Mixed messages

Submitted by Andrew Healey on Fri, 09/30/2011 - 10:31

... In so far that I've just got back from Helitech, a helicopter show that I cover next door. But it's held at Duxford Airfield in Cambridgeshire, the Imperial War Museum site that coincidentally was on my Rough Guides list this year. So I snuck out of the exhibition yesterday for a tour. The highlights are the two main display halls, AirSpace and the American Air Museum. Spectacular stylish spaces, stuffed to the sweeping rafters with aircraft -- so many of them that huge Lancaster and B52 bombers can easily be missed. From the TSR2, F4 Phantom and Blackbird spy-plane to a Wessex helicopter, my final RN conversion. Many suspended from the curved roofs, they form a fascinating insight and tribute to proud UK and US aviation heritages. Can't help thinking that our own history stops right here. Are we designing any aircraft in Britain at the moment? Neat little museum dedicated to airborne forces tucked off the side of AirSpace. Great son et lumiere and full of real guns.