The Vulcan was an aircraft that was killed before its time. It could have provided the UK with long range bomber reach. The B-52 was built about the same time the Vulcans were. The Vulcan raid on the airstrip at the Faulklands islands is a prime example of the Vulcan's reach: the longest bombing flight ever @ 8,000 miles. Now that the English speaking & countries that have populations mainly from the UK our govts are meshing us together as a single force. Take Echelon for example.
jees these green eco people don't realise that the work and dedication that went into these aircraft when they were built, used and kept alive really ment something. This is an amazing angel, one of a kind, something special that astonishes people to watch it climb away into the skies. truely awesome. in fact, i think more money and polution goes into todays industry than ever, so green people, basically, shut up. have a nice day :)
@butlerproman How could our 1950s Lightning go from zero to 50K feet in one minute using your poxy US Allisons?...BTW..your first evrer P51D Mustang had an Allison in it eh? That was crap too. Which is why we gave you our Rolls Royce Merlin from our Spit....remember? Or are you not old enough?
@EnglishTurbines LOL. Load 'er up with enough JATOs and you might come close. :) Of course there's no comparison in performance between the P38 and the BAE - totally different eras. I just prefer the thrum of v-12s, Allison, Rolls, or other, in my ears to the scream of a jet. A Merlin powered P38 would definitely have been interesting. Alas, nobody apparently thought to do it. You Brits have made some fine aircraft over the years, no doubt.
@butlerproman Ah, sorry, you mean your prop P38 Lightning..as I recall that was using a supercharged pair of Allisons?...to make it better at altitude? A fine plane. Our similar bird was of course the Moskito...Light, plywood!.and fast ground attatck...in and out....boom....:) The P51D was also a fine plane..once it had a Merlin in it...or better still the Griffon.
lightning is my all time favourate aircraft. closely followed by two other cold war jets. the vulcan and phantom. going to thunder city to fly upto the edge of space is on my list to do in this lifetime. just gotta save up
EE lightning.... "the most feared interceptor during the cold war" George White said that. I want one. always have since i was 5 and saw one do it's thing fully gunned up over the north sea in 75 with two bear bombers and two mig 25's. they left sharpish back from whenz they came.
Agree, the British government of the day let the industry down massively by appeasing the government of the US; a sadly recurring phenomena. GB is the ONLY country to have fully repaid her war debts to the US. The US conversely, was the only protagonist during WW2 to make a profit and all at the cost of a lower loss rate, per capita, than Australia. When these facts are considered it's easy to dislike the opportunism, particularly when we get so much chest-beating from their descendants..
english electric lightning is my favourite jet and the best cold war interceptor ever built, the worlds first jet to super-cruise. still faster and faster climbing than most modern jets. even by today's standards an awesome aircraft, designed and first flew in the 50s, nuff said!!!
I can't help but think of the story of the TSR2 on it's test flight over the Irish Sea. The pilot, Bill Beaumont, lit the reheat on just one of it's twin engines & it left the Lightning chase plane, operating both reheats, behind! The British Aircraft industry created such fantastic machines & would have carried on doing so had it not been betrayed by a sell-out government. The Lightning was the last operational fighter in the RAF of totally British design and construction. Beautiful machine.
it was all down to our war debt to america. they used our inventions and ingenuity and took them as payment, TSR2 was a prime example, they did not want a more advanced and plainly better bomber than what they were designing, they also done it with our SR-53 interceptor which was much better than their F-104 and their X-1 supersonic experiment was a complete copy of our Saunders roe rocket plane and looks identical but we had to stop testing and give it along with all data to the americans
The X-1 was based on the Miles M-52. Although the airframe was a very similar design, the M-52 had a jet engine with reheat designed by Whittle, and was intended to take off from a runway, wheras the X-1 was rocket powered and dropped by a B-52 at 30.000 ft or something. I don't know if you can blame the Americans for favouring their own technology, though. I blame the idiot British politicians for NOT supporting ours :-(
some people will never understand what this plane means to some of us, keeping her where she belongs in the air is a great thing for aviation and long may it last, top bloke keep up the good work, if only i had the money!!
