BA Battle of Britain Colour Scheme

[Trevatanus]

I SO hope this happens

[Simpo Two]

Fine by me, but far too non-PC to happen, eg 'jingoistic, racist, xenophobic, aggressive' etc.

[Tony1963]

I suppose it could be used to fly gammons to their haunts on the Med.

[67Dino]

That looks amazing, but surely the Lancaster colour scheme would work even better with such a big aircraft? There’s one in the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight so not entirely inappropriate.

[Eric Mc]

Lancasters have no real relevance to the Battle of Britain.

[yellowjack]

Tony1963 said:

Only fair that Lufthansa do a V1 themed aircraft for the Frankfurt to LHR route!
And maybe a Belsen themed one to Tel Aviv?

Edited by Tony1963 on Friday 28th February 20:05

Rather tasteless, fella. I'm guessing you haven't been to Bergen-Belsen? I don't think you'd be making light of it if you had...

In April 1945 Richard Dimbleby said:

I passed through the barrier, and found myself in the world of a nightmare. Dead bodies, some of them in decay, lay strewn about the road and along the rutted tracks [...] Inside the huts it was even worse. I've seen many terrible sights in the last five years, but nothing, nothing approaching the dreadful interior of this hut at Belsen. The dead and the dying lay close together. I picked my way over corpse after corpse through the gloom, until I heard one voice that rose above the gentle, undulating moaning. I found a girl. She was a living skeleton, impossible to gauge her age, for she had practically no hair left on her head, and her face was only a yellow parchment sheet, with two holes in it for eyes [...] Babies were born at Belsen, some of them shrunken, wizened little things that could not live because their mothers could not feed them. One woman, distraught to the point of madness, flung herself at a British soldier who was on guard in the camp on the night that it was reached by the 11th Armoured Division. She begged him to give her some milk, for the tiny baby she held in her arms. She lay the mite on the ground, threw herself at the sentry's feet and kissed his boots. And when, in his distress, he asked her to get up, she put the baby in his arms and ran off, crying that she would find milk for it because there was no milk in her breast. And when the soldier opened the bundle of rags to look at the child, he found that it had been dead for days [...] I have never seen British soldiers so moved to cold fury as the men who opened the Belsen camp this week, and those of the police and the RAMC, who are now on duty there trying to save the prisoners who are not too far gone in starvation.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/4445811.stm

Have a little respect. The Holocaust is not a subject to be made a joke of, or kicked around like a political football. And it has little relevance to a proposed paint scheme for a BA jet. This is about celebrating the achievement of the men of the RAF during what was a battle for the very survival of Great Britain. You might not like the idea, and to be honest I'm not sure it's a very good idea either on a civilian airliner , but you're going the wrong way about making that point, imho...

Edited by yellowjack on Saturday 29th February 01:44

[Tony1963]

I wasn’t making light of it. I was saying, in a roundabout way, that in my opinion painting an airliner in war colours is making light of the deaths of many. I don’t need lecturing over it, that’s for sure, but hey, say anything about the Holocaust and you risk being taken to court over it.

[Eric Mc]

From a purely practical point of view, camouflaging an airliner is not that great an idea. I can't think of any previous occasion where a civil airline had painted up one of its aircraft in camouflage.

[Tony1963]

Eric Mc said:

I can't think of any previous occasion where a civil airline had painted up one of its aircraft in camouflage.

So it worked then!

[MarkwG]

Tony1963 said:

Eric Mc said:

I can't think of any previous occasion where a civil airline had painted up one of its aircraft in camouflage.

So it worked then!

- if it's not a wind up, I'm also struggling to see the point: surely artwork actually representing the men who flew would be more appropriate? Perhaps the names of the pilots along the fuselage. For me, war is about the people, rather than the things.

[Starfighter]

I have to agree. That colour scheme is military and has no place on a civilian airliner.

I would love to see a Spitfire and a Hurricane on the side and I like the idea of the name of pilots involved.

[KrazyIvan]

Ok I am gonna go against the crowd and say it looks ridiculous......also does it not have a French flag on the tail and FROG on the side!

[warch]

Starfighter said:

That colour scheme is military and has no place on a civilian airliner.

I would love to see a Spitfire and a Hurricane on the side and I like the idea of the name of pilots involved.

I agree. Perhaps a life size graphic of a Spitfire or Hurricane on each side of the fuselage would look better and be less overtly militaristic*.

• Unfortunately years of misuse of Battle of Britain imagery by the far right and nationalists groups has rather poisoned the well for people using it for more innocent commemorative reasons.

[dr_gn]

coanda said:

You probably couldn't do this on a technical basis, because of the change in heat absorption.

Vinyl of a Hurricane, Spitfire (and preferably a Defiant and Blenheim) on the side, no problem. Maybe one of the more famous squadron codes, fine too.

Doubt it'll get past PR unfortunately.

Some RAF VC-10’s has full green/grey camo. Not sure if they were somehow restricted for altitude of flight duration - IIRC they might have been tankers.

[Simpo Two]

warch said:

*Unfortunately years of misuse of Battle of Britain imagery by the far right and nationalists groups has rather poisoned the well for people using it for more innocent commemorative reasons.

All the more reason to use it then - by which I mean ignore them and use it for the correct connotations. If any far-liberals get 'offended', too bad. But it won't be, for the latter reason.

[Riley Blue]

Eric Mc said:

From a purely practical point of view, camouflaging an airliner is not that great an idea. I can't think of any previous occasion where a civil airline had painted up one of its aircraft in camouflage.

Was this an operational scheme?

[Eric Mc]

dr_gn said:

Some RAF VC-10’s has full green/grey camo. Not sure if they were somehow restricted for altitude of flight duration - IIRC they might have been tankers.

The initial scheme adopted for the VC-10 tankers was grey and green upper surfaces. However, they quickly switched to an overall hemp scheme and then the later grey scheme.



The original VC-10 transport fleet had the rather nice white, grey with blue cheatline scheme -

[Eric Mc]

Riley Blue said:

Was this an operational scheme?

Yes.

During World War 2 UK civil airliners adopted the dark green/dark earth or ocean grey scheme. It was obviously only for the duration of hostilities and they did carry very prominent set of civil markings in an effort (not always successful) to deter them from being shot at by enemy aircraft.

[ecsrobin]

This isn’t from BA it’s some lads concept.

Kmacps91 on Instagram.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9BHEvJh_bw/?igshid=16...

[dr_gn]

Eric Mc said:

dr_gn said:

Some RAF VC-10’s has full green/grey camo. Not sure if they were somehow restricted for altitude of flight duration - IIRC they might have been tankers.

The initial scheme adopted for the VC-10 tankers was grey and green upper surfaces. However, they quickly switched to an overall hemp scheme and then the later grey scheme.



The original VC-10 transport fleet had the rather nice white, grey with blue cheatline scheme -

I know. I was responding to Coanda’s point about potential radiation issues with camo schemes on airliners.