A newly-restored Hawker Hurricane Mk. IIb (famous for its strike role in the Western Desert campaign of 1942-43), the only flying example of its type, made its first flight in England six weeks ago. Today, it had an accident.
A unique £1.5 million [about US $2.1 million] World War Two fighter plane crash-landed today just weeks after its owner completed a three-and-a-half-year restoration.
The Hawker Hurricane MK IIB - nicknamed the 'Hurribomber' - ended up on its nose after the undercarriage locked on touchdown.
Its pilot was unhurt in the crash. The extent of the damage to the plane - the only one of its kind still flying - is not yet known.
But at the very least, it is going to need a new propellor.
Witness William Page, who works at the neighbouring Essex Motorcross site, said: 'I watched the plane do a couple of fly-bys, and then it began its approach to land.
'Everything seemed to be going fine until it touched the ground - it looked as though the brakes suddenly locked on and I saw the nose hit the ground and the tail-end flip up.'
A spokesman for Hawker Restorations in Milden, Suffolk, said the owner had taken the plane for its first flight on January 27 and North Weald was its home airfield.
The spokesman said: 'It's quite a unique plane in as much as it is the only flightworthy hurricane bomber, it is set up with guns and potentially can carry two bombs. It is the only one like that flying in the world.
He added: 'Planes like this ... take about 30,000 hours to restore.
'We are not very happy. We are waiting to see the damage.'
More info and pictures at the link.
Ouch indeed! One hopes the damage isn't too serious. Fortunately, judging from the photographs, it's likely to be confined to the propeller, and perhaps the driveshaft and engine. Since the Hurricane used the Rolls-Royce Merlin engine, also used by many other World War II aircraft, there are plenty of them still available. The rather more scarce (and much more expensive!) airframe and wings still look perfectly sound, thankfully.
Peter
3 comments:
I am glad to see one flying, awkwardly or not; with a little luck he is only out the prop and the crank. Did you ever see the video of Alain de Cadanet's experience with the Spitfire flyby? It is worth a google search.
Jim
Ugh... Beautiful airplane, but that will be another 10k hours to repair, since the airplane will have to be disassembled back to the firewall and re-jigged to make sure everything is still in alignment. It will also mean a new engine.
Yeah, prop strikes are WAY BAD! The entire engine will need to be disassembled and inspected at the very least....
According to my War-Bird friends, airworthy engines are getting very difficult to come by....
Peter
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