What we don't need is a bunch of green socialist have-nots telling this guy how to spend his money. It's HIS money, he can spend it how he wants. I hope he burns more fuel just to tick the tree hugging,granola eating anti-capitalists off even worse.
I personally dont have a problem with what this guy is doing, infact I admire his efforts to keep these old cold war planes flying ! if it wasnt for people like him, these planes ould more than likely be left to rot in an old scrap yard somewhere or be climbed all over in a museum, good on him i say ! and besides, he is keeping aive the respect and appreciation what these aircraft did for us today, ie, intercepting the Bears over our home airspace to protect us, people should be grateful !!!
seems like a good thing to me keeping the lightning flying, dont expect there will be many private owned 2nd generation supersonic jets unless there selling f15/f16, but that wont happen too much tech in them for joe public and several unnamed nations, and to compare a lightnig to a phantom is like comparing an f1 to a school bus, but i could be wrong can a phantom do mach 2.6 and can the public buy them ?
Ridiculous amount of fuel? They irregularly fly on short missions...it's not like there's squadrons of them blowing litres of Avtur per second.
This isn't about fuel economy...it's about the conservation of one of Britain's greatest and iconic aircraft - and in small doses...using some millionaires money...who cares about the fuel burnt.
Further, they're sponsored by Shell - so if Shell thinks it's a good idea...why shouldn't you?
Better uses for time and money? In that case ban F1 racing.
one of only 4 aircraft that can supercruise and keep accelerating upwards. the others are the typhoon raptor and su-47. but the lightning climbs fastest of the lot
yes, with today's technology. This was built in the 60's...back in the day's of the The Beatles...so to speak. And thank's to aircraft like the lightning...we have learned many aeronautical lessons.
Yes it's a challenge to maintain something that usually soaks up alot of unnoticed government funding re: maintanance but...Mike Beachy-Head and crew are dediacted to keeping the astonishing performance and sheer brute force of this aircraft alive...whatever it takes.
While at the same time helping to destroy the world's economy by consuming a ridiculous amount of fuel for absolutely no benefit. I get why it was designed back then and I'm glad it helped advance technology but in case you haven't noticed that was 40 years ago and the economy is not what was back then.. I just think there are better uses for your time and money than something like this.
Ridiculous amount of fuel? They irregularly fly on short missions...it's not like there's squadrons of them blowing litres of Avtur per second.
This isn't about fuel economy...it's about the conservation of one of Britain's greatest and iconic aircraft - and in small doses...using some millionaires money...who cares about the fuel burnt.
Further, they're sponsored by Shell - so if Shell thinks it's a good idea...why shouldn't you?
Better uses for time and money? In that case ban F1 racing
You realize that jets like this burn up to 200 gallons of Jet fuel an hour right? That's ridiculous. And as for preserving an icon, I think that's a great idea. I'm just not sure flying a plane that requires a complete overhaul for every hour of flight time is quite the the way to go about it. And it's not just their money they're wasting. How do you think Shell sponsors teams like this? They raise fuel prices... What a shocker. I'd wouldn't mind banning F1 at all.
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
But then again, banning F1 would piss off a lot more people than grounding a few old warbirds. Put it in a museum and be done with it. Find a newer, more efficient aircraft to get your adrenaline high in.
I guess what i'm saying is - that's what it takes to make the lightning operational - and considering you can't fly it in the UK - where i'm sure it would be funded lottery style much like Vulcan XH558 - these guys have taken up the challenge. Could we reach a compromise and suggest that after Thunder City's Lightnings run out of hours and do end up mothballed - they buy an F-4 Phantom for a similar 'twin-jet reheat' thrill?
for the amount of aircraft mike has it's hardly single handedly destroying anything.you could bleat on about the amount of passenger flights there are per day,how thirst guzzling ferrari's are etc,etc.
