dave d

I keep trying to get a business trip to St Albans so I can get to go here.

Mosquito Aircraft Museum - de Havilland Aircraft Heritage Centre

I can't think of any other reason to go there though. My brother bought me a certified piece of wreckage from a crashed Mosquito for my birthday last year and I wrote to them with photographs, asking if they could tell me exactly what the component is but they never even responded to my email. I've just checked their website and there's no mention of the first flight anywhere.

I saw that. It's some sight, eh? And the sound of those synced Merlins when they reverb never gets old. It's never going to get shown over here but, all the same I'm chuffed that there is one that's now airworthy. One of the main arguments has always been the moulds for forming the fuselage were impossible to reproduce. Well, now they've got some, so let's see the deHavilland Trust at Salisbury Hall get their fingers out.

I've heard rumours of one being rebuilt in Australia for years but there's never been anything anywhere that I've been able to find to confirm it. I really thought it couldn't happen. It is so difficult to reproduce the structure of the mosquito without full factory resources and funding. What these guys have done goes far beyond rebuilding a stressed metal airframe. I can't explain it in a mere email. The bonded ply/balsa/ply laminate has to be formed around a mould, exactly like the halves of an air fix kit.

Words fail me.

I came out of retirement for one last wedding about three years ago. First one I'd shot digitally. I took 600 shots. The last one I did before, I think I shot about 90.
I almost got lumbered with another one last month. It's the bloody children of the people I did in the '80's.

Cracking shot Dave. One for the wall?