HMS Hornbill 1950's (RNAS Culham)

[texaxile]

My Dad recently gave me this photo Album from when he was stationed at HMS Hornbill in the early 50's. I'm unsure of the specific year but will find out.

Here are a few pics, he has more but we're currently going through them. Apologies for the poor quality, he was only a Writer at the time and used an old Camera my Grandad gave him from WW2!. We also have (somewhere) some pics from Manston when it was a base and my Grandad was Groundcrew there.

He has written the what planes are, I think they're a combination of Sea Furys and Sea fires with a Firefly thrown in for good measure.

I do have a question, one of the first pics looks as if the Aircraft is Taxiing with wings folded up, was this normal practice?.

[Eric Mc]

It was not unusual for naval aircraft with hydraulic wing folding systems to taxi with the wings folded. Normally the wings would move into the flat position as the aircraft taxi'd along.
Obviously, if the wings needed to be folded or unfolded manually, that would be done by ground/deck crew whilst the plane was stationary.

[aeropilot]

texaxile said:

My Dad recently gave me this photo Album from when he was stationed at HMS Hornbill in the early 50's. I'm unsure of the specific year but will find out.

They were taken some time between Feb 1950 and Sept 1953, as Sea Fury T.20 VX284 was written off on 5th Sept 1953.

The airworthy Sea Sury T.20 that flies with Navy Heritage at Yeovilton, is VX281.

Yes, as said, quite normal for FAA pilots to fold wings quickly after landing and taxi in, as that is the proceedure when landing on a carrier, for obvious reasons, so its a matter of standard drills being applied.
Having seperate drills for landing on land and landing on a carrier could lead to a pilot in a high stress situation with a carrier night landing perhaps forgetting to fold the wings as soon as catch the wire.

Edited by aeropilot on Wednesday 15th July 08:57