The Vulcan was an aircraft that was killed before its time. It could have provided the UK with long range bomber reach. The B-52 was built about the same time the Vulcans were. The Vulcan raid on the airstrip at the Faulklands islands is a prime example of the Vulcan's reach: the longest bombing flight ever @ 8,000 miles. Now that the English speaking & countries that have populations mainly from the UK our govts are meshing us together as a single force. Take Echelon for example.
nor888vast695 9 months ago
75 maint hours for each flight hour??????
PICLex 9 months ago
@PICLex 10 blokes, less than a days work!
Sterlingjob 6 months ago
@Sterlingjob
Haha nice, yeah putting it like that sounds like no prob :)
PICLex 6 months ago
if i had that much i would buy the tsr 2 and engines from museums and get it working again
geoffers158 11 months ago
If I had that much money, I don't know what I would buy, maybe an f-100 super sabre.
3ISAMAGICNUMBR 1 year ago
good choice of jet : )
aadrianlee 1 year ago
This has been flagged as spam show
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MakaylaQhyj 1 year ago
The only reason the Lightning has wings is to keep the nav lights apart.........
thunderclapharry 1 year ago 5
poor guy hes gone brock now!
jakem1900 1 year ago
@jakem1900 Brock Lesnar?
jonesy97 1 year ago
@jonesy97 no i ment broke as in the guy who has this lighting!
jakem1900 1 year ago
MiG-21 ON STEROIDS!
MiG0992 1 year ago
hey, can anyone tell me the music which plays at the end of this episode, i want it !!!
paparrazi1 1 year ago
Great, keep it up.
solarday 1 year ago
jees these green eco people don't realise that the work and dedication that went into these aircraft when they were built, used and kept alive really ment something. This is an amazing angel, one of a kind, something special that astonishes people to watch it climb away into the skies. truely awesome. in fact, i think more money and polution goes into todays industry than ever, so green people, basically, shut up. have a nice day :)
willbertdsgc 1 year ago
Comment removed
willbertdsgc 1 year ago
Nice! Never seen one of those in action before, only in model form. Wasn't this Britain's first supersonic fighter, or was there one before it?
rustyATV 1 year ago
что в нем такого интересного ?
Alexei55555 1 year ago
Comment removed
nittynorns 1 year ago
rich cunt.
BigDuke6ixx 1 year ago
AIRSHOW 2010 Danmark Airbase Skrydstrup 6 Juni
airplayer11 1 year ago
Impressive plane, but if I were rich, I'd take my Lightning with twin Allisons, thank you very much.
butlerproman 1 year ago
@butlerproman How could our 1950s Lightning go from zero to 50K feet in one minute using your poxy US Allisons?...BTW..your first evrer P51D Mustang had an Allison in it eh? That was crap too. Which is why we gave you our Rolls Royce Merlin from our Spit....remember? Or are you not old enough?
EnglishTurbines 1 year ago 3
@EnglishTurbines LOL. Load 'er up with enough JATOs and you might come close. :) Of course there's no comparison in performance between the P38 and the BAE - totally different eras. I just prefer the thrum of v-12s, Allison, Rolls, or other, in my ears to the scream of a jet. A Merlin powered P38 would definitely have been interesting. Alas, nobody apparently thought to do it. You Brits have made some fine aircraft over the years, no doubt.
butlerproman 1 year ago
@butlerproman Ah, sorry, you mean your prop P38 Lightning..as I recall that was using a supercharged pair of Allisons?...to make it better at altitude? A fine plane. Our similar bird was of course the Moskito...Light, plywood!.and fast ground attatck...in and out....boom....:) The P51D was also a fine plane..once it had a Merlin in it...or better still the Griffon.
