

There's potential to lose a lot more than can be gained. Remember that 12 years of legwork have been done by a private individual to find them with no guarantee they could be exported once recovered. Let someone else have the risk, as UK PLC owns more Spitfires than anyone else already (with some in storage). It would be hard to justify spending public money when all that may remain are some disintegrated hulks with a few valuable data plates, which probably even in good condition would have no more than a $250,000 value.

Essentially what the individuals concerned have are salvage rights, and the right to dispose of whatever they find how they wish.

As an aside to my previous post, IIRC they are though to be quite close to the main runway at an airport, so as you can imagine, in the 67 years since they were allegedly buried there's a chance "the earth has moved" in more ways than one!

Thanks for the Link "Jetranger"...very good read...