Viscount Stephen Piercey comes to Brooklands - The Inside Story

Back in 1990 Brooklands Museum asked me to recover a Vickers Viscount named Stephen Piercey. When I agreed I had no idea how much this one job would come to mean to me, or prepare me for the wonderful people who I would soon meet and call my friends, as a result of the project.

Those people range from Stephens fantastic parents Ray and Patsy, through his incredible and diverse friends like Tom Singfield and Roger Hargreaves, their wives / partners.

It includes people who worked on the project like Mick Bates, Viscount Pilots like Jock Bryce and Colin Towle. Project leaders like Ron Brant and John Woodhouse. BAF personal like George Burton and Mike Sessions. Lastly my own team Alan, Brian, Ray and Tony and the girls Pat and Christine Lambert. There are many other who were also touched by this project and we all did our part.

What did we achieve? We saved and restored perhaps the best (and certainly the most connected with Brooklands) Viscount. We did it against the odds and with very little money. Most of all we did it with love and perhaps we did it for someone special, many of us never got to meet, but who meant so much to our new friends.

Andy Lambert
Summer 2009

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Vickers
• Viscount
• Stephen
• Piercey
• Brooklands
• Museum
• BAF
• G-APIM
• BOAC
• BEA
• Jersey
• Ray
• Patsy
• Milly
• Tant
• National
• Rescue
• Recovery
• Southend
• airport
• airfield
• aircraft
• aviation
• plane
• aeroplane
• propliner
• Dart

[andysvideo]

Thanks for all the kind comment guys.

Out of all the recovery jobs I have done over the years, this one was very special, because although I never knew Stephen I did meet his amazing family and his wonderful friends and their gratitude made it all worthwhile.

As you will see elsewhere in my Videos we did get to fly on Viscounts a few times and as has already been said, few things get close to the sound of a turbo in full song, at one thousand feet.

[Floppyblondehair]

What a labour of love .. That old girl deserved it !! Thanks to you and all the team

[SpencerJones01]

Absolutely wonderful video, like so many others here that you have done.

We are lucky to have you guys around saving our nobile past from being overtaken by foriegn built computer controled techno flying boxes!.

[SeanBreen]

I love the viscount , well done guys

[rodjames98]

Flew in her many times during the early eightees, I have fond memories of the old viscounts, what a pity so many ended up as scrap tho, APEX. BLOA. AOHM. AOYG. AOYN. AOYR etc! good work and a much needed restoration.

[irishimp2]

Wonderfully done! I remember still flying in one of these beautiful aircraft in Africa during the 1980's. There is nothing in this world that compares with the sound of a prop-driven aircraft! The love you gentlemen showed throughout the project is a testament to a generation who took pride in what they built!

[dianebarqs]

Thank you so much for the rescue. Viscounts have a special place in my heart, as my Father was with Capital & United....I still can hear the glorious sounds of startup.

[john289]

A labour of love...well done lads !

[awlcvl]

Absolutely fabuluos video, so nice to see a greatly restored classic British airliner preserved in such a great museum. My daughter and I have visited this Viscount several times now and we are always impressed by its condition. Well done!

[Copermill]

Nice historical video, I remember the visit to Southend. You can hear the Airport's ATC radar interference at some parts in the first section (every 4 seconds!).