RAF Museum located in London, UK I took the London ” Tube” to Underground station in Colindale on the Northern Line, a 10 minute walk along the road gets you into this fabulous air museum. My 1st visit was back in 2004 and since than the museum have added a lot of aircraft and exhibits. The entrance you see 3 huge hangers with a Hurricane wearing the brown green Battle of Britain colors and of course Spitfires. Also we can see a Bloodhound Surface to Air missile.
I would split my review by the Hangers we will be going through.
The 1st Hall is the Milestones of Flight
A time line of aviation milestones from the earliest flying machines to the 21st Century Eurofighter Typhoon test airframe ZH588. This new hall houses aircraft such as: de Haviland Mosquito, Eurofighter Typhoon, Hawker Tempest Target Tug, Early Prototype Meteor, P51D , ME262, Hawker Harrier GR3 and many more. Here are the exhibits in this great hall. Most notable on this Hall is the All black Typhoon.. the latest and greatest of RAF jet fighters. Also a rotating turn table of a finely restored P-51D Mustang. I was drawn to a Harrier Gr3 use in the Falklands Campaign also.
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The 2nd hall is the Bomber Hall
The Bomber Hall houses an impressive number of aircraft from the legendary Avro Lancaster to the mighty Avro Vulcan. There are also US bombers such as the B17 Flying Fortress. Aircraft displays include: Avro Anson,Avro Lancaster 1 ,Consolidated B24 Liberator,HP Halifax, HP Victor K2 (Cockpit) ,HS Buccaneer SB2 ,Panavia Tornado GR1b. There is a few fighters put in the bomber hall like the infamous BF-109G2 ( The Black six), 2 seater FW-190 and a Salamander ME-163. I was drawn to the Buccaneer and they show the array of weapons like the Tilad Designator pod, LGBs . This is followed by the Tornado GR1 in the euro grey green camo. on the side we see Alarm missile, JP-233 and other Tornado’s arsenal. There were 2 Lancaster one fully restored and another wreckage of what is left of a Lancaster … standing beside them makes you feel how big the bomber were. Another notable aircraft is a fully restore Fairly Battle bomber of the early WW2 era. Finally a Vulcan in its glory days …. with full complement of 1000lb bombs …
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The Historic Hangers is the one Hall I came all the way to photograph. A vast collection of British aircraft are held in this hall, including themed displays such as flying boats and helicopters. Some of the 30 aircraft displays include:BAC Lightning F6,Bristol Beafughter,Birstol Bulldog,de Haviland Chipmunk,de Haviland Vampire,F4 FGR2 Phantom,Hawker Hunter,Hawker Typhoon,Supermarine Stranrar,Westland Wessex HCC4,Chinook, P40,Canberra, Gloster Meteor Mk 4, Jet Provost, a few Ejection seats. Notably the F-4M FGR2 from 56th Squadron on steady alert with full AIm-9G and Skyflash and a Vulcan Gatling gun pod on the QRA alert status. A Tornado F3 was sitting right beside the Phantom. Also, Canberra Recon bird , Jet Provost trainer and the Lightning F6 in the Late barley grey camo. After photographing these aircraft I ran out of time as the museum is coming to its closing time. reluctantly I had to miss a lot of aircraft and the battle of Britain Hall which I will leave it for my next visit.
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The other section of this Hall spots a lot of Helicopters but I was disappointed not to see a Gazelle and Lynx ( 2 of my favorite British Helicopter) They also have a section on all the Sea going Bombers like the Beaufort, Beaufighters which have some really interesting subjects.
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I would like to thank my Lovely Wife Linda for letting this visit happen since she sacrifice on going to Stonehenge to be able to let me have a good 3 hrs in this museum and I think that is well worth it.
Excellent write-up and pictures to boot. You did a very good job of capturing the history of the RAF. Thanks for posting and sharing.