Today is the 100th birthday of the Royal Air Force, the world's oldest independent air force. Once upon a long ago, I served in the RAF. Why did I choose the RAF? Well, I got a bit too seasick for the Navy. And bullet dodging with the British Army wasn't something that appealed to me. … Continue reading Happy Birthday RAF
In the 1950s, Britain decided they needed some shiny new planes to deliver the country's nuclear bombs to carefully chosen locations east of Berlin. Britain was still a world superpower of sorts. In the air, she was still the superpower. So in keeping wih that status, the decision was made to put in orders for three … Continue reading Adios Vulcan
The UK is littered with airfields and RAF bases, past and present. Mostly past. The majority were opened at the outbreak of WW2 and closed again at the end of the war. There were no airfields terribly close to my current residency in Bournemouth. There were RAF Stations nearby, as you'd expect on the south … Continue reading Bournemouth Aviation Museum
The Mexile 