EnglishTurbines 1 year ago 4
lightning is my all time favourate aircraft. closely followed by two other cold war jets. the vulcan and phantom. going to thunder city to fly upto the edge of space is on my list to do in this lifetime. just gotta save up
geohutchison 1 year ago
EE lightning.... "the most feared interceptor during the cold war" George White said that. I want one. always have since i was 5 and saw one do it's thing fully gunned up over the north sea in 75 with two bear bombers and two mig 25's. they left sharpish back from whenz they came.
wraith01mg 2 years ago
I hope he wakes up every morning and realises what a lucky bastard he is!
mrrmancunian 2 years ago
Agree, the British government of the day let the industry down massively by appeasing the government of the US; a sadly recurring phenomena. GB is the ONLY country to have fully repaid her war debts to the US. The US conversely, was the only protagonist during WW2 to make a profit and all at the cost of a lower loss rate, per capita, than Australia. When these facts are considered it's easy to dislike the opportunism, particularly when we get so much chest-beating from their descendants..
pete2778 2 years ago 3
english electric lightning is my favourite jet and the best cold war interceptor ever built, the worlds first jet to super-cruise. still faster and faster climbing than most modern jets. even by today's standards an awesome aircraft, designed and first flew in the 50s, nuff said!!!
fairclought7 3 years ago 8
I can't help but think of the story of the TSR2 on it's test flight over the Irish Sea. The pilot, Bill Beaumont, lit the reheat on just one of it's twin engines & it left the Lightning chase plane, operating both reheats, behind! The British Aircraft industry created such fantastic machines & would have carried on doing so had it not been betrayed by a sell-out government. The Lightning was the last operational fighter in the RAF of totally British design and construction. Beautiful machine.
pete2778 2 years ago 5
it was all down to our war debt to america. they used our inventions and ingenuity and took them as payment, TSR2 was a prime example, they did not want a more advanced and plainly better bomber than what they were designing, they also done it with our SR-53 interceptor which was much better than their F-104 and their X-1 supersonic experiment was a complete copy of our Saunders roe rocket plane and looks identical but we had to stop testing and give it along with all data to the americans
fairclought7 2 years ago 5
The X-1 was based on the Miles M-52. Although the airframe was a very similar design, the M-52 had a jet engine with reheat designed by Whittle, and was intended to take off from a runway, wheras the X-1 was rocket powered and dropped by a B-52 at 30.000 ft or something. I don't know if you can blame the Americans for favouring their own technology, though. I blame the idiot British politicians for NOT supporting ours :-(
SAHBfan 2 years ago
some people will never understand what this plane means to some of us, keeping her where she belongs in the air is a great thing for aviation and long may it last, top bloke keep up the good work, if only i had the money!!
lewdoom 3 years ago 34
what I would give to watch one actually fly again in the uk.When I worked on them at binbrook ,I so used to take it for granted.
steviep918273 2 years ago
What we don't need is a bunch of green socialist have-nots telling this guy how to spend his money. It's HIS money, he can spend it how he wants. I hope he burns more fuel just to tick the tree hugging,granola eating anti-capitalists off even worse.
34driver 3 years ago 44
oh youv got no worries there the lightning likes a drink lol
eatthisvr6 2 years ago
@34driver FUKIN A
vonkiser 9 months ago
I personally dont have a problem with what this guy is doing, infact I admire his efforts to keep these old cold war planes flying ! if it wasnt for people like him, these planes ould more than likely be left to rot in an old scrap yard somewhere or be climbed all over in a museum, good on him i say ! and besides, he is keeping aive the respect and appreciation what these aircraft did for us today, ie, intercepting the Bears over our home airspace to protect us, people should be grateful !!!
smileymike100 3 years ago 4
0-200mph in 12sec, thats twice as fast as a veyron!
pjholl 3 years ago 3
seems like a good thing to me keeping the lightning flying, dont expect there will be many private owned 2nd generation supersonic jets unless there selling f15/f16, but that wont happen too much tech in them for joe public and several unnamed nations, and to compare a lightnig to a phantom is like comparing an f1 to a school bus, but i could be wrong can a phantom do mach 2.6 and can the public buy them ?
creature147 3 years ago 2
envy is an awfull thing!!
fuzzdmedic 3 years ago 3
Ridiculous amount of fuel? They irregularly fly on short missions...it's not like there's squadrons of them blowing litres of Avtur per second.
