New Mosquito RS712 footage on You.tube.com

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18 years 8 months

Posts: 301

Some very interesting footage has just been posted on www.youtube.com

It is some colour footage (probably VHS) showing Mosquito RS712 departing Strathallan in Scotland for Booker on 21.12.1984.

If you log onto you tube on www.youtube.com and type "Mosquito RS712" into the "Search" box you will find it straight away.

Colin

Original post

Member for

20 years 9 months

Posts: 18,353

Great footage :)

Those two fly-bys, with the sound up full, really get the goosebumps going!!

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24 years 4 months

Posts: 2,606

Aaaaaah DeHavilland (as Uncle Roger would say)

By crikey, that cheered me up from doing revision! :D

What happened to '712?

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24 years 4 months

Posts: 872

The Kermit Week's Mosquito is now displayed in a museum at Oshkosh, I believe.

I will stand corrected if advised otherwise.

Brian.

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20 years 2 months

Posts: 3,902

What a great sequence; slightly dodgy filming and then You Tube applies added grunge, but still a real gem, and thanks to the author for taking the trouble to show it.

Was that George Aird and Kermit Weeks being interviewed? The final wing-rocking pass is a real tear-jerker, and as the echo of the merlins faded over the Perthshire hills, everybody there knew that she really was gone for good.

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20 years 8 months

Posts: 7,036

Thanks to the cameraman and others to allow us to see it.Don't forget video cameras in those days were huge and heay compared to todays micro size ones.Lovely but sad footage.

Member for

20 years 7 months

Posts: 542

By the sound of the engines protesting, she didn't want to go. Shame we will never see her fly again over here. Great film though.

Martin

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19 years 8 months

Posts: 1,772

Thanks Colin for giving us the heads-up and thanks to the Cameraman for taking and sharing. It brings back so many memories of a wonderful aircraft, the beautiful setting of Auchterarder and George Aird who was a true gentleman and professional pilot.

It was quite emotional watching this as this Mossie is sadly lost to UK audiences and presently grounded, Strathallan is now merely a parachuting field and George has passed on. Seems amazing it was all only just over twenty years ago - it wasn't possible to bottle and keep it but this video is the next best thing - I liked the atmospheric camera work using the shadows on the hangar - nice touch.

Thanks again - one of the best items I've seen via the forum.

Member for

17 years 7 months

Posts: 112

Brilliant piece of nostalgia, and the flypast shots are very good for the video technology of twenty odd years ago. I haven't been back to Strathallan for many years. Shame there's no Mossies flying in the UK these days.

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24 years 4 months

Posts: 2,606

..or indeed anywhere :(

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20 years 2 months

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Mossie at North Weald

Found this link to another fine display of a Mossie at North Weald, if any aircraft deserves to be flying in the skies over the UK now is a Mossie. Think I 'll go and just watch 633 Squardon and turn up the speakers ! Great flying display by this pilot ! Youube is becoming a great site to view aircraft videos !

BlueNoser352 !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRGwfNrnWsc&mode=related&search=

Member for

19 years 9 months

Posts: 467

Ah, that Auchterarder sequence brings back memories...not of 1984 in Scotland, but a few months later at Mt.Hope, Ontario, watching Mr Aird do a similar beatup in 712's sistership RS709 on a bright, frigid February Sunday, en route from a nightstop at CWH to join the USAF Museum collection in Ohio.

(RS709 passed the previous night in the north bay of Hgr#3. Looking at my pix of her parked there rather gives me the shivers now: eight years later that half of that hangar went up in flames in the wee hours of a February morning...) :eek:

S.

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19 years 4 months

Posts: 1,317

Best video I have seen for years. I will try and get a copy on DVD if I can

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20 years 8 months

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Is this the same Mossie that suffered problems with the wood and glue due to the humidity?Thanks.

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21 years 1 month

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Is this the same Mossie that suffered problems with the wood and glue due to the humidity?Thanks.

Yes......despite the warnings :mad:

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17 years 6 months

Posts: 586

If heat and Humidity de-laminate the ply's, that might be why the Week's Mossie is not at his shop here in Florida, we have plenty of both! I have been over there about once a year and have not seen it there. :(

Member for

19 years 4 months

Posts: 5,197

What a great sequence; slightly dodgy filming and then You Tube applies added grunge, but still a real gem, and thanks to the author for taking the trouble to show it.

Was that George Aird and Kermit Weeks being interviewed? The final wing-rocking pass is a real tear-jerker, and as the echo of the merlins faded over the Perthshire hills, everybody there knew that she really was gone for good.


slightly dodgy filming?!!! you are so picky! :) it was evocative and a great tho' sad record.

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20 years 8 months

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Thanks Firebird,sorry to hear about her problems.

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24 years 4 months

Posts: 8,464

For the last time!

There is no problem with the wood on RS712! This Urban Myth gets repeated here all the time.

The aircraft flew into Oshkosh - that means it was perfectly airworthy when it got there. It has been kept in a climate controlled hangar ever since. We have enough Mosquito's in the UK that dont live in climate controlled hangars, and dont have problems with delamination. In fact, RS712 spent a number of years outside in the rain before being flown up to Strathallan, again with few noticeable problems.

However, RS712 has never had a fabric job since she was built, and the issues that are being reported are almost certainly the fabric lifting in places - a common occurrence.

Bruce