It would appear that 20 Spitfires that were sent to Burma shortly before the end of the war are about to be found. They were buried in the crates they arrived in to prevent them falling into enemy hands and then "forgotten".....
I wonder if that includes shed loads of spare parts too??

Fingers crossed

The only slight problem I see is that the government will auction them off, half will disappear into storage after the price of good intentions is realised and the other half will end up going to America (sadly where the collectors have the cash to rebuild them) and the UK will not really get a look in. Still, if that is the price to double the world's collection of flying Spits, then maybe the it is a price worth paying..........

Hagar wrote on Apr 14^th, 2012 at 4:27am:



I was figuratively speaking Hagar, but never the less it would be a huge addition. Could you imagine getting them all together in one place for a flyby. Maybe someone should start planning the 100th anniversary as these things are quite an undertaking

Matt

PS If the above ever took place we would need to put in an order for a porta-loo and a box of Kleenex. After the flyby has finished, Ozzy would need some personal time to himself......................

I've heard these sort of tales before. I hope it is true and that some of them are fit enough to be restored. It would be lovely to see more of them on the circuit

Why do people in the states and england complain about what isn't at airshows???
Here in Ireland there are no airshows at all!
Unless you count the ocasional helicopter taken out for a short flight.
The closest I had seen to an airshow here was a 3 helicopter line flight over the harbour today!

jetprop wrote on Apr 14^th, 2012 at 9:40am:


True, we should feel fortunate, but I tend to feel all aircraft deserve to fly and deserve a chance to be revered by the general public. As I stated in a different topic, the P-51 has absorbed the warbird scene here in the states at airshows. Many times that is the only warbird. Yes there is a wide variety of warbirds flying in the states, but too many seem to come out only for certain special shows like those put on by air museums (Chino and Thunder Over Michigan come to mind). The vast majority of students in my aeronautical engineering course have no idea what a Spitfire is, a Hurricane, Lancaster, F4F, F6F, F8F, F7F, P-38, P-47 (yes the Jug), B-25, B-24, and on and on...keep in mind these are AERONAUTICAL ENGINEER STUDENTS, they (we) are in college to learn how to design aircraft and the vast majority do not know what some of the most influential and important aircraft are!! You ask them what a P-51 is they know (they are common at airshows) and most know what a B-17 is (thank you hollywood)...but the P-51 is not the fighter that everyone makes it out to be. There are many other piston pounders in WW2 that could out-fly a Mustang (Spits being one)...so my beef has more to do with frustration with the INCREASING lack of enthusiasm for historical aircraft. Every time I over hear a lay-person at an air museum or airshow talk about the warbird in front of them it is usually something along the lines of "oh, so this plane did this....whatever"  . This is very very frustrating for me!!

Don't get too excited there are and are romoured to be various aircraft across the far east. Finding them is one thing, getting them out another...

About 10 years ago the Shuttleworth lot tried to get a Balliol or two out of Sri Lanka IIRC; a two seat Merlin trainer being a rare commodity. Peter Vacher also had "fun" getting his the derelict Hurricane hulk out of India (he details the fun in his book). Lots of "diplomacy" is needed - particularly in far reaching former corners of the empire where we taught them the art of bureaucracy, and having everything in triplicate, and signed by everyone including the cleaner's dog. And giving the correct bloke a tenner... or three. Or a cheque. A blank one.

Obviously "someone" has the ear of the PM to bring up what is monetarily a very small topic.

C wrote on Apr 14^th, 2012 at 12:56pm:



The Telegraph mentions that the bloke who's trying to mount the £500,000 recovery is being funded by the Boultbee Flight Academy, who do the Spitfire course at Oxford - and the millionaire owner Steve Brooks. £500,000 is a fair investment when you're possibly selling them for £2-5m each at the end of it.

andy190 wrote on Apr 14^th, 2012 at 6:07pm:

Even I knew what a spitfire was when I was 5 and wasn't into planes.

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...