This isn't about fuel economy...it's about the conservation of one of Britain's greatest and iconic aircraft - and in small doses...using some millionaires money...who cares about the fuel burnt.
Further, they're sponsored by Shell - so if Shell thinks it's a good idea...why shouldn't you?
Better uses for time and money? In that case ban F1 racing.
juzzi07 3 years ago
not to the extent that it can go supersonic nose up less than a minute after take off
wildwattsy 4 years ago
one of only 4 aircraft that can supercruise and keep accelerating upwards. the others are the typhoon raptor and su-47. but the lightning climbs fastest of the lot
wildwattsy 4 years ago
F-16C's can also do so with a thrust:weight ratio of 1.4:1 fully loaded
hellsacomin7 4 years ago
Yes but Lightnings were doing that in 1960.
saab900se 4 years ago
what a waste of money. 75 hours of matainence for every one hour in the air? there's so many better ways to spend your money.
hellsacomin7 4 years ago
Your gonna die one day so why not just enjoy life while it last =)
twinturbo1995 4 years ago
but honestly with the technology we have today you'd think we'd be able to come up with a more efficient design.
hellsacomin7 4 years ago
yes, with today's technology. This was built in the 60's...back in the day's of the The Beatles...so to speak. And thank's to aircraft like the lightning...we have learned many aeronautical lessons.
Yes it's a challenge to maintain something that usually soaks up alot of unnoticed government funding re: maintanance but...Mike Beachy-Head and crew are dediacted to keeping the astonishing performance and sheer brute force of this aircraft alive...whatever it takes.
juzzi07 3 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
While at the same time helping to destroy the world's economy by consuming a ridiculous amount of fuel for absolutely no benefit. I get why it was designed back then and I'm glad it helped advance technology but in case you haven't noticed that was 40 years ago and the economy is not what was back then.. I just think there are better uses for your time and money than something like this.
hellsacomin7 3 years ago
Ridiculous amount of fuel? They irregularly fly on short missions...it's not like there's squadrons of them blowing litres of Avtur per second.
This isn't about fuel economy...it's about the conservation of one of Britain's greatest and iconic aircraft - and in small doses...using some millionaires money...who cares about the fuel burnt.
Further, they're sponsored by Shell - so if Shell thinks it's a good idea...why shouldn't you?
Better uses for time and money? In that case ban F1 racing
juzzi07 3 years ago
You realize that jets like this burn up to 200 gallons of Jet fuel an hour right? That's ridiculous. And as for preserving an icon, I think that's a great idea. I'm just not sure flying a plane that requires a complete overhaul for every hour of flight time is quite the the way to go about it. And it's not just their money they're wasting. How do you think Shell sponsors teams like this? They raise fuel prices... What a shocker. I'd wouldn't mind banning F1 at all.
hellsacomin7 3 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
But then again, banning F1 would piss off a lot more people than grounding a few old warbirds. Put it in a museum and be done with it. Find a newer, more efficient aircraft to get your adrenaline high in.
hellsacomin7 3 years ago
I guess what i'm saying is - that's what it takes to make the lightning operational - and considering you can't fly it in the UK - where i'm sure it would be funded lottery style much like Vulcan XH558 - these guys have taken up the challenge. Could we reach a compromise and suggest that after Thunder City's Lightnings run out of hours and do end up mothballed - they buy an F-4 Phantom for a similar 'twin-jet reheat' thrill?
juzzi07 3 years ago
for the amount of aircraft mike has it's hardly single handedly destroying anything.you could bleat on about the amount of passenger flights there are per day,how thirst guzzling ferrari's are etc,etc.
steviep918273 2 years ago
Thats a days work for 10 blokes! All aircraft spend many hours in the hangar!
Sterlingjob 4 years ago
I own three planes and all they require is an annual. That's like 4 hours in a hangar for 500 hours in the air.
hellsacomin7 4 years ago
What a lucky sod!! That is surely the coolest plane ever built.... I want one :)
robnob2 4 years ago