End of an era - The Vulcan has landed
 

The vulcan has flown today for the last time

http://www.vulcantothesky.org/news/7...-of-XH558.html

No more will we see this mighty plane swooping through the sky :(

Personally I'm gutted,

Both southern displays i attended this year purely to see her fly had the

displays cancelled for technical or other reasons

Live long and prosper XH558

Mart :( :cry:

Yes I bet the CAA are happy now they've stopped a bunch of civvy's hooning about the sky in such an iconic aircraft.

IMO the reasons given for grounding it could apply to any historic aircraft especially some of the WW2 aircraft still flying.

Such a shame, glad I was able to see it fly in peace, and play in one as a child at Blackpool. A real shame that legendary aircraft are leaving us, and in some cases, nothing to replace it that is like it.

It's a real shame that the final flight was such a low key thing. I appreciate that they didn't want thousands of people turning up at Doncaster Airport and blocking roads etc, but surely something more appropriate could have been planned.

I totally agree, I'm on their email list and received no notice that the very last flight was taking place:(

Its akin to Concorde being grounded on the anniversary 100 years of flight, just wish they had kept one flight ready same with the Vulcan.

But there was ultimately no need to replace it. The improvements in ICBMs did away with the need for strategic long range bombers.

I wonder if the level of donations will drop off now flights have ceased?


I curious, If visitor attendance around the perimiter was cited as one of the

issues that caused problems, surley having fast taxi days wil only compound

the issue with masses ofspectators wanting to see / hear the old girl??

Mart:wonder:

I meant planes in general, nothing to replace Concorde :thumb:

Nonsense, the Americans saw plenty of reason to carry their B52 programme on and that's about as long range bombing as you can get. They also have a replacement programme for the B52 which is many years away as they have no plans to end the life of the B52 any time soon.

Long range bombing and ICBMs do not provide the same role and are used for very different targets. Long range bombing is used predominantly to hit a large area i.e. carpet bombing where ICBMs are used for a precise single target strike not to mention the difference in explosives/warheads used.

The UK still has longe range bombing capability with the Tornado GR4 however it's payload is far more restricted than of the Vulcan's. It's down to cost savings and nothing more.

Heads up...

Tonight, 2nd Nov:

Inside Out, BBC One East Midlands, and Yorkshire, and Lincolnshire, at 19:30. And nationwide for 30 days thereafter on the iPlayer.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england...shire-34676403

Yeah but the Vulcan was heavily used as part of the UKs nuclear deterrent and once that went to submarines and ICBMs, the Vulcan became pretty unnecessary.

No arguing with that the issue is the Vulcan's could easily have been redeployed as a conventional long range bomber like it performed in the Falklands but cost savings put it out of service, even the mighty Tornado has struggled to keep it's place in the RAF simply because of budget cuts. It's mainly down to Iraq and assisting the US that the Tornado has survived the cuts.

If the Falklands conflict had occurred as little as ten years later than it actually did, the Black Buck operations would not have happened anyway. Sub launched cruise missiles would probably have been used instead, as would be the case if a similar conflict erupted today.

Channel 4 Sunday 29th ......last flight of the Vulcan bomber 90 minute special

Is this the doco with Guy Martin?

If so, how much of a win-win is that gonna be. :cool: Can't wait!

Yes looking forward to it myself.

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/g...-vulcan-bomber

Must-see telly. :)